[MD] Plains Talk and Pragmatism

[John Carl]

Thanks for sharing your  response with us, Matt.  I appreciate your words
and believe you make a good point.  I'd like to chit-chat a bit, about that
point.



> My suspicion is that "anti-theism" is peculiar to the European West in
> many respects because it is a cultural manifestation only possible after
> we were able to off-load into the written text many of the noetic
> responsibilities then only capable of being held in oracular form (e.g.,
> dealing with the limits of memory).  In other words, "god" and "religion"
> were very different concepts for primary oral cultures ("primitive"), and
> asking them to be against god-talk would be like asking people to be
> against education and thinking.  Doesn't make sense.
>
>
Agreed.  And this is a very excellent point.



> However, it might make a lot of sense for the European West.
>
>
Also agreed.  However, "might" in this case, is what makes  right.  ;)

I believe leaving it as an ongoing and open question is the heart of what
"mysticism" means.  Or in pragmatic terms, it's the heart of pluralism and
appreciation for the varieties of religious experience that give rise to
ongoing realization that lies at the heart of any metaphysics or
philosophical behavior.  If you're just gonna make dogmatic assertions and
demand allegiance.... well, they have that back at the church I left behind.

Ultimately, we can't really prove anything, so we're stuck with which signs
are useful, and which ones are not.  Which ghosts serve our purposes, and
which ones don't.

Now what started this whole discussion in my head, was Dan's and gav's and
dmb's assertions that the Coppleston Annotations make it pretty clear that
RMP did and does intend the MoQ to be fiercely anti-theistic.  My
disputation being that the words "regarding the term 'God" are not the same
thing as having anti-theism at the core of the belief system.   We interpret
the text differently, evidently.

I'm still not convinced by this small band of 'experts', but I highly
respect your viewpoint and understanding (as I did Dan's and gav's, for that
matter) so your opinion of the text might just be the final straw which
convinces me that I seriously need to consider some reconsideration.

Capiche?

I said "did" respect Dan and gav's, because of the quality of their rhetoric
in the past.  But I don't have much respect for Dan anymore, because while
he totally disparages my words as "chit-chat" , he himself evidently has no
true integrity in his word.  He said that I was wrong in my critique of
gav's reasons for leaving, that gav was correct, and I'm wrong.  But if
gav's conclusion is correct, then what is Dan doing here?  Gavin's
conclusion was that the MoQ was at it's heart morally bankrupted by it's
anti-theism, and ought to be left far behind.  Yet Dan's still here.  So
obviously, he doesn't agree with gav, and thus evidently just wants to make
some kind of disputational or oppositional point of his own, arising out of
his own unspoken agenda, and he does not love truth or intellectual quality
more than social acceptance or goals.

And he flushed our dialogue down the toilet, in a most rude and unthinking
manner.  While I do wear the habliments of a fool, I do not suffer those who
actually are, lightly.

So what do you think, Matt?  Is the MoQ, absolutely anti-theistic?  I am at
the point where I will take your word for it.

However, given the caveats of respect toward native spirituality, I think
you're going to have to, or somebody ought to, spell out exactly what this
"anti-theism" means then.

With appreciation,

John