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Post by Tenarke on Feb 13, 2005 14:53:21 GMT -5
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Post by RobertGraves on Feb 23, 2005 1:40:22 GMT -5
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Post by Wyndham on Mar 1, 2005 9:28:29 GMT -5
Tenarke/Roberts: No worries though. It appears the scientists are working on a pill for what ails you. In a decade or so, you'll be off to chapel with the best of 'em. www.guardian.co.uk/life/feature/story/0,13026,1423450,00.html |
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Post by RobertGraves on Mar 1, 2005 13:35:30 GMT -5
An interesting article W. '...it's interesting to see how brains can create very strange states of consciousness, but in terms of threatening religion, I think it'll have absolutely no effect.' Religion is a very out there state of being. www.abc.net.au/news/newsitems/200503/s1313779.htmAsylum seeker numbers down. Will the extreme policies continue? |
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Post by Tenarke on Mar 1, 2005 15:35:34 GMT -5
Sorry Wyndham, the only pill I take these days is for hyperacidity.
Besides, my wife has pointed out that the only way to become one of the chosen involves circumcision.
Oh yes; that reminds me. There is one other pill I take from time to time. A blue one.
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Post by Wyndham on Mar 1, 2005 16:45:32 GMT -5
You had me stumped Tenarke. Had to look up 'blue pill' on google. Viagra! Say it isn't so.
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Post by Wyndham on Mar 2, 2005 9:46:54 GMT -5
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Post by Tenarke on Mar 2, 2005 20:49:05 GMT -5
Thank you, Wyn; I did.
I read, and enjoyed, Candide many years ago. However my knowledge of Voltaire himself was pretty superficial. The article you linked tells me more about the man and, if anything, I like him even better.
Touching on Leibniz and optimism this echoes back to the Greeks. Socrates had the same opinion as to this being the best of all possible worlds.
A more contemporary iteration of this has to do with the definition of the optimist as opposed to the pessimist. The optimist holds that this is the best of all possible worlds, whereas the pessimist is afraid that the optimist is right.
As for the blue pills; what will be will be. I am 75 this year and am no longer as upstanding as when in my youth. When the occasion arises, the pills work.
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Post by Wyndham on Mar 2, 2005 23:13:28 GMT -5
I like him too. Horror is horror. Who said 'by their fruits shall you know them'. I wish some contemporaries would remember.
75! If you exit Tenarke, full of blue pills, booze and badness, you'll be my hero.
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Post by Aravis on Mar 3, 2005 1:48:45 GMT -5
Great article. I had a good chuckle over the Martha Stewart shopping comparison.  Tenarke's pill preference puts me in mind of something that happened to a friend a few years ago. He was on the volunteer ambulance squad and got a call one night for an unknown medical condition. When he and the crew got to the house in question, a 91-yr.-old man was waiting for them and demanded to be taken to the hospital. When asked what was wrong, he informed them that he had been trying to make love to his wife and for the first time in his life, he was unable to attain an erection. Therefore, he must need medical attention and he called an ambulance. My friend and his fellow EMT's escorted the gentlemen to the hospital, each secretly hoping that they, too, would reach the age of 91 before that function failed them.  |
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Post by john on Mar 3, 2005 23:52:33 GMT -5
You rang, Wyndham?  Matthew 7:16 "Ye shall know them by their fruits. Do men gather grapes of thorns, or figs of thistles? Matthew 7:20 "Wherefore by their fruits ye shall know them." |
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Post by RobertGraves on Mar 5, 2005 18:45:04 GMT -5
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Post by RobertGraves on Mar 18, 2005 16:30:55 GMT -5
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Post by Tenarke on Mar 19, 2005 17:34:07 GMT -5
The fundamentalists are at it again! www.nytimes.com/2005/03/19/national/19imax.html?thThis alarms me, as being more and more typical of a trend. By pitting religious faith so squarely against science, damage may be done to both. As those who have been with me for a while know, I am not myself actively religious, but this does not mean that I am opposed to those who do have faith and who find strength and comfort in it. I know that much of our cultural heritage including our sciences comes down to us through the middle ages into the renaissance due to the work of the church and its scholars. These men recognized human reason as a benefit and scholasticism as a virtuous pursuit. Now it seems that the church is in danger of being defined by lesser men who to serve their own ignorance would set it in opposition to its own heritage. |
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Post by RobertGraves on Mar 20, 2005 13:42:04 GMT -5
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