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ninalanyon · 61-69, T
I presume you mean the Christian heaven. Not Valhalla.
No. What little I have heard people say about the place makes it sound terribly dull.
But regardless of that the one thing most people seem to agree on is that it is eternal. That means I won't be missing anything if I hang around here for another decade or two.
Edit: It has always seemed odd to me that people seem to be so reluctant to shuffle off this mortal coil when they claim to be confident of entering heaven and keen to be there.
No. What little I have heard people say about the place makes it sound terribly dull.
But regardless of that the one thing most people seem to agree on is that it is eternal. That means I won't be missing anything if I hang around here for another decade or two.
Edit: It has always seemed odd to me that people seem to be so reluctant to shuffle off this mortal coil when they claim to be confident of entering heaven and keen to be there.
rinkydinkydoink · M
ninalanyon · 61-69, T
@rinkydinkydoink To add to the edit: if people are confident that the innocent go to heaven why do they grieve for them when the die early?
Of course I do feel that I understand grief, to some degree, at least from my own atheist point of view. When I cry at a funeral it is my loss that causes the emotion. And in fact that is how it is invariably referred to. People offer sympathy by saying "I'm sorry for your loss.". They never say "How terrible that your wife [i]is dead.[/i]" nor do many people these days say "Your wife has gone to a better place".
So it seems to me that regardless of whatever humans claim to believe that there is a core of atheism in all of us. That we all deep down in our unconscious know that before we were born we did not exist and that when we die we cease to exist. All the grand edifices of religion are but wishful thinking writ large.
Of course I do feel that I understand grief, to some degree, at least from my own atheist point of view. When I cry at a funeral it is my loss that causes the emotion. And in fact that is how it is invariably referred to. People offer sympathy by saying "I'm sorry for your loss.". They never say "How terrible that your wife [i]is dead.[/i]" nor do many people these days say "Your wife has gone to a better place".
So it seems to me that regardless of whatever humans claim to believe that there is a core of atheism in all of us. That we all deep down in our unconscious know that before we were born we did not exist and that when we die we cease to exist. All the grand edifices of religion are but wishful thinking writ large.
rinkydinkydoink · M
@ninalanyon
Before you wrote this additional edit I commented on a post asking what we don't like about ourselves. I responded by saying I don't believe in anything. This near 77 yr stay on Earth has been but a blink of the eye - not enough time to learn anything, really.
EDIT - I'm not the only one who hasn't learned anything. For how many centuries has the Middle East been war-torn?
Before you wrote this additional edit I commented on a post asking what we don't like about ourselves. I responded by saying I don't believe in anything. This near 77 yr stay on Earth has been but a blink of the eye - not enough time to learn anything, really.
EDIT - I'm not the only one who hasn't learned anything. For how many centuries has the Middle East been war-torn?
ninalanyon · 61-69, T
@rinkydinkydoink
For how many centuries has the Middle East been war-torn?
Not as many as Europe. And quite a lot of that was associated with religion.
ninalanyon · 61-69, T
@rinkydinkydoink
This near 77 yr stay on Earth has been but a blink of the eye - not enough time to learn anything,
It's enough to learn enough to add to what we as a society and species knows.William of Conches writes:
The ancients had only the books which they themselves wrote, but we have all their books and moreover all those which have been written from the beginning until our time.… Hence we are like a dwarf perched on the shoulders of a giant. The former sees further than the giant, not because of his own stature, but because of the stature of his bearer. Similarly, we [moderns] see more than the ancients, because our writings, modest as they are, are added to their great works.[5]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Standing_on_the_shoulders_of_giantsThe ancients had only the books which they themselves wrote, but we have all their books and moreover all those which have been written from the beginning until our time.… Hence we are like a dwarf perched on the shoulders of a giant. The former sees further than the giant, not because of his own stature, but because of the stature of his bearer. Similarly, we [moderns] see more than the ancients, because our writings, modest as they are, are added to their great works.[5]
rinkydinkydoink · M
@ninalanyon
Give me a moment - there's something Einstein wrote along those lines. I need to find it.
EDIT - - for too long some have said Einstein believed in God because he said "God doesn't play with dice". This short piece fleshes out what he really meant.
https://getpocket.com/explore/item/how-einstein-reconciled-religion-to-science?utm_source=firefox-newtab-en-us
Give me a moment - there's something Einstein wrote along those lines. I need to find it.
EDIT - - for too long some have said Einstein believed in God because he said "God doesn't play with dice". This short piece fleshes out what he really meant.
https://getpocket.com/explore/item/how-einstein-reconciled-religion-to-science?utm_source=firefox-newtab-en-us
The word God is for me,” Einstein wrote, “nothing more than the expression and product of human weakness, the Bible a collection of honorable, but still purely primitive, legends.* No interpretation, no matter how subtle, can change this for me.”
ninalanyon · 61-69, T
@rinkydinkydoink The standing on the shoulders of giants bit is also in one of Newton's letters but William of Conches said it five centuries earlier.