Quote from: Unclean on 2005-09-02 04:12:42   

Quote from: David Lucifer on 2005-09-02 00:13:32    Quote from: Unclean on 2005-09-01 07:21:14    If you no longer believe in god and think the bible was written by humans why would you hang on to this proclamation attributed to god in Revelations? Not in the Christian sense I meant. Quote: The bible was written over a very long period and editors over many generations decided what to include and what to exclude. The bible is a set of memes that evolved and you can bet that it was manipulated to serve some purpose. Who are the "evildoers"? That is true about the bible being edited over the centuries. That is why I reject it. I guess the "evildoers" in this instance are the people manipulating information.

Welcome to the Church of the Virus, Unclean.  I hear you wrestling with some issues concerning your initial religious indoctrinations.  Here is my standard advice to all people struggling with such things.  First of all, if this is not some issue handed down vertically (ie. did you parents make this an issue for you?  or perhaps a sister, cousin, uncle, etc. allied with such parental authority?) or did you recieve this through horizontal transmission?  Like a friend, stranger, or someone else acting on "outside" programming, perhaps someone making your acquaintance during a period of crisis etc.?  If you don't otherwise trust your critical faculties, then this is not a completely unreasonable strategy, trust those most invested in you, for their decisions are most likely (however otherwise improbably) to match up with your own interests or issues.  This is a basic lesson from evolutionary psychology.  Of course it works best in terms of genetics, but if memetics has any competive value it should work in varying degrees there as well.

Second of all, I would like to introduce you to the Virtues and Sins.  Empathy, Reason, and Vision shine as virtues, while Hypocricsy, Apathy, and Dogmatism darken the sinful aspects.  We view these sins and virtues as transcendent.  Basically all people, religious, atheist or otherwise whom uphold this ethical standard we view as memetic/ideological/spiritual bretheren regardless of their genetic or cultural happenstances.  So keeping in mind the honor thy parents issues that we hold closely as well, we consider these vertical programs as otherwise essentially compatible.  In other words we believe that you can listen to your genetic ( or even spiritual parents) and us within the Church of Virus as well.

Of course Lucifer, our first host raises some important and relevant issues of interpretation etc., and I probably agree and understand on those issues as well, but these are what I see as some more important framing issues as well.

-Jake