On 03 Jan 2013, at 14:47, Craig Weinberg wrote (to Roger Clough):
Personally I believe that Hell and Heaven are metaphors which
extrapolate the ordinary high and low moods of human consciousness
to a super-significance. God is a metaphor in the exact same way -
an algebraic concept of X = Infinite proprietary superlatives.
I don't disagree. Possible.
If you are in a world of competing polytheistic deities, each the
representation of a personal superlative or sphere of influence (God
of war, Goddess of beauty, etc), then the invention of a supreme
ultimate deity who trumps all others in all categories is an
excellent political strategy.
Yes.
Unless the "unique" God is used in a normative way, like if some
people knew better than others in some public way.
Then it is no more an excellent political strategy, but the worst.
Normally comp "well understood" prevent "God", or actually anyone, to
be thinking at your place.
It's a convenient way to consolidate allegiance and direct
everyone's personal insecurities to a mass psychology solution.
(I imagined well you were using "politics" in a pejorative sense, but
politics for me is like sailing, except the boat is not always close
to the sea). By definition I would say that an excellent politics is
one which optimizes stable (perdurable) majority satisfactions.
It is here, like in science, that God is probably the best idea and
"God" is probably the worst idea.
That's the difficulty in theology: to distinguish God from any "God"s.
The confusion is easy, even more in time theology is artificially
separated from the scientific attitude.
By using "religion" and "politics" only in the pejorative sense, not
much hope can remain.
Bruno
http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/
--
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups
"Everything List" group.
To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com.
To unsubscribe from this group, send email to
everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com.
For more options, visit this group at
http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
