24-Dec-18 World View -- Generational Dynamics analysis of the troop withdrawal from Syria

Discussion of Web Log and Analysis topics from the Generational Dynamics web site.
John
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Re: 24-Dec-18 World View -- Generational Dynamics analysis of the troop withdrawal from Syria

Post by John »

shoshin wrote: > Where is Chirstopher Hitchens when you need him?

> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xYrVh1I-E_E

> The Catholic Church has ZERO moral standing (priests raped nuns,
> forced them to have abortions).
And let's not forget that in the Old Testament, God orders
the Israelites to commit genocide and ethnic cleansing.
shoshin wrote: > I would rather you didn't kill yourself, John, as I like having
> you around, but that's selfish, isnt it?

> Do what you want, it's your life.
Thank you. I couldn't agree more.

Higgenbotham
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Re: 24-Dec-18 World View -- Generational Dynamics analysis of the troop withdrawal from Syria

Post by Higgenbotham »

This is John's forum. And I'm not going to render an opinion on suicide because he didn't ask me for one. If my opinion or help in that regard is asked for (by John, nobody else), I will give it. I've seen no indication that my opinion (or anybody else's) is wanted by him.

What he did ask the forum for was to ensure that a good deal of his life's work (this web site) be preserved. As I see it, this was done as a courtesy to the many readers who may have come to the site one day and find that it no longer exists. The planned suicide was mentioned as an introduction to the business at hand to explain why it is urgent that the business at hand (namely what is going to happen to this web site) be considered.
While the periphery breaks down rather slowly at first, the capital cities of the hegemon should collapse suddenly and violently.

John
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Re: 24-Dec-18 World View -- Generational Dynamics analysis of the troop withdrawal from Syria

Post by John »

** 02-Apr-2019 Future of forum
Higgenbotham wrote: > This is John's forum. And I'm not going to render an opinion on
> suicide because he didn't ask me for one. If my opinion or help in
> that regard is asked for (by John, nobody else), I will give it.
> I've seen no indication that my opinion (or anybody else's) is
> wanted by him.

> What he did ask the forum for was to ensure that a good deal of
> his life's work (this web site) be preserved. As I see it, this
> was done as a courtesy to the many readers who may have come to
> the site one day and find that it no longer exists. The planned
> suicide was mentioned as an introduction to the business at hand
> to explain why it is urgent that the business at hand (namely what
> is going to happen to this web site) be considered.
Thank you.

This is a good time to repeat that the GenerationalDynamics.com and
gdxforum.com web sites will probably disappear unless someone is
willing to take responsibility for them. It requires some technical
expertise, and costs around $50+ per month for the web hosting and the
periodic domain registration. My preference would be that they be
taken over by an organization -- educational, analyst, business or
government, but I'll consider any offer.

FishbellykanakaDude
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Re: 24-Dec-18 World View -- Generational Dynamics analysis of the troop withdrawal from Syria

Post by FishbellykanakaDude »

John wrote:** 02-Apr-2019 Catholic Encyclopedia on Suicide
John wrote: > Catholic Encyclopedia on Suicide

> http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/14326b.htm
FishbellykanakaDude wrote: > To commit suicide is a sin. Period.
Wow! You seem to have it all figured out, don't you. Since
the Bible doesn't prohibit suicide, I assume you're just one of
the sheep following the rant in the Catholic Encyclopedia, or similar
rants elsewhere.
Actually, yeah, I do have it all figured out. But just for myself. This is one of those areas where each of us has to "figure it out" for ourselves. :)

..and no, I only follow my own rants, thank you.
So I guess you've also decided that a person with cancer who
refuses treatment is also a sinner. Or a person who signs a
DNR so that his parents won't have to suffer through months
of pain is also a major sinner.
Well, since we're all sinners, that's rather a distinction without a difference.

Taking treatment (for cancer) is not a guarantee that life will be saved, therefore refusing treatment is not a sin, per se.

Refusing treatment that guarantees survival would be a sin, but as with all sins, absolution is always possible, and highly probable under the "truly regretful when the rubber meets the road" principle.

Authorizing another person's DNR is a sin, but the regret or lack thereof will be dealt with eventually anyway, as with all accumulated sins, and usually not until the choice is "urgent".
But there's a more fundamental issue. The Catholic Encyclopedia rant
says: "Positive and direct suicide perpetrated without God's consent
always constitutes a grave injustice towards Him."
The crux of the issue is "God's consent", which no one knows.

I'm not a big "subscriber" to the "property rights" argument promulgated by the Church, myself.

In my opinion, God is a big boy, and can handle trivial "injustices" against Him. The more "convincing" argument (to me) is that God wants what's best for us to fully experience ALL of life, so as to "learn" most, and our "short-circuiting" that which is available to us to learn from is a "non-optimal" thing.

Once again,.. just my opinion, but even great suffering is preferable to wasting a second of "living existence", and having that "experience/learning" to "use" (whatever that may mean!) in the eternity we will inhabit.

I know,.. crazy,.. but except for the minuscule number of people with the same thinking as myself, the consequences OF my thinking is my problem, and no one else's. :)
So when you condemn someone for committing suicide, you're taking on
the role of God himself, by claiming to know whether God gave his
consent.

You are absolutely correct! But I DON'T condemn anyone, for anything. Saying something another does is a sin is not a condemnation. It's merely an observation that that other person will have something "weighty" to deal with at some point in the future.

Anyone who claims to know the mind of God is, at best, severely delusional with grandiosity, which is by definition a sin, which will have to be dealt with, as with any other sin.

Condemnation comes from the actor "finally" not having regrets for that which should be regretted.
A person committing suicide may have good reason to believe
that God gave consent, and has no obligation whatsoever to provide you
with the reasons behind that belief.
Firstly, to believe one knows God consented to ANYTHING is the same sin as believing one knows the mind of God, which we've established is a no-no.

Secondly, it is supremely uncharitable to think the worst of people, and imagining that anyone owes you (OK... me) ANYTHING regarding their "moral thinking" is massively egomaniacal ("thar be demons!"), degrading to the person being considered, uncharitable, and extremely rude. (Not to mention counterproductive, and several other negative things.)

(..I don't really have a problem being "a bit" rude, but that's REALLY rude!)
So unless you claim to be
speaking for God, then you have no right to pass judgment.
I personally don't make those claims, and it's not my place (as explained above) to condemn people.

:) ʻE aloha nui guyz! Nā mahalo for the good walaʻau. (conversation, chit-chat)

John
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Re: 24-Dec-18 World View -- Generational Dynamics analysis of the troop withdrawal from Syria

Post by John »

** 02-Apr-2019 #2 Catholic Encyclopedia on Suicide
FishbellykanakaDude wrote: > Well, since we're all sinners, that's rather a distinction without
> a difference.
Copout.
FishbellykanakaDude wrote: > Taking treatment (for cancer) is not a guarantee that life will be
> saved, therefore refusing treatment is not a sin, per se.
Total copout. Jumping off a building is not a guarantee that you'll
be killed, so according to you it's not a sin. In fact, applying your
reasoning, almost nothing is a sin, since you almost never predict the
consequences of your actions with 100% mathematical certainty.
FishbellykanakaDude wrote: > Firstly, to believe one knows God consented to ANYTHING is the
> same sin as believing one knows the mind of God, which we've
> established is a no-no.
Well, first off, that means that the entire "God's consent" part of
the Catholic Encyclopedia rant on suicide is meaningless, and since
the entire rant hinges on consent, that makes the entire rant
meaningless, according to you.

Second, I've known many people who pray every day and believe that
they receive signs from God. No one has ever told me that he received
a sign that he can commit suicide, but it's certainly plausible.
Furthermore, if you go back to the Catholic Encyclopedia, you'll see
that it seems to excuse suicide in some cases, e.g., when someone is
"impelled by the desire of martyrdom." By the way, Muslim jihadists
will be happy to hear that.

FishbellykanakaDude
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Re: 24-Dec-18 World View -- Generational Dynamics analysis of the troop withdrawal from Syria

Post by FishbellykanakaDude »

John wrote:** 02-Apr-2019 #2 Catholic Encyclopedia on Suicide
FishbellykanakaDude wrote: > Well, since we're all sinners, that's rather a distinction without
> a difference.
Copout.
You can characterize it as you wish, of course, but my point was that committing a sin is not equivalent to being damned to hell.

I ate too much chocolate, so I'm a (gluttonous) sinner.
I refused life saving treatment, so I'm a (non-gluttonous) sinner.
I authorized a DNR for another person, so I'm a (still non-gluttonous) sinner.

Sin is sin, and will need to be dealt with at some point,.. and the only difference between ALL the various sins is the "proposed" (meaning: "guestimated") severity of the "regret" that the sinner will have to deal with when that time comes.
FishbellykanakaDude wrote: > Taking treatment (for cancer) is not a guarantee that life will be
> saved, therefore refusing treatment is not a sin, per se.
Total copout. Jumping off a building is not a guarantee that you'll
be killed, so according to you it's not a sin. In fact, applying your
reasoning, almost nothing is a sin, since you almost never predict the
consequences of your actions with 100% mathematical certainty.
I'm not gonna argue with your use of the word "copout", as it's neither here nor there as far as this conversation is concerned.

So, to your point that "sin" is a very "fuzzy" term. I agree wholeheartedly. :)

It's not my (or anyone's) job to definitively call people sinners. That's not the "important part". The important part is that a general principle be recognizable as a possible signal of "error", so that "error correction" might become more probable, if that's appropriate.

Sorry for the "fuzzy words" there. It's necessary to use them because it's very fuzzy subject.

There are NO hard and fast (or mathematical) rules when it comes to this "sin" business. But it is possible to find general principles.

"Unnecessarily" ending life is GENERALLY not a good thing. Any "unnecessary" not-good-thing is a sin. That's what "sin" means.

..but there may be mitigating circumstances that can be convincing that the unnecessary is necessary, at least at the time.

That is why sin is forgivable. And will always BE forgiven as long as the ego (accumulated self accepted "demons") has not made self-forgiveness, otherwise known as heartfelt regret, impossible.
FishbellykanakaDude wrote: > Firstly, to believe one knows God consented to ANYTHING is the
> same sin as believing one knows the mind of God, which we've
> established is a no-no.
Well, first off, that means that the entire "God's consent" part of
the Catholic Encyclopedia rant on suicide is meaningless, and since
the entire rant hinges on consent, that makes the entire rant
meaningless, according to you.
It IS meaningless as a formula to definitively assign guilt or innocence. (Let that soak in for a while!)

The "rant", as you put it, is for recognizing where people may incur "future regret", so that they can be prepared to deal with it eventually.
Second, I've known many people who pray every day and believe that
they receive signs from God.
Everyone receives signals (signs) from God. But signals are different from "getting God's consent".

Getting a definitive "agreement" (consent) from God is merely wishful egomaniacal thinking. That's my opinion, and it has exactly ZERO value to everyone other than myself. Unless someone else believes as I do, of course.
No one has ever told me that he received
a sign that he can commit suicide, but it's certainly plausible.
I'm sure if you checked closely that very many suicides "knew" perfectly well that God had given them His consent to murder themselves, "disguised" as to "kill themselves", further disguised as to "relieve their pain".

But that is completely irrelevant, because the only thing that matters is whether the dying choose to forgive themselves of whatever "regrettable stuff" they've done, or not.

All I know, for certain, is that it's not my job to condemn anyone.
Furthermore, if you go back to the Catholic Encyclopedia, you'll see
that it seems to excuse suicide in some cases, e.g., when someone is
"impelled by the desire of martyrdom." By the way, Muslim jihadists
will be happy to hear that.
The Church is an institution that exists in, and has to "deal with", the temporal human world, and is composed of human persons.

That means it's susceptible to the same "egomaniacal" (demonic, or "obsession with the inappropriate") forces that any other group of humans are.

Putting yourself in danger to try to minimize the suffering of others is charity (caritas).

Ending your own life before that is necessary is "non-optimal", and God really loves optimizing that which should be optimized, but nobody knows what actually IS optimal, so we all do our best to achieve what we imagine we think might be God's optimization,.. or we actively don't,.. which is called doing evil.

There is only one mortal sin. The sin of final non-regret of that which we should be regretful.

That, and only that, has you sending yourself to hell.

But none of that is my job, nor anyone else's. :)

John
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Re: 24-Dec-18 World View -- Generational Dynamics analysis of the troop withdrawal from Syria

Post by John »

FishbellykanakaDude wrote: > I'm sure if you checked closely that very many suicides "knew"
> perfectly well that God had given them His consent to murder
> themselves, "disguised" as to "kill themselves", further disguised
> as to "relieve their pain".
That makes sense to me. If a religious Catholic is going to commit
suicide, and he prays to God and responds to what he believes are
signs from God -- then he would look for consent. And only he would
know whether he's received that consent, so I wouldn't put "knew" in
quotes.

I get the feeling that someone in your life must have committed
suicide. Please accept my sympathy.

FishbellykanakaDude
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Re: 24-Dec-18 World View -- Generational Dynamics analysis of the troop withdrawal from Syria

Post by FishbellykanakaDude »

John wrote:
FishbellykanakaDude wrote: > I'm sure if you checked closely that very many suicides "knew"
> perfectly well that God had given them His consent to murder
> themselves, "disguised" as to "kill themselves", further disguised
> as to "relieve their pain".
That makes sense to me. If a religious Catholic is going to commit
suicide, and he prays to God and responds to what he believes are
signs from God -- then he would look for consent. And only he would
know whether he's received that consent, so I wouldn't put "knew" in
quotes.

I get the feeling that someone in your life must have committed
suicide. Please accept my sympathy.
No... actually, I suppose that my Mom comes closest to willing herself to death. She was a rather unhappy lady, most probably clinically depressed from her mid-teens, who smoked like a chinese french woman masquerading as a rich filipino tobacco merchant addicted to his product for 40 years with no friends to make him feel bad about always stinking of cigarettes and really expensive cigars that smell of ass.

She seemed relieved at the bone and lung cancer diagnosis, and dropped off quite quickly. She made it to 54.

Thanks for the sympathy, though, by the way. :) Most gracious of ya'!

And, to address the Religious Catholic suicide "victim" thing,.. the more "religious" a person is, the more susceptible they are to those "egomaniacal" tendencies (aka those "damned demons that convince you that the masks that they put over reality are real and that there's no need to be regretful of anything you've done because there's nothing more powerful and/or weak than you are because you're the VICTIM, damn it!") that can find a not-reasoned, but very attractive, excuse to do pretty much ANY darned thing.

That's one of the big hazards of promoting the concept of clerics, or the laity, being more "devout" than "learned" (or even "thinking").

..many are barely conscious, actually. It's a very worrisome thing...




Now, for all those devout hampster-brains out there...

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Tom Mazanec
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Re: 24-Dec-18 World View -- Generational Dynamics analysis of the troop withdrawal from Syria

Post by Tom Mazanec »

John, I just got another idea.
When you run out of money, go to the swankiest restaurant in town. Order the fanciest meal. After you finish, tell them you can't pay.
Then at least you can get three hots and a cot.
“Hard times create strong men. Strong men create good times. Good times create weak men. And, weak men create hard times.”

― G. Michael Hopf, Those Who Remain

FishbellykanakaDude
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Re: 24-Dec-18 World View -- Generational Dynamics analysis of the troop withdrawal from Syria

Post by FishbellykanakaDude »

Tom Mazanec wrote:John, I just got another idea.
When you run out of money, go to the swankiest restaurant in town. Order the fanciest meal. After you finish, tell them you can't pay.
Then at least you can get three hots and a cot.
Haven't I seen that in at least a half-dozen movies?

.."Victor Victoria" comes to mind. <chuckle!>

Oh,.. well there we go,.. "Joanna John"..!!!

..so, all we need is a Rich Gangster-ish woman (or Politician) who wouldn't mind "palling around with" an apparent male impersonating female political analyst and authoress (!?), who is actually a man pretending to be a woman pretending to be a man, who scandalously falls in love with "her" causing a huge kerfuffle in "gangster/political society", which,.. uh,.. this is getting complicated...

Anyway,.. they get together and live the good life on her dime...

..until she is destroyed (aka "taken out poimanently (sic)") by the LGBTQXYZ Identity Politics mob for betraying them because Joanna is REALLY John, and not Joanna.

Although John wins in the end because they WERE married, as wife-and-wife, which is adjudicated not fraud because "gender is fluid and arbitrarily changeable", so he gets to keep all their assets.

FIN.

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