have found most religious people to be far more fundamentalists than they even seem to be aware of themselves — Christoffer

And as such, a product of culture and society. But sure, it wasn’t institutional. Not sure what the point was here. — Jamal

The main problem with our usual understanding of secularity is that it is taken-for-granted, so we are not aware that it is a worldview. It is an ideology that pretends to be the everyday world we live in. Most of us assume that it is simply the way the world really is, once superstitious beliefs about it have been removed. — David Loy

The Enlightenment era not only categorically rejected all Religious doctrines, it also rejected all philosophical beliefs that "go beyond" actual/factual descriptions of the world based on the five senses (meta-physics). — Gnomon

Then, not long ago, I came to a realization that may seem like it would worsen my depression at first glance, but was actually a complete game changer for me… I don’t matter. — AWill

McCarthy has warned that negotiators must come to an agreement on at least the broad parameters of a deal by this weekend if a bill is to have any chance of moving through both the House and Senate by June 1, the earliest date when the Treasury Department has warned of a default.

If we are talking about the energy of the body kickstarting at the formation in an egg and the energy flowing away after death as heat, then I would never call that by anything other than what it is, energy, and energy is not a soul. — Christoffer

It is like when evangelists move their goal posts of what the definition of God is every time a scientific discovery shows that their previous beliefs are clearly wrong — Christoffer

If so, what you’ve got here is a truism, since institutions are social reality. — Jamal

There is no way of distentangling religious thought institutions and social reality

If subjective reason in the form of enlightenment has dissolved the philosophical basis of beliefs that have been an essential part of Western culture, it has been able to do so because this basis proved to be too weak. — Horkheimer, The Eclipse of Reason

I’m also slightly vexed by Wayfarer’s use of secular humanist Horkheimer as a weapon in his battle against secular humanism, although it’s fair to do so. — Jamal

if reason is a product of natural selection, then how much confidence can we have in a rational argument for natural selection? The power of reason is owed to the independence of reason, and to nothing else. (In this respect, rationalism is closer to mysticism than it is to materialism.) Evolutionary biology cannot invoke the power of reason even as it destroys it. — Leon Wieseltier, The God Genome

the pertinent point in this thread is that Materialism is presented as a natural fact, while alternative metaphysical notions are rejected as Super-natural fictions. It's like an old western showdown : there ain't no room in this town (Truth) for both tangible Matter and intangible Mind. — Gnomon

The soul's deeper parts can only be reached through its surface. In this way the eternal forms, that mathematics and philosophy and the other sciences make us acquainted with will by slow percolation gradually reach the very core of one's being, and will come to influence our lives; and this they will do, not because they involve truths of merely vital importance, but because they [are] ideal and eternal verities.

The Republicans want major spending cuts, but they want to force those cuts through by threat instead of having to legislate normally. And the cuts they’re asking for are appalling: they include slashing funds to things like cancer research, rental assistance for the poor, support for schools with large numbers of low-income students, and pay for Americans in uniform. The Republican bill would end Biden’s attempt at student loan debt relief, repeal tax breaks for renewables and clean energy while increasing reliance on fossil fuels, raise already-onerous work requirements to receive food stamps and welfare benefits, and decrease the efficiency and abilities of the IRS.

The Republican proposal would leave a great many Americans worse off – but (OF COURSE) it would be a boon for oil executives and wealthy tax avoiders. ...

Today’s Republicans are a party of destruction. As much as they claim to want to make America great again, they seem much more intent on sowing division, fomenting chaos and embracing an ethos of nihilism. There is no school shooting brutal enough to make them reconsider America’s extreme gun laws; no pregnant woman who suffers enough to make them take a step back on criminalizing abortion; and virtually nothing their unelected leader Donald Trump can to do make them reject him – allowing a deadly attack on the Capitol, being deemed a sexual abuser by a New York jury, and undermining America’s tradition of free and fair elections have not been enough to end the Republican party’s love affair with Trump. As the party has not only embraced Trump but molded itself in his image, it has become all the more dangerous to the nation. — The Guardian

I don't see what the causal relationships would be between mentality--it is all immaterial mind operations. — Bob Ross

Rational explanations do not reveal the same sorts of causal connections that explanations in the natural sciences do. Rather, rational causation draws on the theoretical and practical inferential abilities of human beings.

I am wondering how that activity is specific to a problem we are having now seen side by side with people having the problem at other times. — Paine

go on to easy passage in the Senate for Biden to sign the clean debt ceiling raise into law by the first of June — 180 Proof

The article assumes a divide between language and the study of what exists which ignores how the problem of language has always been central to the concerns of philosophers. — Paine

We can speak of "soul" as exploratory concepts, but if anyone claims the soul to be a real thing, they have a burden of proof to such a claim and if that proof is simply a religious belief, it is not philosophy anymore, but evangelism. — Christoffer

We can't ignore that the claims about the physical world are false by what we know today in physics. — Christoffer

In order to go beyond a way of thinking, you first have to demonstrate a proper understanding of it. — Joshs

It doesn't need to be of empirical scientific validation, but at least logical and hold together without unsupported claims as foundational premises. — Christoffer

Then there is the master.... — Christoffer

The mind of him who stands detached is of such nobility that whatever he sees is true and whatever he desires he obtains and whatever he commands must be obeyed. And this you must know for sure: when the free mind is quite detached, it constrains God to itself and if it were able to stand formless and free of all accidentals, it would assume God’s proper nature … The man who stands thus in utter detachment is rapt into eternity in such a way that nothing transient can move him … — Meister Eckhart

It's when religious truth claims and conclusions are made based purely on the belief biased to that religion that it stops being philosophy and becomes biased delusion. — Christoffer

The extraordinary and eccentric emphasis on "belief" in Christianity today is an accident of history that has distorted our understanding of religious truth. We call religious people "believers", as though acceptance of a set of doctrines was their principal activity, and before undertaking the religious life many feel obliged to satisfy themselves about the metaphysical claims of the church, which cannot be proven rationally since they lie beyond the reach of empirical sense data.

Most other traditions prize practice above creedal orthodoxy: Buddhists, Hindus, Confucians, Jews and Muslims would say religion is something you do, and that you cannot understand the truths of faith unless you are committed to a transformative way of life that takes you beyond the prism of selfishness. — Karen Armstrong, Metaphysical Mistake

Ghost in the Shell... — Christoffer

By voting to give them power in the first place, you are agreeing to give them the power to potentially outlaw future elections. You would be at their mercy, so your solution of voting them out is being hopeful at best. — AntonioP

You can call voting "consenting", but why would you consent to allowing politicians to write and pass whichever laws they feel like? — AntonioP

Special counsel John Durham had everything he needed. Time, money, resources and a clear if not-quite-stated charge from then-Attorney General William P. Barr: Go after the investigation into Russia’s attempts to manipulate the 2016 election. Turn over every rock. Make the whole thing look like the “hoax” Donald Trump said it was.

Durham has released his report, and not only is it a dud, but in many ways it’s also the direct opposite of the investigation by the other special counsel in this case, Robert S. Mueller III.

Mueller amassed a mountain of evidence making clear the shocking sweep of Russia’s campaign to put Trump in the White House. He also showed how eager Trump, his family and his aides were to receive Vladimir Putin’s help. Yet Mueller bent over backward to avoid saying that Trump was guilty of a crime or that the whole affair met the legal definition of a criminal conspiracy.

In contrast, Durham assembled a molehill, which Trump and his supporters are desperately trying to claim is a mountain.

Beginning in 2019, Durham spent years and millions of dollars investigating Crossfire Hurricane, the FBI’s investigation of the Russian interference effort. While his 300-page report excoriated the FBI, just about all the facts he discusses were detailed more than three years ago in an inspector general’s report that revealed serious problems with the way the bureau handled Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) warrant requests, among other things.

But if you look at the way conservatives are spinning the report by Durham, you’d think he claimed that the FBI never should have investigated Russia’s efforts in the first place. That’s bonkers.

“Yes, the FBI could be second-guessed for some of its decisions, and it got sloppy” at times, says Barbara McQuade, a University of Michigan law professor and former U.S. attorney. But given the suggestion that a hostile foreign power was trying to manipulate a presidential election, “it would have been a dereliction of duty not to investigate.” ...

During the campaign, Trump, members of his family and his campaign aides had dozens of contacts with Russian nationals and officials. His campaign chairman, Paul Manafort, and Manafort’s deputy, Rick Gates, who both worked for pro-Russian oligarchs and politicians in Ukraine, passed confidential internal polling data to a Russian intelligence operative.

Russia hacked Democratic National Committee servers, then passed embarrassing information to WikiLeaks so it could be released publicly at moments advantageous to Trump. WikiLeaks was in communication about the information with Trump adviser Roger Stone, whom Trump later pardoned for lying to Congress about the scandal, witness tampering and obstruction. Russia also mounted a comprehensive trolling campaign through social media to boost Trump’s presidential bid. Plus, the infamous Trump Tower meeting with Russian nationals.

Trump successfully convinced people that all of that (and more) could be reduced to the question of whether he “colluded” with the Kremlin, a word with no fixed meaning. Mueller unwittingly helped in this effort by contending in his report that he was prevented by Justice Department policies from saying Trump committed crimes, even though he offered copious evidence that Trump did, especially in his efforts to obstruct the investigation.

Mueller “practically stood on his head to avoid besmirching Donald Trump out of an exercise of caution,” McQuade told me. “I don’t see Durham doing the same thing here.” In fact, Durham did just the opposite. His report ignores that it would have been insane for the FBI not to investigate what turned out to be perhaps the most dangerous effort ever of a hostile foreign power attempting to manipulate American politics.

You’ll search his report in vain for any mention of, for instance, the fact that Trump’s campaign chairman passed information to a Russian intelligence operative. Nearly every mention of Manafort is about his relationship with former Trump campaign adviser Carter Page, who turned out to be an inconsequential figure in the scandal yet takes up much of the space in Durham’s report because of the FBI’s shoddy means of obtaining FISA warrants to surveil him.

In the end, Durham’s investigation achieved little to nothing of consequence. He indicted three people, one of whom pleaded guilty to illegally modifying an email and was sentenced to probation; the other two were acquitted. His report tries to turn what is already known about FBI sloppiness into something new and shocking.

But if his goal was to give Trump and his dishonest minions an excuse to repeat their bogus claims about his innocence in the Russia scandal? Mission accomplished. — Washington Post

in which he argues that the belief in political authority, or the institution of government, is the most dangerous superstition people have been taught. — AntonioP

I have no problem with the Materialism embodied in my cell-phone. But I do take issue with ignoring the philosophical questions raised by the spooky foundations of the material world. — Gnomon