Subj : Rush to Judgement?
To   : RALPH ZETTER
From : Frank Masingill
Date : Wed Nov 01 2000 05:14 am

 RZ> I do find the few truly philosphical bits here to be
 RZ> interesting. Todd believes in the Biblical God and it's
 RZ> accompanying philosophy, John believes the universe is alive,
 RZ> and I'm still not sure what Frank believes, but I like the mix
 RZ> of all these ideas. And how the topic goes back and forth
 RZ> betwen science, religion, philosophy, and back around again.
 RZ> Good mix. I suppose Joseph is an atheist. There are a few
 RZ> others here, but these guys seem to talk the most and the
 RZ> loudest. :-)

        You may put it down firmly that I'm not looking for
anybody's set of answers to "believe" or for a "good mix" but for
the truth of existence.  I will dialogue with anybody who is serious
about the same thing.  Such philosophers aren't looking for
anybody's shortcut "answers" but for more precise and thoughtful
ways of asking the question of origin and destiny, personal and
social.  You may also put it down that when I use the term "God" I'm
not advancing either a "philosophical" or a "biblical" God OR a dead
God.  One simply uses a convenient symbol that has been common to
philosophers searching for the same truth of existence ever since
the dissociation of the cosmos and the process called
"dedivinization."  Note that I didn't say dedivinization of the
cosmos OR the world because there or not now and never have been any
gods in either the cosmos or the world after dissociation of the
cosmos.  

        There are plenty of ready-made belief systems if that is
what one is looking for.  Somebody MAY be at your front door next
week trying to plop their's upon you.  All you have to do is think
that it's well dressed out and logical or terribly attractive with
all kinds of knowledge of that which "only gods could know." 

        And then, on the other hand, there is science, openness to
truth as it might unfold in experience and philosophy as love of
wisdom unto its source in the Divine Ground of Existence which
DRIVES science but is mediated to humans ONLY through the medium of
the myth (not, I reiterate and reiterate a bad word but a necessary
one).

        One should not look only in philosophy books for philosophy.
Remember the courtroom scene in the _Oh God_ fantasy movie when the
attorney for the prating evangelist says he NOW wants to ask God
some questions.  "Sit down, Sonny, I've answered enough questions."
Did you notice how quickly the director of the movie has the
attorney sit back down?  It reminded me of Plato's Thracian slave
girls who laugh when Philosophers with eyes on the stars fall into
wells.  But then, says Plato, if the Philosopher can EVER get one of
these men who are standing so firmly in life, into existential
quiet,  THEN instead of the philosopher "stumbling into wells" it is
the "Man of Affairs" who becomes "small like a child."     

        Philosophy is being done WHEREVER man is questioning and
wondering in true Aristotelian fashion.  When one has stumbled on a
satisfactory ANSWER or a GOOD MIX philosophy has twinkled out of the
door.

Frank

Frank

--- PPoint 2.07
 * Origin: Maybe in 5000 years (1:396/45.12)

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