On Dec 18, 5:13*pm, "ooznb" wrote:
"Fran" wrote in message

...
On Dec 18, 3:07 pm, john fernbach wrote:



On Dec 15, 7:42 pm, Fran wrote:

On Dec 16, 3:37 am, john fernbach wrote:

On Dec 15, 5:39 am, Fran wrote:

On Dec 15, 5:52 pm, "HD" wrote:

"Fran" wrote in message

...

On Dec 15, 3:59 pm, "HD" wrote:
"ooznb" wrote in
...
Worshipping the Weather

December 14 2008

Larrey Anderson

Everyone is religious. People will have their religion. The
particular
religion does not, necessarily, have to include worship of a
god -- but
it
must include a dogma and rituals.

The word "Religion" means Fear of God.

Actually, the origins of the term are unclear. In English, it is
first
attested at around 1200 when it referred to those *bound* by
monastic
vows. The Latin "religare" means "to bind fast". Contemporary
words in
English such as "reliable" have this derivation. The etymology
may be
apocryphal since this was a time when Latin was written more
frequently than English particularly in the church.

One might speculate that a person devoted to worhip things godly
or
monastic might persistently read and re-read texts (hence
Cicero's
suggestion re + legare). Just as the meaning of texts (ie
textiles
[woven things] on which ideas and accounts were set down in
ancient
Sumeria) became transferred to the articles and then the ideas
themselves (hence our modern word "text") so too one can imagine
that
a person devoted to re-reading texts, perhaps in solitude
(recall than
monastic life is about 'oneness' hence the "mono" stem) might be
an
exemplar of 'religionem' or "respect for things sacred;
reverence for
gods".

[Sidebar: It's interesting that text is, after all, *ideas*
woven
together with *syntax* whereas in ancient Sumeria things were
written
onto woven things -- language comes full circle. Equally
interestingly, the first computer like programs were written on
what
was known as a "Jacquard loom" -- long punch card like
'software' that
looked like pianola roles that allowed the loom -- a weaving
machine
to operate). But I digress ...

If my hypothesis is correct this idea of weaving and text should
go
back further than the Latin "legere" to read/go through, perhaps
to
proto-Indo-European (PIE), and indeed this turns out to be so..
There
is a straight line between the modern word 'lecture' to 'lectus'
(the
past participle of 'legere') where it also was used to convey
the
idea of "gathering and choosing" (compare "elect", "select",
"collect"). Homer used the Greek "legein" in this sense and also
to
mean "enumerate" and "logos" for "word speech, thought,
description".
The stem 'leg" does appear in PIE as "gather" or "collect" or
"pick".
The word "lignin" describing the robust carbon-based material in
woody
plants has this root (no pun intended), presumably because this
is
what people were gathering up. Ironic that they later made paper
out
of it!\ and we now do "elections" on these things.
Interestingly, the
word "elite" (chosen ones) has the same etymological origins

So as it turns out, religion may have a basis in respect for
forests
after all.

Isn't etymology fun?

You are full of bull****.
You don't have a religion, you have a sick obsession.

Since when is sick obsession incompatible with religion?

Fran

That all depends on your understanding of religion and worship.
If religion gives you the serenity to face all situations of life
without
anxiety or guilt;

Religion isn't necessary to that, and in some cases, it's religion
that ensures that you will have anxiety and guilt.

If you see God's face in your fellow human being, then it
is not a sick obsession.

Well it might not be a sick obsession, but in all honesty, it would
make you a little odd.

In America recently, some of the religious were seeing in the face
of
Obama not "god" but "satan".

But if you jump up and down like a possessed
fanatical born again idiot, then you have a sick obsession. But
then, the
latter are semi agnostics who need to see signs, miracles and
wonders.

If religion comforts people and harms nobody else, then I've no
objection, but the trouble is that so often it's simply the rubric
for
animus, violent communalism and repression. As the bearer of
"absolute
truth" this is its most logical expression.

Fran- Hide quoted text -

- Show quoted text -

Fran - You don't think it's just alienated human consciousness, as
Feuerbach thought?

"Religious distress is at the same time the expression of real
distress and the protest against real distress. Religion is the sigh
of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, just as it
is the spirit of a spiritless situation. It is the opium of the
people. The abolition of religion as the illusory happiness of the
people is required for their real happiness. The demand to give up the
illusion about its condition is the demand to give up a condition
which needs illusions."

Karl Marx, Critique of Hegel’s Philosophy of Right- Hide quoted text -

Oh I entirely accept Marx's commentary here and in broad terms, that
of Feuerbach as well. It's not at all in conflict with what I said.

There is, to follow Marx's point, no vehicle,as things stand, for
people giving up the conditions which 'need' illusions. Scarcity
persists and so repression and human alenation must also persist.

Fran- Hide quoted text -

- Show quoted text -

I wonder if one of the conditions that make people "need" religion
isn't the inevitability of death, and our fear of it.

Rational people fear that their *lives* will be pointless, and that is
where religion can play a role.
************************************************** ***

Aha, you've finally admitted your primary reason for converting to the
anthropogenic global warming religion!!


As usual, your logic is specious and your data corrupt.


I thought so all along, baby!!


You don't 'think' about anything. You merely regurgitate.

Why don't you try a respectable religion then?


I'm interested neither in religion nor acquiring the respect of people
such as you.

Fran