Why do so many people believe in God? (Serious Question?)

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luggi

Trad climber

from the backseat of Jake& Elwood Blues car

Aug 17, 2010 - 12:32am PT

[while standing at the entrance to the Triple Rock church watching the service with much dancing and Hallelujah choruses, a heavenly light shines down on PATE and he has an epiphany]
PATE:...I preach on Supertopo
Reverend Cleophus James: DO YOU SEE THE LIGHT?
PATE: My computer screen???????
Reverend Cleophus James: DO YOU SEE THE LIGHT?
Elwood: What light?
Reverend Cleophus James: HAVE YOU SEEEEN THE LIGHT?
PATE: YES! YES! JESUS H. TAP-DANCING CHRIST... I HAVE SEEN THE LIGHT!

Norton

Social climber

the Wastelands

Aug 17, 2010 - 12:39am PT

Scarface, thank you.

And good night.

healyje

Trad climber

Portland, Oregon

Aug 17, 2010 - 12:54am PT

Haven't really been following along of late to know how all this Okinawa business got going, but I will comment that local girls were being raped by American servicemen when I was there in '72, '73, and to my knowledge it has never stopped. and from what I can tell it's always been considered a cost of posting a large number of American servicemen on the island and accepted by both the U.S. and the Japanese governments as such. The ones who do not accept it are the Okinawans, and rightfully so. But then they have a long history of not being treated well by anyone who has occupied the island, especially the Japanese.

paul roehl

Boulder climber

california

Aug 17, 2010 - 02:00am PT

Our consciousness thrives in the strange soup of dualism, dialectic is the natural condition of discourse: Light/dark, up/down, right/left, right/wrong, belief/non belief. The position too often irrelevant to the need for rightfulness

Why does humanity take such joy in the great pleasure of disagreement? Because in it is the potential power of rightfulness in which the universe itself seems to lay fine victory on the head of one and intolerable shame on the other.

The righteousness of the self, the celebration of individual superiority over the other, the pissing contest writ large; isn’t this what matters? With some exceptions, I’m not sure anybody really cares about God’s existence or non-existence on this thread, since the important thing is simply the sure superiority of being right and the disdain of the other: pure vanity!

Ask any sophist: to be perceived as right is all in all even if that perception is in error, because the foolishness of others is a function of the superiority of ourselves.

“It is a fine thing to be superior, though it is a superior thing to be fine.”

Tony Bird

climber

Northridge, CA

Aug 17, 2010 - 02:13am PT

interesting, healjye--i was about to concede the point to jan, but your report seems to confirm the impression i've gotten through my wife, who was raised in japan, studied both there and here, and stays in touch with current events professionally.

from my point of view, jan and scarface represent a political orthodoxy which, if overturned in my lifetime, would put a smile on my face when i die. it's a simplistic version of geopolitics administered by big media and that periodical jan quotes with reverence, foreign affairs, designed by insiders to lead americans to think they should have no opinions except what their betters cook up for them. just go shopping, we'll take care of it.

some suggested reading: confessions of an economic hit man by john perkins, a window on what really goes on and how it works. the new word for it is deep politics, and there's already been a conference on it. funny how people coming at it from different directions seem to be reaching the same conclusions.

i'll never forget george bush sr. villifying manuel noriega, then a year later, sadam hussein. same plodding cadence, same song: behold thy antichrist. shortly after that he sunk his bowie knife deep into the back of the chinese freedom movement.

Jan

Mountain climber

Okinawa, Japan

Aug 17, 2010 - 03:18am PT

So Tony, what or who exactly are you proposing to improve the situation? What country in this world would do a better job than the U.S.?

All the major European powers have been tainted by colonialism, all of Asia distrusts if not hates the Japanese, the Russians have already shown us their misuse of power, the Germans didn't have much of an empire but held their own with Nazi imperialism. What if the Arabs could reunite and suddenly decided to return to their conquering days of glory? Some seem to have that idea already.

So who's left?

Seems to me it is the Indians and the Chinese. In general the Chinese have had a pretty benevolent empire as you have already pointed out on another thread. Then there's what the Chinese did in Vietnam for a thousand years and Tibet more recently and what the Chinese did to each other during the cultural revolution, which does not give confidence.Indians fought many wars among themselves but have so far not been expansionist though they have been brutal in Kashmir and towards their own citizens deemed Untouchable.

Maybe, the problem is human beings, not individual nationalities? I believe senseless violence was one of the major issues for the Old Testament prophets, Jesus, Mohammed, and Confucius anyway. Perhaps controlling violence has been a function of religion and philosophy even though it too, was often the cause of violence?

Or maybe the Quakers and Amish and Mennonites are right, better to be someone's slave than ever lift our hand in violence? Of course they won't face that dilemma because they have chosen to live in countries where other people provided the security for their freedom of religion.

So what is your solution, Tony?

Jan

Mountain climber

Okinawa, Japan

Aug 17, 2010 - 03:38am PT

healeyje-

The Vietnam War era and its aftermath in the early '70's was the low point of the American occupation as far as the Okinawans are concerned. There were even race riots between blacks and whites off base during that time. It was unsafe for me to walk across a base in Germany during that era also. It's very hard to discipline an unwilling and often drugged out draftee.

While I have my qualms about a professional military in a democracy, I think you would be amazed at how professional and disciplined the volunteer military is. Random urine tests and the Japanese laws against guns since reversion in 1972, have done wonders here.

Jan

Mountain climber

Okinawa, Japan

Aug 17, 2010 - 03:56am PT

jstan-

Malaysia was occupied by the Japanese and has no love for them. Meanwhile they have a market in the Muslim countries of the Middle East. Australian and New Zealand prisoners of war were treated so brutally by the Japanese, an alliance would be a very hard sell to them as well. Koreans are more angry about the 50 year Japanese occupation before WWII than the war itself. Then there was the Japanese invasion in the 1500's before that.

A hopeful sign is that the present left of center prime minister did not go to the national war shrine where Gen. Tojo and others have their ashes, this August as is customary, and did apologize for Japan's actions during WWII on that day instead, the first prime minister to do so.

However, Japan's society is rapidly aging and conservative about change and the country is deeply in debt. Personally I don't see any alternative for them but to cling to us.

One of the many paradoxes of life in Japan is that the very cultural rules which work so well among themselves, are the source of them being misunderstood by others. At the top of this list is their habit of ignoring anything that is embarrassing or uncomfortable. I get mainland Japanese students in my classes who have never heard of Pearl Harbor.

healyje

Trad climber

Portland, Oregon

Aug 17, 2010 - 04:32am PT

Jan, all true, but you would be naive in the extreme if you think anything about a more 'professional', drug-tested military will substantially change the problem of rape when you base 25-30K servicemen on a small island with a large population of locals. There is simply no way to avoid rape being a periodic part of the cost of maintaining a military presence there. And the fact that Okinawa bears the brunt of the burden of our military support of Japan is another sad and very telling story about the Japanese people and government all by itself.

Jan

Mountain climber

Okinawa, Japan

Aug 17, 2010 - 05:53am PT

healeyje-

I agree. Of course all this is part of the complicated triangular ballet that the U.S., Okinawans, and Japanese do every day. Another aspect of American crime in Okinawa is that each incident which is protested is worth millions more in subsidies from Tokyo.

The U.S. only provides 10% or so of the economy now while a much larger chunk of the rest comes from mainland.They have given far more than we ever did and have to a certain extent, bought Okinawan cooperation. You would be amazed at the higher standard of living now compared to the early '70's.

A bigger long term problem than us in my view, is that the mainland Japanese are slowly buying up the island and driving up the cost of living.This is useful to the mainland as it provides lots of cheap temporary Okinawan workers who are easily laid off from the mainland factories.

For sure, never have a nicer group of people than the Okinawans been more screwed over by more people.

Tony Bird

climber

Northridge, CA

Aug 17, 2010 - 08:32am PT

your mistake, jan, is thinking you're dealing with a lot of separate countries.

here's a good place to start. recognize the guy here?

having grown up in chicago, i'd recognize that baseball cap anywhere. but why put it on a mural in the federal building in santa ana, california?
__

another mistake being made here is trusting the u.s.a. with nukes. the nuclear power club is quite large. members all have rings through their noses. japan doesn't belong, but it has a ring as secure as any of the others. club membership is no big deal if you have a dynamic duo like india and pakistan staying peaceful with it. the whole charade just keeps folks like yourselves, and your counterparts in japan, involved in superficial debate.

from my front row seat at the gladiatorial arena, i've gotten the impression that we came quite close to nuking iran during the bush administration. if you didn't notice it, there was a furious back-and-forth on the internet about it. dick cheney was the spearhead, george bush, my guess, dragged his feet, as he did against the great agenda throughout his administration. i can almost admire him for it. there isn't 100 percent concordance in the club that controls things, but there is a brutal discipline. it's highest priority is to hang onto power and continue to control the world. the public is totally out of the loop. you will see grassroots democracy in small towns, and, rarely, in larger cities. in the u.s. the link to the public is severed when someone--anyone--enters congress, again with rare exceptions like paul wellstone. you don't get into the congressional club without joining that other club. weak dissent is allowed, even encouraged, because it enhances the myth of democracy. my favorite weak voices these days belong to ron paul, dennis kucinich and barbara boxer. what sweet little guppies they all are.

iran may still get nuked at the behest of israel, which seems to have far more control over the course america takes than americans. iran today, sadam hussein and manuel noriega, whom jan brought up, and a couple you can read and weep about in perkins' book, jaime roldos and omar torrijos. all independent heads of state, refusing to join the good old boys who really run things. hitler and mussolini went the same route, long before that war came to a head. it's easy to turn people into devils after going through a real war. learn to look for the devil in the winning side. in our lifetimes we got john kennedy, born, like george bush, into the club. he made the tremendous mistake of thinking he could yank free from the ring through his nose.

--

healyje, just to push your historic memory back a few years, our "support" for japan has a certain continuity going back to 1945. there wasn't a helluva lot of choice in the side they took in the cold war. and to push jan's a little further, we must remind you all of the only nation ever to use nuclear weapons as weapons, in the good old tradition of war, which is war on everyone, not in accordance with the niceties of the geneva convention.

go-B

climber

In God We Trust

Aug 19, 2010 - 10:50pm PT

Matthew 17:5, behold, a bright cloud overshadowed them, and a voice from the cloud said, “This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased; listen to him.”

TripL7

Trad climber

san diego

Aug 22, 2010 - 04:17am PT

Wes- "Tony...care to explain the significance."

Well, I suspect that T.Bird is referring to a young Barrack Obama's likeness, which is displayed along with other culturally significant achievements which our great nation is famous for, on a mural in the federal building in Santa Ana, Ca(believe I read an article about the artist/muralist and the mural some time ago). How this ties into Jan's post i am not sure(haven't been following this thread lately). But your appeal to Tony sparked my curiousity.

edit: the hat would be a Chicago White Sox hat(me thinx)...it would simply say SOX (in white)! B.O. being from ChiTown!!

BTW, I recognised the kid in the pic because it first reminded me of my sixth grade teacher Mr. Cain, who has a striking resemblance to our current Prez.!!

FWIW, Mr. Cain was my greatest role model/influence when I was growing up, other than my father.

go-B

climber

In God We Trust

Aug 22, 2010 - 10:11am PT

Psalm 32:11, Be glad in the Lord, and rejoice, O righteous,
and shout for joy, all you upright in heart!

Jan

Mountain climber

Okinawa, Japan

Aug 25, 2010 - 12:09pm PT

Tonight is the last night of Obon in Okinawa - the three days when the ancestors come back to visit their families. The streets are full of costumed dancers beating taiko drums, singing and dancing to give them a good send off. No hassles over dogma, no competing theologies, just a communal celebration with a little magic in the air.

Here's a typical group

http://www.3gpdb.com/videoy.php?b=fyXy2gKAUG1&

and here's a well known Okinawan folk singer with scenes from the island.

http://www.3gpdb.com/videoy.php?b=RaRLz9F69Mm&begin-a