Tuesday, July 29, 2008

The Infinite Stupidity of the Liztardian Mind

Those that deny the creator are the most miserable of all things. --Kepler Sings

[H]umanistic culture, insofar as it functions as an ideology and therefore as a religion, consists essentially in being unaware of three things: firstly, of what God is, because it does not grant primacy to Him; secondly, of what man is, because it puts him in the place of God; thirdly, of what the meaning of life is, because this culture limits itself to playing with evanescent things and to plunging into them with criminal unconscious. In a word, there is nothing more inhuman than humanism, by the fact that it, so to speak, decapitates man: wishing to make of him an animal which is perfect, it succeeds in turning him into a perfect animal; not all at once... but in the long run, since it inevitably ends by “re-barbarizing” society, while “dehumanizing” it ipso facto in depth. --F. Schuon

Man is not only capable of knowing the Absolute, but he was made to know it. As such, not only may he ascend to the eternal, the sublime, the godly, but he may sink beneath himself into a kind of infinite stupidity that in turn opens the floodgates to evil. For if man does not know what is ultimately true, he cannot act in accordance with virtue, at least in any essential, ontologically grounded way. Thus, infinite stupidity goes hand in hand with infinite evil.

For example, the reason we stand in awe of our military heroes is that they risk nothing less than an infinite sacrifice, for to give one's life for the Good is not susceptible to any human calculus. Likewise, to take an innocent life is an evil that can never be reconciled, at least on the human plane. A murderer with even a shred of human decency would ask to be put to death, because he has destroyed something infinite and infinitely precious.

Although it may be "in a manner of speaking" in order to emphasize the point, Jesus says that the one sin that will not be forgiven is blasphemy against the Holy Spirit. Why should this be so? I believe because in essence it undermines the very possibility of grace, redemption, and salvation, and attributes to man -- or to "matter" -- what can only come from the Creator. It is to turn the cosmos upside down, always and forever, rendering Man spiritually lost for all time.

In other words, to sin against the Holy Spirit is essentially to murder God, and how can that be forgiven? For this is to murder the Sovereign Good, the very source of truth, beauty, virtue, perfection, wisdom, harmony, holiness, light, radiance, the sacred. Furthermore in annihilating God, one commits the genocide of Man as such. And none of this can be accomplished unless it is under a cloak of pride, hubris, and cosmic narcissism.

At First Things there is an essay by Joseph Bottum (TW: Michael Egnor) that speaks to the infinite stupidity of the Liztardian mind and its gleeful vandalism against the human station. The essay is about the philosopher José Ortega y Gasset, whose most famous Vicious and Unhinged Rant Against Queeg was The Revolt of the Masses, which I read long ago. In it he discusses a new psychohistorical phenomenon, the "mass man," who "is not just an ordinary man, and he is not associated with any particular class. He is, rather, a product of European historical development, a kind of human being born for the first time in the nineteenth century."

Thus, we appreciate the immediate irony that the Liztardian queegling is most assuredly a product of "evolution," except that it is a downward evolution -- or devolution -- away from what man was intended to be, in the direction of matter, of infinite stupidity, of "anti-wisdom," or (-n).

Indeed, without the vector provided by the Absolute, Darwinism can only produce the lateral mutation of this or that, but nothing of eternal value. There can be no standard of excellence, nothing timelessly true or beautiful. Obviously nothing can be higher than anything else, which is precisely why postmodernity is necessarily the cult of mediocrity in which every Queeg is "entitled to his opinion," no matter how banal and childlike.

To assault the Holy Spirit is to decimate the hierarchy that allows the mind to discern the infinite gulf between a Meister Eckhart and Masterless Liztard. So one might say that Queeg's puny misosphy is entirely self-serving, as it a priori places him on the same plane as those who infinitely surpass him, like a child who has no conception of adulthood (except perhaps as something from which to reflexively rebel). To paraphrase Schuon, the Raccoon is "one who transcends himself and loves to transcend himself," while the worldly Liztard "remains horizontal and detests the vertical dimension." Ho!

Again, this attitude is both an effect and cause of Cosmic Narcissism. As Bottum explains, "The mass man lives without any discipline"; he "possesses no quality of excellence," and "demands more and more, as if it were his natural right, without realizing that what he wants was the privilege of a tiny group only a century ago. He does not understand that technological wonders are the product of an intricate cultural process for which he should be grateful. 'What before would have been considered one of fortune’s gifts, inspiring humble gratitude toward destiny, was converted into a right, not to be grateful for, but to be insisted on...'"

In short, Ortega understood "that the nineteenth century created the kind of human being who would become the dominant social force in the twentieth century." He was concerned -- and rightfully so -- that this whole process would end in "the total disappearance of man as man and his silent return to the animal scale." Those with eyes to see are already witness to this re-barbarization of Man. The infinite stupidity of the Koslings and Queeglings is but a symptom.

Both of these deviant cults of ignorance "lack of even a rudimentary understanding of culture," which is to say, "the set of ideas, motives, and religious truths that gave birth to civilization." The cult member is "oblivious to the fact" that modern science is solidly rooted in Judeo-Christian metaphysics. Once in place, science can obviously continue. However, once severed from the roots that gave birth to it, it can be no different than when behavior is severed from consciousness of virtue. Being that man is "suspended," as it were, between God and matter, he does not remain stationary. If he does not ascend toward the nonlocal attractor, then he tends to fall in the other direction, toward dispersion, fragmentation, and absence of any true center.

Along these lines, Schuon writes that "We do not deny that evolution exists within certain limits, as is indeed evident enough, but we do deny that it is a universal principle, and hence a law which affects and determines all things, including the immutable; evolution and degeneration can moreover go hand in hand, each then occurring on a different plane. However that may be, what has to be categorically rejected is the idea that truth evolves, or that revealed doctrines are the product of an evolution" (emphasis mine).

In a way, that sums up the argument against the cult of Queeglings. Evolution cannot be a "universal principle," for nothing absolute can ever be derived from pure relativity. Clearly, change cannot affect the changeless, and if there is no vertical realm of absolute truth, then we would have no way to discern the difference between evolution and devolution, progress and degeneration. And truth surely cannot be a product of evolution. Rather, it is realized through evolution. Again, to the extent that human beings may know truth, then they have ipso facto either transcended it or realized its end -- which amounts to the same thing.

In this sense, the Raccoon obviously believes in real evolution, not the anemic, watered down version of the Liztards. As always, we go the whole hog, and say that Man is the pinnacle of evolution, which cannot be surpassed, being that he is capable of knowing the infinite, the absolute and the eternal, and none of these things can be exceeded. Rather, we can only fall short of them, like the devolutionary cult of clueless Liztards. Man's plight and his saving grace is that he is not fixed but an evolutionary possibility. A spiritually unevolving man who is "frozen" and encased in matter is a deviant monster.

There is a great deal of talk these days about “humanism,” talk which forgets that once man abandons his prerogatives to matter, to machines, to quantitative knowledge, he ceases to be truly “human".... Humanism is the reign of horizontality, either naïve or perfidious; and since it is also -- and by that very fact -- the negation of the Absolute, it is a door open to a multitude of sham absolutes, which in addition are often negative, subversive, and destructive.... What is human is what is natural to man, and what is most essentially or most specifically natural to man is what relates to the Absolute and which consequently requires the transcending of what is earthly in man. --F. Schuon

103 comments:

Anonymous said...

Ah, first on the scene, and a troll to boot. Life is good.

Bob writes: "A murderer with even a shred of human decency would ask to be put to death, because he has destroyed something infinite and infinitely precious."

I would sy, death is the easy way out. It is harder to work off the debt in the here and now. The sincerely repentant murderer would ask for long life, of the most subtle and spiritually painful kind.

Secondly, your attack on Lizardom is well taken and eloquent, but betrays an overestimation of man and an underestimation of God.

God can have any Lizard he wants, at any time. He allows Lizards free and destructive play but only up to a point, and then reins them in.

The point is, Lizards are part of a controlled chaos well managed by the Lord and need not be a source of angst (at least to the point that your tone indicates).

The question is ask is: What are Lizards for? What purpose do they serve? What kind of thing gets done by their scaly paws?

Contemplate this and the picture snaps more into focus, or it should.

Anonymous said...

We have no response to someone who does not believe in free will, and who thinks that human falsehood and evil are actually arranged by the God. The misunderstanding is too deep.

Susannah said...

Bob, reading your essay reminded me how infrequently words like "wisdom," "courage," "gratitude," "humility," "obedience," "providence," and the like, are heard from modern or postmodern lips.

I suppose we should be glad of that, for that would probably mean the words were being completely disassociated from their true definitions.

Much in the way "choice," "marriage," etc. have been.

Gagdad Bob said...

If there is no goal, you can't fall short of it. That's the one big payoff for Liztards and Koslings: Darwin loves them just the way they are.

Susannah said...

"For example, the reason we stand in awe of our military heroes is that they risk nothing less than an infinite sacrifice, for to give one's life for the Good is not susceptible to any human calculus. Likewise, to take an innocent life is an evil that can never be reconciled, at least on the human plane. A murderer with even a shred of human decency would ask to be put to death, because he has destroyed something infinite and infinitely precious."

Very well put, Bob.

"The voice of your brother's blood is crying to me from the ground."

Anonymous said...

I recently read Pierre Teilhard de Chardin's "The Phenomenon of Man". That's some evolutionary reading for Lizards and Rays.

Wait! I think I'm hearing Chardin's voice in my head right now, he wanna say something about the upcomming election...

- "Listen, Obama just want change for change's own sake, that is no evolution. We all know that for change to be a necessity, it has to be towards something better. Evolution is change with an alpha and an omega. Vote for evolution, not change!"

Anonymous said...

Susannah,
Here http://inspire.contactinfo.net/v5_i151/story_1.htm is a guy that talks about grattitude and wisdom.

Ray Ingles said...

A murderer with even a shred of human decency would ask to be put to death, because he has destroyed something infinite and infinitely precious.

I thought the whole thing about eternal life is that humans can't destroy what's "infinite and infinitely precious"?

Anonymous said...

It's weird, you'd think a conservative would have a soft spot for tradition, for receiving from his forefathers stuff that is important - a way of life, a discipline, a worldview.

But these guys want to be constructed out of points of knowledge or "talking points", a perfect many, with no relation between them. It's weird. There's no unity there, just a heap of points. It's like Spiderman fighting the Sandman, if there's no connections, what can you do? You can't reason or show inconsistency, you just go right through that infinite set of points with no effect.

Well when you turn away from the One to adore the many, I guess stuff gets weird in a hurry.

Gagdad Bob said...

There is a book by Beatrice Bruteau called Evolution Toward Dvinity that reconciles Teilhard and Aurobindo. At the moment, I can't remember whether or not I liked it... If I didn't, it was probably because for me it was more or less a review of what I already know.

Ray Ingles said...

"We do not deny that evolution exists within certain limits, as is indeed evident enough, but we do deny that it is a universal principle, and hence a law which affects and determines all things, including the immutable..."

Can y'all point to someone who thinks that evolution "determines all things"? Actual quotes of them saying so would be most helpful.

I can see someone claiming that it's a "universal principle" in the sense that 'reproduction plus mutation' will inevitably result in evolution, but that's not the same as evolution determining everything...

Anonymous said...

Ray:

If you are reminding us of the truism that there is "none good but the One," then we cooncede your point.

Anonymous said...

Ray:

If you are reminding us of the truism that Darwinists don't actually believe their reductionistic bullshit, then we cooncede your point.

jp said...

Ray says:

"{various statments over the past few weeks/months that will not be repeated here because of a lack of any desire on my part to go find such statements)"

Is your position best summarized that everything is randomly deterministic?

NoMo said...

You're closing in on it, Ray. Fasten your seatbelt, it's going to bumpy ride (but exhilarating!).

NoMo said...

Ray - Just ask. I do constantly.

James said...

Thanks Bob for taking the time to tell the truth. Thanks to all the Raccoons who through your thoughts and comments opened my mind and allowed God to come in. I'm glad to be a recovering humanist and ex-lizard. Things make so much more sense now. This post touched on where I was compared to where I am. I really enjoy the Raccoon antics. Lizards just sit there and try to find ways to eat you. Not funny at all.

Ray Ingles said...

Petey - No, I'm just saying that it would help if you could point to a Darwinist "in the act" of being Darwinistic. Say, actually saying what y'all say that they say.

Anonymous said...

If Darwinists agree with us, then we have no quarrel.

Anonymous said...

Which would make Dupree very sad, because he likes to argue.

jp said...

Here's a random comment I found on The Oil Drum comment section of some random article. Granted, it's in the context of a discussion of overpopulation, but it's a fun comment:

http://www.theoildrum.com/node/4345

"You ask: "...what is the root cause of overpopulation? Religion."

I could not disagree more. You might as well blame "culture" itself, for that is all religion is.

You'd just as well ask: "What is the root cause of religion?" To which the answer is "biology, sex, fecundity, and death"

In fact my question is a much better question, I would humbly suggest.

Because people are animals they have evolved to reproduce efficiently, to derive pleasure from sex, to derive pleasure from children, and all to avoid the full consequences of personal mortality.

Religion and all culture helps organize all that mad shtuping and birthing and dieing so that humble apes can experience some modicum of meaning as the are born, blossom, impregnate, become impregnated, give birth, nurture a few young and die. Our brains force us to try to make sense of this mad dash from womb to grave.

The very idea that "thinking" affects behavior is a very religious idea, and one that I would question. It is behavior that leads to thoughts... to religious ideas and to religions. And the things that lead to behaviors are the material conditions of life... the availability of resources, food, land, etc.

Religions do nothing but put a belated stamp on what we are and what we do. If you would change Man, change the circumstances of his life and his religion will follow rapidly behind. Religion is but the tail on the dog of the human condition.

Witness for example the disappearance of Christianity in Europe. It can happen in a moment, as the world changes. In contrast, fighting religion directly, as if this religious idea or that matters for people's behavior seems extremely foolish. Religions express underlying realities... they rarely determine them."

mushroom said...

Ray, you're always quoting yourself. I think you've explained to us many times that science has all the answers or will have eventually leaving no room for God. If you go back and look through your posts, I think you will find words to that effect. Most of us have better things to do.

mushroom said...

...Jesus says that the one sin that will not be forgiven is blasphemy against the Holy Spirit. Why should this be so? I believe because in essence it undermines the very possibility of grace, redemption, and salvation, and attributes to man -- or to "matter" -- what can only come from the Creator. It is to turn the cosmos upside down, always and forever, rendering Man spiritually lost for all time.

Well put. Man cannot deny the Holy Spirit without denying himself as he truly is. You can get around it for a while -- most of us have -- and I suppose, even if one is as brilliant as Christopher Hitchens, one might stay drunk enough to deny it to the end.

Van Harvey said...

Great post, but rushed, please forgive drive-by commenting (duck)

aninnymouse said" The sincerely repentant murderer would ask for long life, of the most subtle and spiritually painful kind."
aka living as a liztard

ray said "Can y'all point to someone who thinks that evolution "determines all things"? Actual quotes of them saying so would be most helpful."

Here you go ray, no time here, if I remember it rightly it's chock full of quotes, get your own :
Dennet on Consciousness

mushroom said...

#1 Anonymous says: The point is, Lizards are part of a controlled chaos well managed by the Lord and need not be a source of angst (at least to the point that your tone indicates).

I don't know. It seems to me Dear Leader is working along the lines of Jesus speaking in Matthew 23, pronouncing the "woes" on the religious lizards of His day.

You say brood of vipers; I say lizards. Tomato; tuh'mater.

Anonymous said...

what about Mayr?

http://www.aps-pub.com/proceedings/1454/409.pdf

Last paragraph has the summary.

"He was responsible for the replacement of a world
view based on Christian dogma by a strictly secular world view."

"Almost every
component in modern man’s belief system is somehow affected by one
or another of Darwin’s conceptual contributions."

A variation on it is Susan Blackmore, if I read it correctly.
http://www.susanblackmore.co.uk/

Gagdad Bob said...

John Derbyshire at NRO weigh in on Queeg:

"I have banged on here at NRO about the corroding dishonesty of the Intelligent Design project, arguing that it arises from the very nature of the thing: pretending, in hopes of winning the occasional church/state lawsuit, to be one thing (a pure-science research institute), while in fact being a different thing (a Christian-proselytizing lecture agency, pressure group, and publisher). There is nothing wrong with being either of those things: the corruption stems from being the one while pretending to be the other. Not only is this dishonest in itself, it does no good to either cause."

First of all, NRO, which largely has a Catholic sensibility, is to be commended for allowing an atheist crackpot among its ranks, unlike Queeg, who brooks no dissent.

Secondly, one could easily rewrite Derbyshire's inanity to read of:

"the corroding dishonesty of the Liztard project, arguing that it arises from the very nature of the thing: pretending, in hopes of winning the occasional church/state lawsuit, to promote one thing (an interest in pure science), while in fact being a different thing (a stupidly materialistic, antagagnostic blog with a radically secular agenda)."

Anonymous said...

Another masterful column.
Thank you Master Raccoon.

But they will not understand because they don't want to understand.
Because in "understanding" it is implied the UNDER - standing, and they want to stay up on top.

Like monkeys on a tree ? LOL !
A devolutionary problem, indeed.

Sherab

Warren said...

Speaking of free will....

Is there another major stream of human thought and belief besides the Judaeo-Christian one that affirms that human beings have free will? Modern secular inhumanism obviously does not ("frisky dirt is all there is"). Islam does not ("the will of Allah is all there is"). Hinduism, in its "higher" and more philosophical forms, does not ("Brahman is all there is"). Mahayana Buddhism does not ("all is Emptiness").

Everyone but philosophers takes free will for granted. But if it exists, then it is a supernatural miracle quite as astonishing and hard to believe as, say, the Resurrection or the Virgin Birth.
If it does not exist, then the universal illusion of it is just as astonishing and inexplicable, and is even harder to believe.

Either way, a Mystery.

Anonymous said...

Bob said:
"If I didn't, it was probably because for me it was more or less a review of what I already know."

And since I most definitly do not know all that already, I will check that one up. Have not really got in to Aurobindo (got "The Adventure of Consciousness but far from finished it), it might work as a "bridge" for me, thanks Bob!

Warren said...

"First of all, NRO, which largely has a Catholic sensibility, is to be commended for allowing an atheist crackpot among its ranks, unlike Queeg, who brooks no dissent."

The only thing Derb has done is to take his Anglican heritage to its logical conclusion. (I say this in sadness, as an ex-Anglican.)

NRO also allowed an orthodox Jew to give a scathingly negative review to Dinesh D'Souza's recent book of Christian apologetics (which I thought was pretty good, BTW). I thought that was some admirable chutzpah on their part.

Ray Ingles said...

Mushroom - "Ray... I think you've explained to us many times that science has all the answers or will have eventually leaving no room for God."

You misunderstand my point, unfortunately. There's two parts to it. The simpler one is that, while there might be things that will not ever be amenable to scientific inquiry, strong declarative statements about what they are seem unwarranted. There's a long history of such things that have turned out not to be so inaccessible.

The second point is more fundamental. How can we know what we can't know? Most religions have things that are "mysteries" or "ineffable" or "beyond human comprehension". But how do you tell the difference between something you can't ever understand and something you don't understand... yet?

None of that implies God's excluded. Indeed, I've mentioned a couple times a potential test that'd demonstrate the existence of a soul, or at least something beyond the brain.

Gagdad Bob said...

And they routinely publish unhinged voices from the dreaded Discovery Institute, such as the shill George Gilder.

julie said...

Warren,
re. the perception of free will, I came across this interesting article the other day. Fatalism in action (or is that inaction?). I am honestly baffled that they even bother trying to do anything (and I mean that literally - why get out of bed if you believe God's going to do it for you when He feels like it?). But of course, to follow that line of belief to its logical conclusion, one must first be capable of actual logic, which appears to be in mighty short supply.

Anonymous said...

You get out of bed because God would hate himself if you didn't.

Gagdad Bob said...

Big earthquake! I'm guessing 6.1.

julie said...

Ray, that's your problem. You want to put everything to a test, to have it verified scientifically. When the actual answer to the test is... you. And me. And everyone else that has ever lived or will live. The proof is literally everywhere - but it is never enough to satisfy you. It can't be. Because you've already made up your mind that it's not what it is.

The dots are the picture Ray, but the picture is much, much more than just the dots.

julie said...

Yikes, Bob - you were pretty close, initial reading says 5.8.

Anonymous said...

Preliminary magnitude 5.8, but it was a little higher according to my sphincter scale.

robinstarfish said...

Those that deny the creator are the most miserable of all things. --Kepler Sings


heart of vital man
replaced with heart of a beast
nebuchadnezzar

jp said...

Julie says:

"Ray, that's your problem. You want to put everything to a test, to have it verified scientifically. When the actual answer to the test is... you. And me. And everyone else that has ever lived or will live. The proof is literally everywhere - but it is never enough to satisfy you."

The existence of people are simply not going to do the trick for Ray. Ray wants something he can replicate in a laboratory, preferably in the realm of neurosurgery, I expect.

I can probably come up with a test. Ray, I can't remember what your test is. Would you refresh my recollection?

Ray Ingles said...

Van - I'll probably check out the Dennett thing on the bus ride home, but then my wife and I are going on a date, so I won't be responding until tomorrow.

Phil, I wouldn't be quite so sure about Mayr. Saying that "Darwin's philosophical thought" "profoundly affected" "the thinking of every modern Western man" is not the same thing as saying evolution "determines all things"... especially since he also claims Darwin led to the rejection of "determinism".

Erasmus, I think you may actually have found one. Of course, "there is no cause so noble it will not attract some kooks." I don't blame y'all for the young-Earth types, after all.

Anonymous said...

I would like to address this breathtaking stupidity in the form of a bumper sticker thought: "Evolution does not preclude a belief in God. Belief in God does not preclude a belief in Evolution."

Maybe this will address the questions of some of those that commented on my observations in the last thread regarding the worship of the Creator. First, as it has been done many times when most of us talk of evolution, we are addressing the ridiculous, unproven, miserable falsehoods of Macro Evolution, not Micro Evolution and adaptability.

The list of NO evidence for Macro Evolution is nearly endless. Any metric evolutionists have posited since Darwin have never been met, no transitory species, no gradual development of the inverted hierarchal tree, from phylum to class and down to species.

Every form appeared suddenly in the pre-Cambrian rocks, to such an extent that one of the most learned Darwinists of the 20th century (Gould) invented the theory of “punctuated equilibrium,” essentially an even greater stupidity than original evolution.

Reducing to essence: this idiotic theory is saying the mathematically undefined “force” of evolution can speed up or slow down, willy nilly to effectually create species whole cloth in such short geological time as that no transitory species become fossilized. It is as if physicists having problems explaining the nature of light were to suddenly propose that electrons can have different masses at different times, or light can travel at different speeds during different cosmic ages.

No serious scientist would ever accept such theories in any other branch of science except evolutionary science which is filled with such contradictions, or outright tautologies. Only stupid minds can believe such nonsense, you must first be brainwashed by cultural Marxism to the point where you no longer know the meaning of words. Words just become toys, for your use, (See rap culture, or liberal politicians for reference) not vehicles of revelation, knowledge and ultimately the very package in which truth is delivered.

Most in liztardom know far less of this theory than many posting here at Bob’s site. Yet they will argue for this theory more violently than medieval monks would argue Catholic doctrine. None can explain, not the most accomplished evolutionary scientist, down to their ignorant sycophants produced by our Godless schools, how such things as symbiotic relationships can arise in nature without an outside pre-planning intelligence, let alone all the parasitic relationships (thousands) found in nature.

Worse than this is the nominal and stupid Christian who knows nothing of what they believe as a professing Christian, and know nothing of evolution, and so feeling the pressure to be accepted by the popular culture they will say such nonsense that God does create…He just does it via evolution.

In other words God is so lame, so hidebound by process…He actually serves process, He must create via process. That God created the material universe via physical process over immense periods of time is not in doubt, and only goes to convey the eternal nature and majesty of God. His precision in setting the constants of the universe is a lifetime study in itself.

But when it comes to life, God is explicit, in that His hand is directly involved, and even more explicitly He is the personal creator of man. And last, but most importantly for a Christian believer the doctrine of original sin is for the Christian, not possible to abrogate, no matter if 10,000 scientists in pristine white smocks scream in unison for a thousand years that we descended from apes…it is not possible on spiritual grounds, nor physical grounds (and true science will eventual vindicate that view) that man must have come from an original set of parents, otherwise we cannot be saved by one man, as the Bible in mathematical precision states it: Through one man (Adam) sin came into the world, therefore by one man (Jesus) sin can be removed.

If we descended from tribes of apes, then there would have been need for each of us to have a one to one redeemer...a cruelty unimaginable as God would have to have had billions of sons that each died for the billions of us. And why such? Because God set the parameters of all law both spiritual and physical, and that law demands death for sin…He would cease to be God IMO, if he waved a wand and abrogated his own law by whim or necessity. In other words, and this is true genetically also, we all descended from one set of parents, who were perfect in mind and body…and genetically we were all in those parents (We were in the garden).

In a mystical way we all made the decision to disobey God. In other words all of us having been in Adam (and Eve) they were perfect, none of us are since the fall, damage to DNA has occurred, damage to the human psyche has occurred we are all less than our original parents, as so do we think in our unperfected state we could have resisted temptation? No…every man on earth continually rejects a relationship with God (the unseen) for a relationship with the seen (Eve). Men constantly sell out the spiritual for the carnal. And women continually listen to their egos and entertain vanity and deception.

To become spiritual is to reverse that process and to me that must be our return to the Creator, the worship of the absolute, the first cause, the unwavering, the center, only that will quench this hunger this loneliness this sense of something wrong.

Evolution is a salve to carnality, to remaining anesthetized to our depraved state, our spiritual hollowness. Evolution is the coward’s way of defying God, not even as a defiant and hateful atheist, who is at least honest in his hatred of God.

No the evolutionist is a hypocrite, living in an obviously created universe and inventing constructs of mind to deny the existence of that creator, or maybe worse, to minimize His power and set it at a distance from himself, least he awake and begin the long agonizing trek back to his estranged love.

Ray Ingles said...

Erasmus - The test, or at least the basis of how to make one, is here.

Ray Ingles said...

Kepler - How will "true science" explain endogenous retroviruses? (Sorry, I couldn't resist. I hereby promise not to take up further time on this blog arguing about the evidence for evolution per se.)

Anonymous said...

Ray, you're right on Mayr, it is different. I'll have to dig around some more.

Anonymous said...

Too deep for His Liztardness. You might want to use fewer polysyllabic words next time!

mushroom said...

Ray, I don't misunderstand you. I mock you.

NoMo said...

Kepler sang it all. Not only does the song have the full support of systematic Biblical theology, but there is just no better explanation for REALITY.

Once again - everyone knows there is a God...believing it is the problem.

Anonymous said...

That's the spirit, Mushroom! Let the dead bury the tenured, and may the last Kosling be strangled with the entrails of the last Queegling! (metaphorically speaking)

Anonymous said...

Kepler,
Your points remind me why I always get a little squeamish when Bob says something like this, "The cult member is "oblivious to the fact" that modern science is solidly rooted in Judeo-Christian metaphysics", and then follows with a quote from Schuon, who, would have categorically disagreed with the previous statement. Certainly, certain aspects of modern scientific discoveries owe much to Judeo-Christian principles, but it is also this "context" where we see much of the Satanic ideas of the modern world emerge fully--secularism, Marxism, and, scientism (most especially evolutionism). Schuon and Guenon attributed this "development" to a lack of Christian metaphysic, as the entire philosophical basis of most of modern science is simply put, anti-Christian, especially evolution.
Schuon clearly stated that transformist evolution is a metaphysical impossibility, and, therefore, completely disagreed with de Chardin, Vivekananda, and Aurobindo on these points.

Gagdad Bob said...

Let us just say this about that: our right brain sides with Schuon, but our left brain sides with Aurobindo.

Anonymous said...

Ray

You want to play the continual game of all evolutionists that find molecular mechanisms everywhere (so what?) and then that is somehow proof your non defined "force" is responsible for their existence.

It is equally proof I suppose that someone made these little machines. That their purpose is many times deleterious to other life (is a virus alive itself?) really does not interest me. Those that want to find fault with God's creation will find fault.

If not the endless complaint of why would a "loving God," create, or at least allow evil, pain, death, torture, little puppies being squished, this always posed in a churlish little girl got rejected flounce.

But if we had the clockwork and pristine perfect world the unbeliever pretends should have been made by his imaginary God (who he hates anyway) then there would be the complaint we are all puppets with no choice, and what is the use of such a macabre theater of life.

Christ nailed all you guys two thousand years ago when you wore the robes of Pharisee's instead of the cloaks of science.

When God sent John the Baptist who was a strict religious type...they didn't like him, saying he was too religious or strict. When Christ came they didn't like Him, saying he was to loose, and hung out and even (gasp) drank with sinners.

And Christ said no matter how the truth is packaged, you reject the truth, in order that it might be proven that some are just squirting out their squid ink as they scuttle away proclaiming they are upset with God's ways...so they will not believe, (stamping their little feet!) but in truth, they are simply upset with God. Who proposes to kiss them on the lips, but they insist He kiss them somewhere else.

He does not need to reconcile Himself to you, it is you that needs to reconcile to Him. Your delight in going though the junkyard and finding various hubcaps and carburetors and thence proposing there is a hubcap making force is childish in the extreme, look at the backside of the hubcap and see who actually made the damn things.

The manufacturer stamped his logo on everything made, and it is why the idiot evolutionist stumbles constantly over the fact that an efficient designer re-uses design or DNA to do the same thing in species after species, or is He somehow dumber than us, and re-invents the wheel over and over because He forgot He invented it once before?

Somewhat sorry for the tone of this post, but you are not unique, your arguments are tired and shopworn bromides used over and over by your tribe. A cult of narcissists who I find have a peculiar myopia like spoiled rich children given toys, they delight in breaking them to bits, looking at the parts, they never play with or enjoy the toy...something mean about it all, something crude about those that live in the midst of beauty untold and see it not, and are too stingy and dried up in spirit to lift their eyes on high and see who created these stars.

Science can go to hell they day it demands I stop my worship of God. For I know that my redeemer lives. As for all you evolutionists, enjoy the ugly world YOU created.

mushroom said...

In other words God is so lame, so hidebound by process…He actually serves process, He must create via process. ... But when it comes to life, God is explicit, in that His hand is directly involved, and even more explicitly He is the personal creator of man.

Kepler, I disagree to some extent. As a Christian I don't say that God must create via process. However, consider one of temptations of Christ -- "Turn these stones into bread". The Lord refused.

Then consider a miracle recorded in all four gospels, twice in some cases, of feeding a multitude of people with only a small amount of bread. Why is it OK in one case and not in the other?

Jesus said, "I only do what I see My Father doing."

The Bible is not a science textbook. It is a revelation of God -- in love and grace, wrath and judgment.

Original sin is a result of communion and revelation followed by disobedience. There may have been other human-like creatures but there is a difference between a humanoid and something in the "image and likeness" of God. I'm sure you are familiar with the many lines of thinking about Genesis 6. Adam was the son of God -- called that expressly in Luke's geneology.

So that son of God fell in the Garden, and we waited for the Son of God to face the ultimate choice in another garden to deliver us.

I hope you won't consider me apostate as I fully agree with you about the essentials.

Anonymous said...

Joseph

I see your point. Have not read Schoun yet, but when I get time I will. It seems to pass the notice of our modern "scientists," that science only came forth after 1200 years of conditioning of the European mind to the idea of a God, and specifically a creator God. After some time it dawned on man that if all was created and there is order, then that order could be discerned, cataloged, forces understood and harnessed.

Certainly nearly all of the great early scientists were Christians, some even nearly fanatical, such as Newton. But it was during the 19th century that science was hijacked by the secular humanists...they had to or they would have become extinct. The church also did itself harm by holding to non-Biblical interpretations of Genesis and the age of the earth. A young earth is in no way indicated by the Original Hebrew of Genesis.

Anonymous said...

"The manufacturer stamped his logo on everything made..."

Are there others beside the golden ratio?

Anonymous said...

Mushroom said:

Original sin is a result of communion and revelation followed by disobedience. There may have been other human-like creatures but there is a difference between a humanoid and something in the "image and likeness" of God. I'm sure you are familiar with the many lines of thinking about Genesis 6. Adam was the son of God -- called that expressly in Luke's geneology.

So that son of God fell in the Garden, and we waited for the Son of God to face the ultimate choice in another garden to deliver us.

I hope you won't consider me apostate as I fully agree with you about the essentials.

************************

I have no problem with the idea there may have been manlike creatures on the earth in Adam's time, he may have even been one of them. The essential is that a single man (thing) was selected/created and God breathed something into that being that made him a different order.

You still have the problem of how Eve was made, quite hard to get allegory out of that story. But once again the story is expanded when the spear was thrust into his side and blood and water poured out and his bride (the church) was birthed.

Anyway scripturally it is not forbidden for Adam to have come about by peculiar selection. However I stand on my belief and on the evidence that somebody is/has/does actively create species at particular times.

Now that may not be God himself, perhaps angels have work to do in terraforming planets according to general designs and plans, maybe Satan was one such angel, and decided on his own designs here. Who can know? Certainly science shows certain lifeforms seem to appear on the earth at just the right time to create the next set of conditions for the next level of life.

Think nearly two billion years of blue-green algae, and hardly nothing else to reduce the atmosphere of the earth to oxygen bearing for all subsequent life. Then vegetation to help produce soil etc...All this synchronized with other perfect timing and forces like just the right size moon, just the right orbit, in just the right part of the galaxy an on and on.

Anonymous said...

Bob said, "Let us just say this about that: our right brain sides with Schuon, but our left brain sides with Aurobindo."

As an aside, I used to get furious, now it is only sqeamish. Nonetheless, it continues to be a fundamental riddle.

Gagdad Bob said...

Perhaps I'll revisit the issue in tomorrow's post, in order to find out exactly what I think about it...

Anonymous said...

son of the preacher


PI, e, the ratio of the mass of the proton to the electron, speed of light, The ratios between the 4 fundamental forces of nature (Strong force, weak force, electromagnetic force, gravity). DNA itself, specific protein folding (governed by the electromagnetic force) And too many mathematical and cosmological constants to mention.

mushroom said...

Now that may not be God himself, perhaps angels have work to do in terraforming planets according to general designs and plans, maybe Satan was one such angel, and decided on his own designs here. Who can know? Certainly science shows certain lifeforms seem to appear on the earth at just the right time to create the next set of conditions for the next level of life.

I think that's possible. I think of the unmoved movers of Aristotle's celestial spheres and, of course, Out of the Silent Planet.

With DNA it almost looks like it was making the planet progressively more inhabitable for itself. Wonder how it got so smart?

Van Harvey said...

"...In other words God is so lame, so hidebound by process…He actually serves process, He must create via process..."

That is one way to look at it. Another way, to me, is that that seems to say that God is such a spaghetti code programmer, that he couldn't design a Cosmos that would result in such as Man, so he had to put some hard breaks in his application to halt it when it got to a particular point and hardcode the tricky stuff. Also seems to imply a bit of inconsistency on God's part, in that He was fine waiting 13.7 billion years for a hospitable solar system such as ours to develop... but then got impatient and sidestepped all of the natural systems he'd allowed to unfold, in order to zap some dust into Adam and Eve.

"...And last, but most importantly for a Christian believer the doctrine of original sin is for the Christian, not possible to abrogate, no matter if 10,000 scientists in pristine white smocks scream in unison for a thousand years that we descended from apes…"

Man can only know through capital 'R' Reason (consisting of Mind and Soul, not the desiccated logic chopping little 'r' reason of the scientistics), he must examine and respect reality, and he must Choose, he must Judge for himself. And more importantly, for all of our ability to grasp principle, and so know reality, we must always be aware that though correct and true as we may be, we must keep in mind that all we know of the universe will always be somewhat less than fully and completely True (the astronomical progression from Aristotle to Ptolemy to Copernicus to Kepler to Galileo to Newton to Einstein.... was not one of correcting mistakes, but of ever expanding and deepening the Truth which was grasped), always somewhat 'wide of the mark' (I don't have my ref's here, but I believe that to be the original meaning of the term 'Sin') . To me that encompasses Original Sin. Only that which fully comprehends all of the Cosmos, could have perfect knowledge of it, and we will always be wide of the mark, by virtue of our origination in who and what we are as human beings, and to assume otherwise is a willfully misplaced and false pride, and that which surely leads towards Evil (witness any hellhole leftist Utopia or scheme for one).

Yes, Kepler's reading is too literal for my tastes. I think it comes up short of the full meaning available in scripture as well, scripture being the 3D object, and literalism being what happens to it when you try to squish it upon a flattened table of one-to-one literal relation to reality on the mortal plane - it splits and separates and strains perspective, as happens with a Mercator map. I see that as too limited a view for me... but then again, it's only me I'm speaking for.

But with that said, I have no problem vertically rehydrating Kepler's song to accommodate the science of the Cosmos as it is before us created, and enjoying and reveling in the Truth living in the poetic and the analytic without contradiction, I can read what Kepler says, and see the Truth shining brightly within it.

I can't say the same for the utterly flat and lifeless pancake of the scientistic materialist darwinistas, who claim to have discovered the facts of the universe, magical quantumly belched (I kinda like that too Ximeze) mechanical construct they proclaim as (while mocking) Truth.

Ugh.

For me, let Kepler Sing… and keep the tone deaf darwinistas away from the mike.

julie said...

Ray, this one's for you:

"I'm not gonna write you a love song,
'Cause you asked for it,
'Cause you need one, you see.
I'm not gonna write you a love song,
'Cause you tell me it's,
Make or breaking this.
If you’re on your way,
I'm not gonna write you to stay.
If all you have is leaving,
I’m gonna need a better reason to write you a love song today."

(I know, I know - the commercial is kind of annoying, but I can't help liking this tune. Time to see if the rest of the album is worth it :)

julie said...

Ooh, it is a good album.

robinstarfish said...

Now that may not be God himself, perhaps angels have work to do in terraforming planets according to general designs and plans, maybe Satan was one such angel, and decided on his own designs here.

MOTT, in Letter VI, The Lover, explores that theme in some detail.

A mini-excerpt (pg 142):

"The tableau of evolution that the natural sciences - above all biology - have at last obtained as the result of prodigious work reveals to us without any doubt the work of a very subtle, but imperfect, intellect and a very determined, but imperfect, will. It is therefore the serpent, "the most artful animal of the fields", that the world of biological evolution reveals to us, and not God. It is the serpent who is the "prince of this world", and who is the author and director of the purely biological evolution following the Fall. Read The Phenomenon of Man by Peirre Teilhard de Chardin, which gives the best summary and interpretation that I know of natural evolution; study this book and you could not arrive at any other conclusion than that the world of evolution is the work of the serpent of paradise, and that it is only since the prophetic religions (of which there were many) and Christianity that the "good news" (evangelion) of another way than that of the evolution of the serpent exists."

Gagdad Bob said...

I was actually going to review that chapter....

Van Harvey said...

"Clearly, change cannot affect the changeless, and if there is no vertical realm of absolute truth, then we would have no way to discern the difference between evolution and devolution, progress and degeneration. And truth surely cannot be a product of evolution. Rather, it is realized through evolution. Again, to the extent that human beings may know truth, then they have ipso facto either transcended it or realized its end -- which amounts to the same thing."

Exactly. Without One Truth, no thing would be possible, no relation, no conception, no evasion, no lies or liars. Few know the Truth like the liar, and how they are utterly dependent upon it as the center around which they scurry about trying to deflect any recognition of it. They hate it, and hate it all the more because they cannot do without it.

"To assault the Holy Spirit is to decimate the hierarchy that allows the mind to discern the infinite gulf between a Meister Eckhart and Masterless Liztard. "

It's also a visible strategy wherever the leftist attacks. If you examine the building assaults upon the U.S. Constitution, beginning right after (even before) ratification (the more lasting hits coming from those who became the Proregressives of which the lefft was formed), you'll find that the common theme amongst them is an attack upon hierarchy, from the property qualification for voters through the 17th amendment destroying the Senate. Hierarchy has been the political target of leftists, because it is the embodiment of an ordered and True reality. The leftist ideal is a flattened, scattered "all no better than any other" expanse of preferences rather than Virtues.

"The mass man lives without any discipline"; he "possesses no quality of excellence," and "demands more and more, as if it were his natural right, without realizing that what he wants was the privilege of a tiny group only a century ago."

Without hierarchy, there's nothing to stop you from claiming a 'right' to anything you feel you deserve. Of course without hierarchy, you also lack the perspective to see that coming soon after will be a complete absence of even the conception of 'rights'... or Truth... or a life worth living.

Warren said...

Since some are talking about the nature of science, here are some thoughts on the subject from C. S. Lewis' "The Abolition of Man":

".... the real story of the birth of Science is misunderstood. You will even find people who write about the 16th century as if Magic were a medieval survival and Science the new thing that came in to sweep it away. Those who have studied the period know better. There was very little magic in the Middle Ages: the 16th and 17th centuries are the high noon of magic. The serious magical endeavour and the serious scientific endeavour are twins: one was sickly and died, the other strong and throve. But they were twins....

"There is something which unites magic and applied science while separating both from the wisdom of earlier ages. For the wise men of old, the cardinal problem had been how to conform the soul to reality, and the solution had been knowledge, self-discipline, and virtue. For magic and applied science alike, the problem is how to subdue reality to the wishes of men: the solution is a technique; and both, in the practice of this technique, are ready to do things hitherto regarded as disgusting and impious....

"No doubt those who really founded modern science were usually those whose love of truth exceeded their love of power; in every mixed movement, the efficacy comes from the good elements, not from the bad. But the presence of the bad elements is not irrelevant to the direction the efficacy takes. It might be going too far to say that the modern scientific movement was tainted from its birth: but I think it would be true to say that it was born in an unhealthy neighborhood and at an inauspicious hour."

Van Harvey said...

Kepler said (in other order)
"I have no problem with the idea there may have been manlike creatures on the earth in Adam's time, he may have even been one of them. The essential is that a single man (thing) was selected/created and God breathed something into that being that made him a different order."

"Who can know? Certainly science shows certain lifeforms seem to appear on the earth at just the right time to create the next set of conditions for the next level of life."

"You still have the problem of how Eve was made, quite hard to get allegory out of that story. But once again the story is expanded..."

As a teleOscope may be collapsed or expanded the Truth may be appear closer or farther, less or more focused, but it is there, shining brightly.

On the other claw, "The point is, Lizards are part of a controlled chaos well managed by the Lord and need not be a source of angst..." remains a black hole from which Light does not emanate.

QP said...

Sifu Starfish's MOTT "missing link" fixeded.

>>On the other claw, "The point is, Lizards are part of a controlled chaos well managed by the Lord and need not be a source of angst..." remains a black hole from which Light does not emanate.<< ROFLMTCAO

mushroom said...

Didn't mean to ignore you, Dupree. I just saw that -- thank you. I am just a slow learner. Need more slack.

Anonymous said...

Van said:

Man can only know through capital 'R' Reason (consisting of Mind and Soul, not the desiccated logic chopping little 'r' reason of the scientistics), he must examine and respect reality, and he must Choose, he must Judge for himself. And more importantly, for all of our ability to grasp principle, and so know reality, we must always be aware that though correct and true as we may be, we must keep in mind that all we know of the universe will always be somewhat less than fully and completely True.

****************************

Yes but I wonder if in that Reason you are including another form of knowing, and that is knowing by imparted knowledge from God. Now I have witnessed this myself. Men gifted by the Holy Spirit, who could tell people the details of their life, not possible to know unless there is a supernatural intelligence.

And yes my treatment of Genesis was necessarily short and rigid and all the permutations cannot be told in this format. Certainly my take leaves out more than it included, and if it was completely the way I think, that is what would surprise me.

However, my purpose is to draw a clear distinction to the muddled thinking that is part of the average Christian experience. You cannot abandon the principle of original sin, if you do Christianity makes no sense, Christ had no purpose in his sacrificial death, and we cannot be redeemed.

Take it a step further like the secularists and you do not even need to be redeemed. Heck just stand up to smoking in public, or believe in Global Warming and recycle and you have obtained any needed righteousness.

My main brief with evolution other than it is simply bad science and sloppy intellectual posturing, is it is a direct assault on Christianity. All protestations put aside, at its core Evolution is saying this: God did not create man, nor the earth, nor the universe. The central argument, once you get past all the smokescreen of the technical mumbo-jumbo is the direct assault on God as the Creator. Now God (I suppose) is not harmed...but we are, if humanity loses that relationship, or maybe just knowledge, then the next dark ages will make the last one look like practice.

Anonymous said...

Van

I also go back and forth myself about the existence of the negative, or lies or evil to mature those that love the truth, or better yet we are trying to learn to love the truth. And yes the liztard is part of a necessary resistance to sharpen our spirits, so to speak, for the next level.

But at the same time I have that human side of me that comes up and wants to fight directly and call out the rotten bastards! Like my disgust with the pampered of America that decry all war, to the end result that others pay the price for continual tyranny, oppression and murderous regimes.

There will be hell to pay, not so much by the deceived Islamist, or indoctrinated Communist...born into a dark culture, but to the Berkeley graduate that denied we had a purpose greater than sticking cocaine up our noses, or screwing members of the opposite or same sex.

Not only will they not sacrifice to liberate others, but they hate any that will make that sacrifice...off on a rant now...sorry.

QP said...

Presenting:::::

The Ascent of the Darwinistas, [The Movie Version]

Susannah said...

Kepler, I appreciated everything you wrote! You said it well.

Van Harvey said...

Kepler said "Yes but I wonder if in that Reason you are including another form of knowing, and that is knowing by imparted knowledge from God." and "All protestations put aside, at its core Evolution is saying this: God did not create man, nor the earth, nor the universe. The central argument, once you get past all the smokescreen of the technical mumbo-jumbo is the direct assault on God as the Creator."

I'm with ya.

But consider that there was nothing in the pre-Christian Aristotle opposed to God, as there obviously was nothing in the Christian Thomas Aquinas opposed to God, and neither was there anything in John Locke at the dawn of modernity, opposed to God.

I don't believe there is anything in the inductively based theory (the theory, not the theorizers) of evolution that any of these three (and many more) would have found themselves opposed to - startled by, yes, but opposed to? I don't think so.

They, even Locke, who was showing the rough edges of the oncoming modern skepticism, were of a whole Reason viewpoint, that any notion of Reason separate from or absent soul, was barbarous at best, and cynical sophistry at the very least.

It isn't evolution itself, properly stated and understood, that is opposed to God, it is the modernist foolisophes, descended from the worst of Descartes and Hume, and all of Rousseau, Godwin, Kant and their spawn, who are in the roots of their every 'thought', because of their thought, opposed to Reality, to all in us that is Human, to any variation of The Good, The Beautiful and The True - and so against God and any proper Religious expression whatsoever.

What they did, the modernist innovation that makes the modern left a completely different animal (100%) than their shortsighted cousins of the pre-modern era, is to destroy Man's belief in his ability to grasp reality, to control his own choices, to believe that there is such a thing as reality or even such a thing as Man himself. Their audassity of self blinded vision is awesome to behold.

The fundamentals of their smug self lefteous ideas are everywhere, even in the positions of those who recoil from their more obvious expressions of, say, socialism, and they are especially entrenched in the schools. Hard to find a better every day example of the light snuffing darkness of the left than where the 'light of learning' turns out children unable to read or write or smile at what is good (someone mentioned earlier about the rarity of words such as 'joyful' and the like... certainly not without a wink and a gnawing grin), bow towards what is inspiring or show anger at what is bad.

It was our careless leaving of the door of Philosophy and Education open for the dogs to come into our lives, and it is through that same door that we're going to have to uproot and throw them back out through, in order to put things right again... or at least back on a human footing, rather than an animal one.

robinstarfish said...

QP, thanks for the MOTT fix. I musta been hoopled.

Anonymous said...

I was the first poster, and now I return to post the last or near the last.

Today's thread was particularly fascinating in terms of comments.

Kepler Sings is an eloquent writer, a fiercely anti-darwinist commentator who's comments, curiously, tend to make the reader squeamish. Why the squeamishness?

Because reading a blanket, total refutation of Darwin tends to point up and polish the nuggets of truth that are unavoidably embedded in Darwin. Wash away the dross, and there lies the gold, visible even to the likes of Van the Raccoon, or Petey for that matter.

Discernment! That is the key...

So I reiterate what I said about Lizards (translation: confused people). They are beloved of God.

Free will is overrated. The difference between choosing evil and good is usually a matter of how dazed one is by the confusion of material incarnation. And we are all dazed to some extent.

A soul who awakens turns automaticaly to the good, it seems. What then is the function of free will?

It is basically to determine how committed one is and how resolved to becoming unconfused, to waking up.

Genetics plays a part, as does nutrition, in how well one's brain works and how well one can concentratte. These and other factors are not in control of the soul. Free will, therefore, has a role but not an overweening one in the becoming.

I know Petey will disagree.

Anonymous said...

Will is required for truth to become action, which is beauty of soul exteriorized, or a virtue realized.

Susannah said...

"A soul who awakens turns automatically to the good, it seems."

href=”http://www.gnpcb.org/esv/search/?q=Romans+7&src=esv.org”>I wish it were that easy.

The good news is also there, though, if you click on to the next chapter.

Susannah said...

Oops, not quite up on the link thing yet apparently.

Van Harvey said...

aninnymouse belched "Discernment! That is the key...Free will is overrated. The difference between choosing evil and good is usually a matter of how dazed one is by the confusion of material incarnation."

The fool who can utter utter 'free will' and 'discernment' and not grasp that one can't be said without invoking the other, knows the meaning of neither.

Without Free Will, or as Locke preferred to call it, VOlitional Choice, you would not turn to the good, you would continue to sit there as the vegatative sub-human dross that you seek to be (and yet will never be able to acheive).

"What then is the function of free will?"

To enable you to choose to aspire towards The Good, The Beautiful and The True; or to rut upon the ground with all that actually are animals; to rise and be Human, or lay down beneath the dogs.

"It is basically to determine how..."

Determine? Determine how? No determination of any value is made without consideration, discernment and judgment - all of which involve and require a careful series of choices, and unless you be mere darwinistic mechanism, your choice must be freely and deliberately made - if not, it is no more a choice, and of no more significance or value than a coin falling unnoticed into the gutter and landing heads up or down.

Speaking of dogs, that reminds me. A note for our pacifist anti-judgement judgmentalist trolls:

"Although there was never an official Cynic doctrine, the fundamental principles of Cynicism can be summarised as follows:

-The goal of life is happiness which is to live in agreement with Nature.
-Happiness depends on being self-sufficient, and a master of mental attitude.
-Self-sufficiency is achieved by living a life of Virtue.
-The road to Virtue is to free oneself from any influence such as wealth, fame, or power, which have no value in Nature.
-Suffering is caused by false judgments of value, which cause negative emotions and a vicious character.
-A Cynic, then, has no property and rejects all conventional values of money, fame, power or reputation. A life lived according to nature requires only the bare necessities required for existence, and one can become free by unshackling oneself from any needs which are the result of convention.
"

Doesn't that 'virtue' and 'value' talk sound all peaceandluvandunderstanding? They may seem to sound fairly sensible, on their own, but as words devoid of and rejecting what gives them meaning, they promote the opposite (look up the words Virtue or Arete sometime 'I don' tink doz wards mean whatchu tink day mean'), and are flatly animalistic. As summed up further down in the same wiki article:

"...reasons why the Cynics are so named. First because of the indifference of their way of life, for they make a cult of indifference and, like dogs, eat and make love in public, go barefoot, and sleep in tubs and at crossroads. The second reason is that the dog is a shameless animal, and they make a cult of shamelessness, not as being beneath modesty, but as superior to it... "

I think that unnecessarily insulting to Dogs, but it sure gives justice to faux-religious cynics.

You are that which Kepler decried with "... disgust with the pampered of America that decry all war, to the end result that others pay the price for continual tyranny, oppression and murderous regimes."

And to our other frequent aninnymouse trolls who pop up now and then telling us how we must renounce this and that 'material' item or judgmental thought, to become holeoy like they; you ninnies are so far from the Virtuous realm, as the lowest dogman is from the highest Human.

You do serve one purpose though, you make it clear how far a person can fall if they fail to choose wisely.

Anonymous said...

Because reading a blanket, total refutation of Darwin tends to point up and polish the nuggets of truth that are unavoidably embedded in Darwin. Wash away the dross, and there lies the gold, visible even to the likes of Van the Raccoon, or Petey for that matter.

What truths? I refuse to accept as science a theory that cannot be falsified, that cannot meet even its own predictions of the fossil record, and ultimately must come to grips with the phenomena of life from non-living matter, it gets no break from me in claiming it just describes origin of species.

O yeah? Then I name the first one celled organism on earth as species #1, now the Darwinista's can get off their unmathematical pontificating asses and address the mathematical impossibility of the manufacture of one single protein, let alone DNA, RNA, the incorporation of mitchochondria as energy producers in the cell, tRNA, protein transport, protein assembly and the encoded information in the DNA. And none of these pieces mean anything by themselves, in fact much of these chemical constructs cannot survive outside the cell, and have no meaning and purpose uncoupled from each other.

One single cell if blown up to the size of Manhattan would exhibit more complexity by far than that entire city. And all operating with synchronized purpose, with garbage collection, policing, communications, transport, self replicating with hardly a mistake in millions of copies of itself, and self-healing to boot.

Evolution never lets the student in on the fact that it is all so extraordinarily complex, mind-boggling complex. Most dramatizations of evolution just sweep aside such difficulties and blithely go on about fish crawling up on beaches and becoming alligators...stupid beyond belief! All driven by competition for resources, yet half fish half lizard is good as neither, why did the furious competition not kill him off? And he is in this state (the Darwinista's assure us for millions of years). And now multiply this same story for the millions of species that have ever existed. They hardly talk about things such as the engineering skills of spiders, or how the angler fish shoots out a stream of water to knock bugs off low branches of the Mangroves, having somehow figured out the exact angle of the bending of light by the surface of the water so that the bug is not where it appears he is at by sight.

No fish figured this out, it is programmed intelligence...who did this programming? And there are thousands of such behaviors in the animal and insect world that incorporates scientific knowledge that man in all his intellect has only recently discovered. How stupid has the teaching of evolution made us?

Discernment! That is the key...

So I reiterate what I said about Lizards (translation: confused people). They are beloved of God.


Maybe they are, but how do you know? Some people God is all done speaking too, think of Herod. And I hate the smugness the assumption of intellectual superiority that I find on that site, maybe God hates that a little Himself.

We have evidence that Christ did not ever EVER give a Pharisee a break, cept maybe Nicodemus. Even when they started to believe Him, he automatically threw out something else they could not handle in their closed-doctrine, all figured out system. Yet for the regular folks he had endless compassion.

Free will is overrated. The difference between choosing evil and good is usually a matter of how dazed one is by the confusion of material incarnation. And we are all dazed to some extent.

What? I call B.S. most of us know the difference between good and evil, unless our conscious is seared by the constant practice of evil. I think you are confusing the action of free will in what we really avoid is the knowledge that to resist sin, to resist evil is to suffer pain. Free will is always at play in that you choose to resist evil, even if it means you suffer. Humans have always called this "courage," God has always called it "faith."

That in a nutshell is why the loud mouth left are cowards. They hate war, because it offers stark moral choices. Not any on the Left in this country, that I know of, rejoiced that 25 million Iraqis get a chance at freedom and exercising free will.

They endlessly complain about the reasons we went to war, the hell with some little Iraqi girl being raped to death by Saddam's goons. Much better to wail about some frat party hazing in Abu Gharib, that half of them would pay to be subjected to if it was to be a part of the "right," crowd.

Rick said...

I like this Kepler fellow. He can really belt one out. In fact, I just knew it was gonna be good when I heard him rollin’ up his sleeves. Stand back, he speaketh the Toots!

Van Harvey said...

Petey said..."Will is required for truth to become action, which is beauty of soul exteriorized, or a virtue realized."

Well. I suppose that is a bit more concise than what I said...

(wanders off grumbling... kicking dirt... pulls out IfOne and dials)

Hello, Heaven? Yes, I'm calling about the disembodied spirit that is the Grand High Exalted Mystic Ruler, West San Fernando Val... huh? Oh... yes... I think Petey's doing fine... yes, I'll tell him you said hellO. Why am I calling? Uh... well, look, I had this really cool rant...er... I mean comment, that...Hmm? Oh... yes, well I suppose it was more of a rant... well anyway, listen I was up late and put some time into this thing, and then it turns out before I even got to post mine, Petey pops off with his comment that says the best part of mine in 18 words, and I just don't think it's fair, and... hmm? Well I suppose it is true, but that's not the point, you see... hmm? What do you mean that's the Only pOint? Listen, he makes me look REAL long winded and I don't appreci... huh? Ok... I'll get over it, it's jus...hul? Make me feel better? Consolation? What consolation? "Kepler Sings"? Oh... gee... yeah thanks... but...but... yes I'll be sure to tell Petey you said hello, but co...[click]

(walks off grumbling. throws IfOne on ground, stomps on it)

rggl fraggin mumph 'Angelic ol' Boy's Club'...srghh floggrish... Arghhh!....

Van Harvey said...

Kepler Sings said "...Much better to wail about some frat party hazing in Abu Gharib, that half of them would pay to be subjected to if it was to be a part of the "right," crowd."

Ho!

Ray Ingles said...

Kepler - Sorry, you guessed wrong about what that link would have said if you'd read it. (This link is science-free, though..)

Julie - That's okay. I've got someone who sings me love songs already, and she's got a lovely voice, too.

Van - See immediately above for why I didn't get a chance to view the Dennett thing. Gonna have to be tonight's bus ride.

Ephrem Antony Gray said...

Part of the rejection of evolution has to do with the notion of 'essences', that is, what things essentially are. For instance, let's say something is a dog, so it's essence is 'dog'. Do things change essence? No. The definition of essence is that which something is.

The mistake then, I think, in rejecting transformist evolution is the answer to the question 'what is the essence or nature of this or that?' I would assert that firstly no thing has a single nature or essence but consists of a hierarchical layering of natures. Take for instance mankind - at the very least we have five layers to our nature - firstly it is in our nature for our body to be made of matter. So on the lowest level we share a nature with physical matter, and in this way are subject to physics. Secondly we are by nature alive, and therefore share nature with all living things. On the next level we have a mind, that is, we are sapient, able to think. I don't know exactly what that means per se, but I'll go with Bob here. We share nature with anything that is able to think, in whatever capacity. Fourth, we are spiritual, meaning we share nature with any spirit. And fifth we are man, meaning we share nature with any other human. If we say that man is essentially man and can be nothing else nor could have ever been something else, we make the nature of 'man' his entire nature, and assume the current form of it that we observe is the fullness of that nature.

However, with the idea of the nonlocal Telos (which I'm sure Joseph would agree with) it is fairly possible that there are innumerable implicit natures throughout all of creation that have yet to be instantiated, and thus do not yet exist. Thus when looking at evolution I would see it more as a growth of the cosmos than a transformation or random motion of it.

It is very likely that our appearance as we see now is 'final' externally, just like for sharks and cuttlefish and so forth. It is the life-nature within us that grows along with and shares in the life of all life in the cosmos. It is it that adapts to continue itself. But we are more than that nature, therefore, even if our bodies had changed or we are bodily descendents of apes or at least, the common ancestor of both apes and men (the more likely story) who was extincted because monkeys were better at being monkeys and neadrathals better and huntin' and gatherin'.

In this view the cosmos grew until it was ready for man to become. In my view, it happened too 'early' - man got kicked out of instead of let out of the Garden. But it had to happen sometime.

All of the nonlocal potential forms call us towards them. This is the only way I can understand evolution in the context of true metaphysics. Without these varied nonlocal potential forms (of which we know nothing, since we can only guess at an 'ousia' if we do not have a 'hypostases' to exemplify it - so I disagree with certain platonists) and therein is the void, what is unknowable. And thus, we are implicitly talking about God, because this is both the unknowable, the telos, and that which is something coming from nothing.

Thus, I can agree with Schoun and also with Auribindo. Mostly I just agree with Chesterton :)

Ephrem Antony Gray said...

Also, it seems to me that any spiritual form (a hypostases) is by nature a person. Thus it makes sense to consider the natural law and order embodied by angelic powers (virtues, powers, dominions, principalities, etc) the ultimate spiritual form, since law is in a sense spiritual, would also need be a person, too.

This 'ultimate' form is also the 'ultimate' person, the final destination, the Telos.

Simple to me!

NoMo said...

Although it includes some creative ideas, everyone knows that Darwinism is impossible - yet they put their faith in it anyway. It holds them accountable for nothing.

On the other hand, God, Whom they know is Real, holds them accountable for everything - whether they believe in Him or not.

Hmmm. Decisions, decisions.

Thankfully...

Anonymous said...

Well, addressing the first paragraph, acts form habits, and habits form a character that is or is not open to truth, not absolutely but in regards to certain aspects of it.

So it goes both ways - you accept truth and you do what is good, but also if you do not do what is good you cannot accept the truth.

cf Romans 1:19ff, but also the following from conferences of St John Cassian:

If then, those arts follow their own defined principles when they are taught, how much more does the teaching and profession of our religion, which is directed to contemplating the secrets of invisible mysteries rather than to present gain and which seeks instead the regard of eternal prizes, consist in a defined order and method. Its knowledge is in fact twofold. The first kind is praktike, or practical, ehich reaches its fulfillment in correction of behavior and in cleansing from vice. The other is theoritike, which consists in the contemplation of divine things and in the understanding of most sacred meanings.

Anonymous said...

"Whoever, therefore, wishes to attain the theoretike must first pursue practical knowledge with all his strength and power. for the praktike can be possessed without the theoretical, but the theoretical can never be seized without the practical. For certain steps have been arranged and distinguished in such a way that human lowliness can mount to the sublime. ... In vain, therefore, does someone who does not reject the contagion of vice strive for the vision of God. 'For the Spirit of God hates deception, and it does not dwell in a body subject to sin.'(Wis 1:5,4)"

Not to get all preachy on you.

Ephrem Antony Gray said...

Oooh. Bust out the Apocryphal Books! Wisdom of ... is that Sirach or Solomon? Anyway, kudos to Phil.

Anonymous said...

Solomon. The unhinged and vicious babycutter.

But seriously, and this will be ad hominem, though sometimes that's appropriate, it is futile to talk to someone who lacks ... moral fiber ("I invented moral fiber, you pasty-face sumbitch!"). The Interwebs is great for words, but speaking to God in the language of deeds is sometimes the only way to access the higher truth. And how do you gauge that over the net? Very carefully!

Ephrem Antony Gray said...

Levitas, mon ami, levitas.

Warning: Serious merriment ahead!

julie said...

Kepler Sings - wow, I shoulda stayed up for that one!

Ray - once again, to my great relief, you have wildly missed the point; it's good to know that I'm entirely safe when you're pointing in my direction. I save my own love songs for only one man, and you ain't him. If you were to pretend, just for a second, that the snippet I included was written by sOmeone else, perhaps it would make a little more sense. But I won't count on it.

Van Harvey said...

River & NP, good comments - merriment ahead, indeed.

"So it goes both ways - you accept truth and you do what is good, but also if you do not do what is good you cannot accept the truth."

Yep.

Kepler said "...ultimately must come to grips with the phenomena of life from non-living matter..."

Yes, the idea that life, animation, arose from strictly material arrangements, is but the first of many darwinistic deal breakers.

Barb said...

The reading of Gasset's Revolt of the Masses was one of the handful of things I carry with me from college. Everything else has been long forgotten. It was applicable in the 60's and more so today.

Anonymous said...

Evolution is not a universal principle, but it does appear to be a universal process.

This does not invalidate your posting, as evolution in the presence of an absolute good where said good supplies the survival constraint will have a tendency to change things to be more in tune with that good.

Sadly, the reverse is also true. But evolution as an abstract process is as universal as time (for God to create time, but then provide no means for his creation to "handle" time would be very bad engineering).

Anonymous said...

Van 5:24

Dude, you're so Good at that. ;)

Ray Ingles said...

Julie - Do I have to include a smiley so people will know when I'm kidding? Just because y'all assume I have no sense of humor doesn't mean it's not there. :->

julie said...

Holy smokes - you do have a sense of humor?!? *gasps, clutches chest, falls over in a dead faint*
;)

USS Ben USN (Ret) said...

Van said-
"rggl fraggin mumph 'Angelic ol' Boy's Club'...srghh floggrish... Arghhh!...."

Ha ha! Hey, I liked your earlier comments, Van, but this one was funnier!

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