george bush has 2 years to brake the presidental curse



just becouse your parinoid doesn't mean people aren't out to get you

The only reason the world is rich or poor, is because of capatalism. The fact that we have people telling us what to do is a fact of human nature. We crave order, and we are willing to give up a litte bit of our 'soul' or freedom, if it keeps us safe.

This may be so, and if it is, it is most definitely wrong to let capitalism rule our lives. Nothing 'good' comes of it, except for making the elite few even more wealthy at the cost of our savings, our retirement, our child's education and well being (think two working parents... daycare... seven dollar an hour 'babysitters' who really could care less about what they fill your developing child's mind full of).
Our country is very far down the list of top producing nations, yet any of the European one's who beat us give their employees the equivalent of about three months off a year in terms of mandatory vacation/holiday/family time. So why can't our country do this? Because of greed, capitalistic greed.
I may crave some sort of order amongst the chaos but I never asked for this... the incessant rat race every morning, five days a week, just to make money to pay bills for the 'gift' of life.
Electricity, water, heat, shelter... these should all be a given considering how long our society has been around. It doesn't make someone better by depriving them of these things... nor should they be held hostage to these bills. What about our homeless, our old, our weak who cannot do for themselves?
If you wonder what this has to do with Satan... you need to re-evaluate the conversation a bit because to me, it seems he has us acting just like he wanted us to, and he can gleefully throw this at God daily as proof that we are not worth the Lord's love, kindness, or charity... because of our own actions.
Bear with me here, for it's Monday morning and the sand still pours from my eyes.

i believe Islam is under heavy attack, and i think the biggest threat comes from i'ts own achillies heel of intollerance.

Intolerance is a big problem for every major religion I know of, with the possible exception of Buddhism, and I'm pretty sure I just haven't read enough there to know about factional wars among Buddhists or between Buddhists and other factions. The classical samurai were Zen Buddhists, and they hardly refrained from intolerance or violence.

danielost is on to "something" with his list of divisions. For me, much of what's gone on in this amateur theology digression is part of perhaps the most important division in the political world: people who believe in a single, absolute, knowable Truth and people who don't.

Certainty is comfortable when you're thinking about your next meal, and perhaps your next life, but not so good when you're trying to work with other people, much less "history."

Scientists have developed a beam that would be able to penetrate our store memories. Its in its early stages, but when tested this beam was able to make the person remember the smell of something that the beam specified.

Can we get a reference here? This remark brings me back to the science, theory, fact, etc. thing. Written words, in the Torah/Bible/Quran or otherwise, can only be evidence of a particular writer or writers' thoughts. Good nonfiction writing offers the reader ways to check the writer's facts.

Alas, the History Channel, Discovery, and so many other questionable cable operations really seem to be working to persuade everyone that your opinion can trump facts. While I'm obviously an opinionated man and I have mystical tendencies, I admit that I live in a material world, which means I respect things like conservation of momentum, gravity, and the importance of keeping an eye on my blood sugar and electrolytes. What I don't respect is people who are certain that their mystical beliefs are better than mine just because we differ on things like whether or not there is a single, omnipotent, omniscient god.

Plus all this modern lay-reading of Revelations in the Nth translation really scares me sometimes--the phrase "self-fulfilling prophecy" keeps coming to mind.

Plus all this modern lay-reading of Revelations in the Nth translation really scares me sometimes--the phrase "self-fulfilling prophecy" keeps coming to mind

the main problem here is that the two groups of people bringing this prophecy about don't read revelations

there are two truths mans truth and gods truth and i try to listen to gods truth

and a true christian isn't intolerant of anybody
for instance i am against gays but not against the gay person unless said person has done me a wrong

as far as producing is we are near the top of the list

and the main reason in my opionion about the rich getting richer and the poor getting poorer is becouse of raising taxes on the rich

why is this this is becouse the rich own companies like stardock and when their taxes go up all they do is increase the price of the product/service that they provide making the consumer pay their taxes

for instance i am against gays but not against the gay person unless said person has done me a wrong

As the only out gay man I've noticed on the site, I should probably recuse myself from this staggeringly long thread--after one last grumble. "Hate the sin but love the sinner" has never made sense to me. It is Orwellian double-speak.

what i mean is i deal with each person on a personal level

what ever his/her personal beliefs are

besides christ hated sin but loved the sinner didn't he

and i see no reason for you to recuse yourself

i just used that as an example

"Hate the sin but love the sinner" has never made sense to me. It is Orwellian double-speak.

Is this the same as "don't hate the player, hate the game"?

As the only out gay man I've noticed on the site, I should probably recuse myself from this staggeringly long thread--after one last grumble. "Hate the sin but love the sinner" has never made sense to me. It is Orwellian double-speak.

What is Orwellian double speak? i do not understand why it wouldn't make sense? The sin being an action and the sinner being a person. An action and a person seem to me to be two different things or am i just crazy? is a person nothing more than their actions?

is a person nothing more than their actions?

i think that is what we are here to answer

and i am not talking about this feed

the incessant rat race every morning, five days a week, just to make money to pay bills for the 'gift' of life. Electricity, water, heat, shelter... these should all be a given considering how long our society has been around.

Here's an interesting perspective to consider....

What is all this stuff anyway? we have built it all on the ground of a wild planet. Where you now see buildings and streets was once wild and natural land.

I say, apart from appearances, little has really changed. It is still primarily a wild planet, and youMystikmind are in the wilderness trying to survive. Just because we surround ourselves with all these funny little things dousnt change that fact.

Our societies that we live in only function on the basis of words and agreements. Words and agreements enforced by people we call governments. This is all still just a house of cards build most fragile on the top of a very wild planet.

Hehehe... i have been trying to get this thread to go into another discussion for quite a while G.W., all my random blurps arent that random. That beam has actually been filled away somewhere in my archive files, i heard about it quite a while back, dont think much has been done. Again it was just a theory.

Now as for capatalism, its is the best form of a market economy. Capatalism is cruel, but fair, it gives everyone their chance, however that change is often take away by those with the advantage. Socialism on the other hand, is also a very good system for the individual, if you are willing to sacrifice that little tiny part of yourself you call 'free'. The reason European countries can give its citizens vacations, is because they are getting pay from the government(not the employer) for that vacation. This country is already in debt(thank you Hamilton, and those who get what i said ) and wouldnt not be able to do this. Hell, we cant even keep our elderly happy, let alone our young and our middle aged.

Ahh, Mystic, your last sentance brings about the most debated and solid reason for the formation of government. Most, people say that government only formed through the general agreement of a group of individuals to limit their freedoms for the benifit fo the whole.

Now, in not sure which "self-fufiling prophecy" you meant G.W. The one from Statistics and Lab research testing and logistics, or that of religion>

Anyways time for the example of how much we obey authority figures. This quite a fomous and controversial experiment.
What they did was they chose a 'tester' from a random sample of public people. This 'tester' would not know that this was an experiment. All he would be told by the 'observer'(a participant who knew this was an experiment) was that the 'student'(the actually scientist) would be given a list of words to memorize, and then they would have to resite it. If they got a word wrong, the 'tester' was to admister a shock, then a new list would be given and it would be tried again. The 'student' would purposefully get things wrong, because everytime he did the shock would get increasingly painful. In the end the shock was set to a deadly level. Only a few of the 'testers' refused to go on shocking a human being just for money or because the 'observer' told them too. But, a huge majority continued the test untill the deadly level, only because the 'observer' kept telling them that they must go on, they are telling them too, no real harm is happening, plus im telling you too, come on do it, just once more.

Creepy aint it, makes you think if the people under Hitler really knew what they were doing.

Ahh, Mystic, your last sentance brings about the most debated and solid reason for the formation of government. Most, people say that government only formed through the general agreement of a group of individuals to limit their freedoms for the benifit fo the whole.

I thought most governments were formed to replace a previous government??

Now as for capatalism, its is the best form of a market economy. Capatalism is cruel, but fair, it gives everyone their chance, however that change is often take away by those with the advantage. Socialism on the other hand, is also a very good system for the individual, if you are willing to sacrifice that little tiny part of yourself you call 'free'

Capitalism in it's purest form is a balance between the law of supply and demand verses greed verses reputation. As with your own money in the bank... more safe = less potential gain but also less potential risk. This applies to everything in a market economy... There is room for great succes or tremendous failure, and that is why it needs to be regulated. Regulations of course reduce the potential for success as well as failure.

it isn't the governments job to keep anyone happy just healthy

it is the families job to keep people happy and healthy

as far as socialism goes it doesn't work

every country that has social medician their medical system is coming apart

I must ask now, i cant restrain myself any longer.

What is your basis of this? I mean you state one small blrup about this or that, and no explanation, while i spend time writing a post actually explaining something. If i actually took this thread seriously i would be offended. I like this discussion, please dont ruin it

And on a side note:
No i meant the original formation of government, like when we went from barbarianism to civilization, and why that happened.
Technically its a government job to protect its people, what 'protect' means is defined by the people. And if happiness relies on family, than i truely do feel sorry for the world, especially with our divorce rate.