Cat Stevens & Marillion

Can you imagine God creating Velvetclown ???????? I rest my case !!

Velvetclown wrote: Well spoken Pixel !!!!

I think we've been here before...

Are you being ironic?

You Velveteen Fool you!

Touche about the monotheistic point,foiled by my own reasoning!

But since no person daring to call himself an intelligent being will question that,as someone once said, religion is a form of mental illness,the fact that millions of people believe that god created himself proves only the rather pathetic state of human minds in general and not that their assertion is a true one. Millions of people all over the world firmly believe that they are routinely abducted by aliens,but however many there are,and however convinced they are that they're right,doesn't make them right. When christianity was introduced in Greece the greek philosophers thought the christian notion of blind faith quite ridiculous since,as they said: You can't believe,you must know. In other words: The way to view the world is to gather the facts and base your views on that. Not to have a pre conceived notion and then try to force the world to conform to that notion. That has always been the religious way and it's obviously wrong,so no amount of fervent belief from any religious quarter can shake the anthropological and psychological facts that quite clearly show that man created god,not the other way round. So whoever did create monotheism,it must have been a human agency since god is part of mankind's mythology like Jupiter,Hydra,The Easter Bunny or Gandalf,and as far as I'm aware,no figment of human imagination has ever created itself,therefore the religious viewpoint is a moot one.

And,by the way,the phenomenon of religion was actually invented by our long lost  forebears,the Neanderthals about 70 000 years ago and the Neanderthals were too simple and too un-evolved to have had anything like a theology,they reacted purely instinctively,which proves quite conlusively that the origin of religion lies in simple fear of natural forces and has nothing to do with Zeus,Jupiter,God,Allah,Buddha,L.Ron Hubbard or any of the other billion forms it has since taken.

Reed,that the Jews invented monotheism is a matter of historical fact. Do you have any other candidates in mind? The only recent one is Aknathen as I mentioned. Have your historical knowledge in order before you venture into a discussion on the subject. There's a reason I never get into a discussion on auto mechanics: I know nothing about it. And the intelligent alternative to monotheism is of course: No-theism.

I would recommend  "The Source" by James Michener,an excellent run through of the history of the Jews.

We all know that Europe's one world government plan is being fronted by the Illuminati...Big Brother has you by the throat my friends

Reed Lover wrote: There is truth in what you say.However, how many Muslims agreed with the Fatwah but didnt go public in the media with it? Most fundimentalist Muslims I would guess! So why dont you just stop all Muslims from entering America and hedge all bets.You see what I am trying to say here? How many American Presidents have actually signed a Foreign Leader's death warrant, so the CIA could go and bump him off? In effect murdering them theirself. What is the difference? Not all of them were dictators and tyrants. Double standards?

Not at all- I wouldn't feel too safe around any of the surviving US Presidents either 

But nobody has a right to travel wherever they want...you depend upon the goodwill of the destination. This isn't totally an Arab vs. Caucasian thing; this is more like scared people keeping the chain on when answering their door after a break-in. It's too bad we can't keep the doors unlocked anymore, but it's not an inherently racist thing to be nervous about specific people who have advocated violence in the past. Fearing the outsider is a fundamental human attribute that motivates each one of us in subtle or overt ways every day of our lives, no matter how cosmopolitan or civilized we think we are. Do I wish everyone could travel everywhere they want? Sure...I'd love to see quite a few historical locations in the Middle East. Would I make an issue out of the difficulties in doing that right now? Only if I was purposefully blinding myself to reality.

I'm not being naive; there's a lot of racism in the US, and a lot more anti-Arab sentiment since 9/11. I'm not advocating rounding Arab-Americans up for 'questioning' (remeber that glorious World War II? It had a pretty dark side for Asian Americans, especially on the West Coast). However, now is a bad time to try to convince people that an Islamic adherent (which I think is an overly fair description of the ex-Cat-man) poses no more danger to them than anyone else.

I don't believe there can ever be real peace and understanding between people of dramatically different faiths if those religious teachings inherently flame the primal fires of our predjudices- which all major religions do to some extent. Christianity and Islam have been at odds for longer than most of us can trace our ancestors; saying that denying entry to an advocate of violence is a moral weakness on our part just strikes me as either too close to unthinking kneejerk liberalism or too far from realistic expectations. I don't really think he posed any threat, but I also don't think that there's anything wrong with refusing to let him in.

gdub411 wrote: Reed Lover wrote: gdub411 wrote: Marillion-Cat Stevens=theological debate Of course the Cat Stevens issue is a theological debate, Greg. Instead of Reds UnderThe Bed you've now got Saracens.You just dont get it do you? I bet you are looking under your cot right now arent you!   Reed Lover...you really think I am just a big simpleton! I understand the whole Cat Stevens thing. Theological debates just get messy..I was trying to take some of the seriousness out of the conversation because I did not like where it was heading.....

You didnt like where it was going?

And they give you the vote?????????

There is truth in what you say.However, how many Muslims agreed with the Fatwah but didnt go public in the media with it? Most fundimentalist Muslims I would guess! So why dont you just stop all Muslims from entering America and hedge all bets.You see what I am trying to say here?

How many American Presidents have actually signed a Foreign Leader's death warrant, so the CIA could go and bump him off? In effect murdering them theirself. What is the difference? Not all of them were dictators and tyrants.

Double standards?

gdub411 wrote: Marillion-Cat Stevens=theological debate

Of course the Cat Stevens issue is a theological debate, Greg. Instead of Reds UnderThe Bed you've now got Saracens.You just dont get it do you?

I bet you are looking under your cot right now arent you!