Comments

  • Pascal's Wager
    ↪stressyandmessy

    A full reading of the Pensées shows the wager is not simply placing a bet on a yes-or-no proposition but is a reflection of the human condition in which change is possible. It is not bound up with reciting a creed but looking for guidance in the circumstances of our lives. From that perspective, fear is one of things that has to be understood:

    We are not satisfied with the Ife we have in ourselves and our own being. We want to lead an imaginary life in the eyes of others, and so we try to make an impression. We strive constantly to embellish and preserve our imaginary being, and neglect the real one. And if we are calm, or generous, or loyal, we are anxious to have it known so that we can attach these virtues to our other existence; we prefer to detach them from our real self so as to unite them with the other. We would cheerfully be cowards if that would acquire us a reputation for bravery. How clear a sign of the nullity of our own being that we are not satisfied without the other and often exchange one for the other! For anyone who would not die to save his honour would be infamous. — Pascal, Pensées, 806, translated by A.J. Krailsheimer
  • Sophistry
    None whatsoever. I thought you would know (better). It's your theory. — Agent Smith

    He has made the same claim before, along with the same reluctance to actually support it.
  • Ukraine Crisis
    Hey, when a country invades another, u would expect that common people would support the defending country and chastise the invading one. This doesnt seem to be the case here. — Pussycat

    How so?
  • The New "New World Order"
    ↪dclements

    The Trump wing of the GOP gets it ideas from Steve Bannon's fusion of identification politics in the U.S with a foreign policy based upon weakening the EU.

    Tucker Carlson is merely the lipstick on the pig.
  • The New "New World Order"
    To be honest I'm not so sure either, but my guess is that Taiwan has been threaten for decades now by China of a possible invasion where as Ukraine it has been only a few years that this has been going on. — dclements

    The historical background of the conflict in Ukraine needs to include Stalin's starvation of the country, where the agenda to destroy the Kulaks was combined with exerting central control over the 'Soviets.' It should be remembered that Ukraine was the kick off of the Holocaust, where the Nazi idea that Jews were behind Communism became a rule of engagement in Operation Barbarossa. The USSR only recognized a general loss of "innocent people" rather than a specific genocide after the war.

    The policy of erasure and denial of people in Ukraine has been a Cheka legacy since the Bolshevik revolution.

    With the politics of the Cold War leading to the Iron Curtain and the formation of NATO, Putin has taken up the language of ultranationalists to deny Ukrainian nationality now that the USSR and the Warsaw Pact no longer exists. Putin forgot to hold a referendum in Ukraine on the matter.

    Taiwan emerged on the other side of this Cold War dynamic as a resistance to Communism. The situation is very different in economic terms because China is integrated with production on a global scale where Russia is a big player in only a few industries.
  • Thoughts on the way we should live?
    ↪Troyster

    One way to look at it is to ask if you are good company for yourself. Being alone is a pleasure and a form of suffering. I am not sure about those differences for myself and thus am doubly reluctant to say how things should be for others.

    So, one may be living like a monk and not realize it. Or living in some other way without looking at it. What is perception and what is fooling oneself?
  • Jesus and Greek Philosophy
    if, as per the NT text, Jesus was the Son of God, then (a) he would have spoken fluent Greek — Apollodorus
  • Jesus and Greek Philosophy
    Nonsense. Whether divine or not, Jesus would have used the language that had the widest currency at that point in time and space — Apollodorus

    But you just argued that Jesus had to have known Greek on account of him being the Son of God

    as per the NT text, Jesus was the Son of God, then (a) he would have spoken fluent Greek and (b) it would have made sense for him to use the universal language of the time in order to spread a universal message — Apollodorus

    You use the divine to explain capacity and motivation. And then you abandon that argument to justify your thesis on historical grounds again. It is not so much a species of circular reasoning as it is a mobius strip.
  • Jesus and Greek Philosophy
    The way I see it, much of biblical scholarship seems to be stuck in the 1940’s when Israel was controlled by Marxists and there was an effort to dismiss early Christianity as a minor Jewish sect with links to the Qumran scrolls. — Apollodorus

    Well, this goes some way toward explaining what you meant by calling some scholars 'anti-Christian'; You were referring to secular Jews. Perhaps you could cite examples of such influence and motivation.
    The origins of historical research in Jesus' life go back at least 200 years. How does your narrative fit into that?

    Moreover, if, as per the NT text, Jesus was the Son of God, then (a) he would have spoken fluent Greek and (b) it would have made sense for him to use the universal language of the time in order to spread a universal message – which, incidentally, is precisely why Greek was chosen as the language of the Gospels. — Apollodorus

    If you are going to appeal to the divinity of Jesus to say that he would not be bound by any historical condition he found himself in, then it is meaningless to argue for any historical condition being more likely than another. Joe Mello is at least consistent on this point. If one believes that the words and actions of Jesus was accurately recorded and relayed to us is a matter of faith, all questions regarding their veracity has been solved for all time.
  • The New "New World Order"
    ↪Apollodorus
    My observation was not to claim alignments with Putin are all of a piece or of a party.

    Gerhard Schröder is now getting a lot of criticism for his support. As a promoter of a certain kind of economy, his close connection to Putin is no longer connected to what centrists policies will be in the future.

    The interests of national identity politics is not bound by the same language of win-win markets. You call them 'fringe' but they represent divisions that have been underway for some time. Russia itself is divided in that way.

    My question is where will that kind of language go now that the level of violence in Ukraine has overturned the notion it is only an argument at a soirée.
  • The New "New World Order"
    ↪dclements

    In regard to the EU, it will be interesting to see how the Far Right parties will respond to the attack upon Ukraine. There has been support for Putin from them for the last ten years or so. As Foreign Policy article puts it:

    Calling the West’s response to the love affair between Putin and the far right an overreaction greatly underestimates the extent to which the Kremlin and its state-controlled media use support of European politicians to legitimize Moscow’s explicitly anti-western foreign policy agenda: far-right politicians not only vote for pro-Kremlin policies in the EU parliament, they also take part in election observation missions — most notably the referendum for the annexation of Crimea and the “elections” in Ukraine’s Russian-controlled “people’s republics.” The Russian media uses these events and far-right leaders’ visits to Moscow to tout European support for Putin. Even Le Pen was an unknown in Russia until the Ukraine crisis and her outspoken public support for Putin. Now she is paraded as proof that there is some support for Putin’s policies in Europe. — Alina Polyakova
  • What are you listening to right now?
    Seeing/Hearing them this week:
  • Ukraine Crisis
    ↪neomac

    Yes, the message about neo-Nazis is not a reference to antisemitism. Putin's version of national identity is more along the lines of the Falangists in Spain than a celebration of Stalin's atheistic republic. Putin has much support within the Russian Orthodox Church. It is more of a civil war in the fashion of Franco than a model of an imperium.

    In that sense, maybe it is more like the American Civil War than the conflicts which have consumed that area of the globe for time out of mind.
  • Jesus and Greek Philosophy
    ↪Fooloso4

    We cannot witness what other people are 'absolutely certain' about. We can witness what is excluded on the authority of such certainty. Paul's vision excluded other views as a denial of his truth. That is different from simply saying other people don't get it. it is the spirit of that sort of condemnation that has called forth Christianity's darkest aspect.
    For myself, the instruction to not judge so as not to be judged is a lesson that does not fit with this view. It is a proposition of physics more than an article of belief.
  • Ukraine Crisis
    For Zelensky to demand a no-fly zone isn't fruitful. It really won't happen and everybody ought to know it. — ssu

    I am not sure it is without fruits. Everybody knows it won't happen because of the whole WW3 thing.

    On the other hand, In addition to pressing for as much assistance as possible short of that, it is saying the ground forces are toast without Russia air support. In that respect, the impending decision to bombard cities into submission is an admission that the mission, as purported, is a failure
  • Jesus and Greek Philosophy
    ↪Fooloso4

    He acted on his own authority when he represented himself as an apostle and direct witness of Jesus. The communities he formed were based upon this role in them. So, in that sense, he spoke with the authority referred to in Matthew in reference to Jesus at the end of the Sermon of the Mount:

    And when Jesus finished these sayings, the crowds were astonished at his teaching, for he taught them as one who had authority, and not as their scribes — Matthew, 7:28, RSV

    So, when you say, " The content of one's convictions seems to be secondary to the absolute certainty of those convictions" it seems to me that what is claimed matters. What is being asked from others seems to be central to the differences.
  • Jesus and Greek Philosophy
    ↪Fooloso4

    The desire to be an effective agent is present before and after the conversion. How that agency is understood is sharply different between the two conditions:

    For I through the law died to the law, that I might live to God. I have been crucified with Christ; it is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me; and the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me. I do not nullify the grace of God; for if justification were through the law, then Christ died to no purpose. — Paul, Galatians 2:19, RSV

    The mantle of authority taken here is not only directed to his speaking for the Son of God as an apostle but to the right to speak of himself as the last Jew. What he surrenders, all others should too. Perhaps in that latter sense of conviction, that he is truly what a Jew should be, it could be said the 'conviction' is the same.
  • Ukraine Crisis
    ↪T Clark

    I think it is too soon to tell.
    Russia in Grozny and Syria has shown what they are capable of.
  • Ukraine Crisis
    ↪T Clark

    I have half agreed with Bacevich on many issues over the years but will gladly help him kick Friedman's kneecaps this time around. Condemnation of the invasion does not require ignoring:

    "This intellectual framing according to which events occurring in proximity to the Rhine and the Danube possess greater inherent importance than events near the Tigris or the Nile dates from the age of Western imperialism. — Bacevich
  • Jesus and Greek Philosophy
    ↪Joe Mello

    Do you really not see that saying "you boys" is ad hominem?

    You have already admitted you have not explored the texts beyond the interests of your creed. The historical is only what you believe it to be. That is not a contribution in a conversation about the history of Jesus.

    I will leave you with the last word.
  • Jesus and Greek Philosophy
    I pointed out to you boys. — Joe Mello

    By their fruits, you will know them.
  • Jesus and Greek Philosophy
    Exactly... That is ironically debating in bad faith — schopenhauer1

    It is ironic. Another irony is that your review of the texts supports the following observation made by JM:

    And the greatest thing that influenced Paul’s writing was that he had a special direct revelation of Jesus. From that moment on he wrote with the same authority Jesus spoke with. — Joe Mello

    It is not only that Pau's words don't match what Jesus said about the law, Paul describes the centuries of life under it as a bondage that Jews had to suffer for the sake of "justifying the Gentiles by faith" in the Letter to the Galatians 3:6 ff.

    It was the rejection of the idea that a people could live a lie for the sake of the truth that I began to seek for ways to understand the teaching that did not require Paul's testimony.
  • Ukraine Crisis
    ↪Manuel

    The alternative to your view is that the stand-off is beyond any possible bluff by any of the parties with this capacity for destruction.

    It does not permit the articulation of new circumstances. it is a standing wave of the same old shit.
  • Ukraine Crisis
    ↪ssu

    I took that to mean the guns have already been cocked and aimed long ago.

    Having an opponent remind everybody of that is odd. 'Oh crap, I forgot I could wipe Russia off the map if I punched in the correct code.'
  • Ukraine Crisis
    ↪jorndoe
    It is the MT Greene version of Falangist politics.
  • Jesus and Greek Philosophy
    ↪Joe Mello

    I understand that perspective. I grew up in it.

    It does suggest to me that I was not wrong saying that you have no interest in a "historical" Jesus.
  • Ukraine Crisis
    ↪Janus

    Hey, my comments were intelligent.
    But yes, 180 Proof's was more intelligent.
  • Jesus and Greek Philosophy
    ↪Joe Mello

    In order for you to be able to discern such a shallow level of scholarship, you would need to have spent some time and effort reading the sources you believe some forum participants are ripping off.

    A number of your statements lead me to think that you think there is something wrong with the historical approach altogether. That suggests you have no interest in such studies.
  • Ukraine Crisis
    ↪Janus

    I hear that. Fair enough.
  • Ukraine Crisis
    ↪StreetlightX

    It is only a rejoinder if it was pointing to a primary condition influencing what was possible.
    Otherwise, carry on as you like.
  • Ukraine Crisis
    ↪StreetlightX

    I don't know, it seems like the author of this article never heard about nuclear weapons.
    Maybe it was a typo.
  • Jesus and Greek Philosophy
    Paul certainly did, and that’s the most important point. But you won’t hear that from the modern “scholars” you’re plagiarising. — Joe Mello

    What is the basis of this "plagiarizing" charge? Who is being copied here?
  • Ukraine Crisis
    ↪Janus

    Yes, we don't know what will happen.
    I do think that how we think about it is important.
  • Jesus and Greek Philosophy
    And there is no proof whatsoever that the words and deeds of Jesus were influenced by Paul. — Joe Mello

    Paul was not an actual witness of Jesus. Nor was he a contemporary. He acknowledged that in the texts we have to read about it.
  • Ukraine Crisis
    ↪Janus

    If such an agreement was made on the basis that Russia otherwise would have destroyed the world, it negates the purpose of what NATO could secure as a threat to Russia. NATO is meaningless in a nuclear war. It is meaningful as a barrier to territorial expansion. It is a security agreement. To promise Russia that a certain nation could not apply for membership has no bearing on whether nations support them or not when they are attacked. Membership in NATO was meant to make the response automatic, if you will.

    Russia is holding a people hostage and daring anybody to do something about it.
  • Ukraine Crisis
    ↪Janus

    And who could stand as the arbiters of such a deal? There is no tribunal set up to accept promises on this basis. I would rather count on the desire to live as a countervailing force.
  • Ukraine Crisis
    ↪Janus

    I think it has been taken seriously for many years.

    Let me put it another way. After decades of brinkmanship and the political formations made as a consequence, what is left to do when Putin threatens us with the reality of it? Prepare more ICBMs?

    If the message is that he is willing to use a strategic weapon for tactical goals, it does not change the standoff. Once you have a little bit of nuclear war, there is no limit to the response.
  • Ukraine Crisis
    ↪Janus

    We do not have access to his decision tree. But the only reason other powers have been staying out of Ukraine so far is because of the presence of MAD. For Putin to wave it around like a stick is odd. It does not change the calculations of his oppositions.
  • Ukraine Crisis
    I think the likelihood of nuclear deployment is small. But if Putin didn't think it would be considered even remotely as a serious threat, then why would he bother issuing it? — Janus

    Because of the inexorable logic of Mutually Assured Destruction, bringing it up is equivalent to signaling a willingness to destroy oneself if it will attain a certain end.
    That is what the Ukraine ambassador to the U.N. was referring to by suggesting Putin cut to the chase and shoot himself like "that guy in Berlin, you know, in 45."
  • Ukraine Crisis
    ↪Apollodorus

    You view the matter as a game of Risk. I look at it more as what justifies killing populations. A lot of states justify violence on the basis of playing a game. East, West, North, and South, whatever.

    Electing to go to war can be a decision to fight an enemy who is about to kick your ass or a phantasy like Hitler dreamed.
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