http://skeptic.org.uk/
I don't believe that knowledge is impossible but I believe that what is accepted as knowledge should be questioned.....
EXEMPLAR HUMANAE VITAE - SPECIMEN OF A HUMAN LIFE. I am not really a sofa. But I try to be a filosofa. This is the parent blog of my other blogs which all began here, and which in totality constitute the views of an urban peasant living in London. Including some thoughts on politics, psychology, religion, employment and education. And a little humour. I am a rationalist, a humanist and an atheist and I write from a green/socialist/libertarian perspective.
29 September 2008
Community? What community?
We are communal and social animals....
Yet we don't always have communities....
Yet we don't always have communities....
28 September 2008
The Greatest Film Ever Made?
Someone has slagged Life of Brian today in The Independent on Sunday in a totally vacuous article.
Life of Brian is probably the greatest film ever made.
And probably will remain so.
This rather hyperbolic assessment perhaps says more about my view of the medium of film than it does about my view of the film itself.
Life of Brian says a great deal.
For example: about leadership, human freedom, revolutionaries, messiahs, empires, activism, right-wing people, religious nuts, women, politics....
------
Gerald Kaufman said that Schindler's List was possibly "the greatest film ever made."
Maybe he's right.
Life of Brian's scope is possibly much broader. Comparing comedy with tragedy is not really comparing like with like.
-------------
"Crucifixion's a doddle!"
-----------------
Life of Brian is probably the greatest film ever made.
And probably will remain so.
This rather hyperbolic assessment perhaps says more about my view of the medium of film than it does about my view of the film itself.
Life of Brian says a great deal.
For example: about leadership, human freedom, revolutionaries, messiahs, empires, activism, right-wing people, religious nuts, women, politics....
------
Gerald Kaufman said that Schindler's List was possibly "the greatest film ever made."
Maybe he's right.
Life of Brian's scope is possibly much broader. Comparing comedy with tragedy is not really comparing like with like.
-------------
"Crucifixion's a doddle!"
-----------------
25 September 2008
Religion
I would like to say that the (only) religious people I want to hear from are people that are not trying to change the way I think - religious people who are not trying to convert me.
Religions do good.
I think atheists have to face this.
Religions do do some good.
Religions do good.
I think atheists have to face this.
Religions do do some good.
23 September 2008
Contradiction
One of Gordon Brown's contentions in his speech is that some people's supposed attitude that they can receive "something for nothing" should be replaced with an attitude that says "something for something, nothing for nothing".
This is in direct contradiction of the socialist principle:
"from each according to their abilities, to each according to their needs".
This should be taken on board by sections of the media and even sections of the "Left" who seem to think that people don't deserve their basic needs; and who encourage this and similar attitudes.
Part of the reason that they do so is to justify the exorbitant riches of some people who want to feel that they worked for their riches and deserve their riches.
-------------
The above is the essence of what I want to say in this post but there follows a mini-rant coda.
Work is not always paid work! This is the 21st century!
What about the millions who work unpaid for charities?
Do they get "nothing for something" Mr. Brown?
What about job satisfattion? Working for something you believe in and not just for money?..
----
This very attitude - that the world owes no one a living, that there is no free lunch, you've got to work for a living, is an attitude I have scorn for.
It is the attitude of the lowest Daily Mail-reading vermin.
It is not the attitude of a true socialist.
It is firstly totally and utterly untrue.
Giving everyone their basic needs is extremely simple and totally feasible.
Loads of work that is done is totally unnecessary.
"There's enough for everyone's needs. But not for everyone's greed". Gandhi.
Most technology is invented to save work...
It is also morally reprehensible.
To say that if you don't work you can starve is disgusting and unreasonable.
Everyone wants to work, everyone does work; they just don't always get paid for it...
Surely we are above this as a civilisation.
Work should be done because it needs doing.... For a reason....
........
Sure everyone should work. But everyone is also owed their basic needs.
You want me to work by selling people things that they don't need, ripping people off, blowing up women and children??
If that's work, I'm glad I don't work.
If that's your work, fuck your work!
-----
If all the truly necessary work in a technological society was shared out, then no one would need to work more than a few days a week, surely?.....
This is in direct contradiction of the socialist principle:
"from each according to their abilities, to each according to their needs".
This should be taken on board by sections of the media and even sections of the "Left" who seem to think that people don't deserve their basic needs; and who encourage this and similar attitudes.
Part of the reason that they do so is to justify the exorbitant riches of some people who want to feel that they worked for their riches and deserve their riches.
-------------
The above is the essence of what I want to say in this post but there follows a mini-rant coda.
Work is not always paid work! This is the 21st century!
What about the millions who work unpaid for charities?
Do they get "nothing for something" Mr. Brown?
What about job satisfattion? Working for something you believe in and not just for money?..
----
This very attitude - that the world owes no one a living, that there is no free lunch, you've got to work for a living, is an attitude I have scorn for.
It is the attitude of the lowest Daily Mail-reading vermin.
It is not the attitude of a true socialist.
It is firstly totally and utterly untrue.
Giving everyone their basic needs is extremely simple and totally feasible.
Loads of work that is done is totally unnecessary.
"There's enough for everyone's needs. But not for everyone's greed". Gandhi.
Most technology is invented to save work...
It is also morally reprehensible.
To say that if you don't work you can starve is disgusting and unreasonable.
Everyone wants to work, everyone does work; they just don't always get paid for it...
Surely we are above this as a civilisation.
Work should be done because it needs doing.... For a reason....
........
Sure everyone should work. But everyone is also owed their basic needs.
You want me to work by selling people things that they don't need, ripping people off, blowing up women and children??
If that's work, I'm glad I don't work.
If that's your work, fuck your work!
-----
If all the truly necessary work in a technological society was shared out, then no one would need to work more than a few days a week, surely?.....
12 September 2008
Excellent article in an excellent newspaper
Read an excellent article in an excellent newspaper today.
It was about how the rises in people's fuel bills are really all about profiteering by the energy companies and are not about a "recession" at all.
It was in "The Morning Star" which I am lucky enough to be able to get hold of occasionally.
I might subscribe or join them.
I'm not a communist but this newspaper is truly excellent.
Truly heroic. Done on a shoe-string budget and yet they get it out every day.
The article is: -
The great energy rip-off
(Thursday 11 September 2008)
JERRY JONES
www.morningstaronline.co.uk/
-------------------------------
As mainstream newspaper media become more and more bland and homogenous, this tiny newspaper is a last bastion of balanced journalism.
It was about how the rises in people's fuel bills are really all about profiteering by the energy companies and are not about a "recession" at all.
It was in "The Morning Star" which I am lucky enough to be able to get hold of occasionally.
I might subscribe or join them.
I'm not a communist but this newspaper is truly excellent.
Truly heroic. Done on a shoe-string budget and yet they get it out every day.
The article is: -
The great energy rip-off
(Thursday 11 September 2008)
JERRY JONES
www.morningstaronline.co.uk/
-------------------------------
As mainstream newspaper media become more and more bland and homogenous, this tiny newspaper is a last bastion of balanced journalism.
Saxon Street
"We used to play
On Saxon Street....
Black boots on Latin feet
At school they taught us
How they'd ruled the world
Then they'd smother us
With their flag unfurled
....
Well some of us run businesses
And some of us are in jail
And most of us quite frequently
Upon a cross get nailed....."
Ezio lyrics to Saxon Street.
On Saxon Street....
Black boots on Latin feet
At school they taught us
How they'd ruled the world
Then they'd smother us
With their flag unfurled
....
Well some of us run businesses
And some of us are in jail
And most of us quite frequently
Upon a cross get nailed....."
Ezio lyrics to Saxon Street.
11 September 2008
Poverty Chastity and Obedience?
"filo'sofos nutridos en sopa de convento
contemplan impasibles el amplio firmamento"
Antonio Machado.
------
Christianity in monasticism rightly emphasises....
poverty, chastity and obedience.
(St.Benedict. et al.)
Monasticism as a general concept PRE-DATES and in my opinion is superior to "economics" and "psychiatry" and their attendant lies.
It was also a dominant force in the maintenance and preservation of European culture and civilisation for a millennium at least.
What would a 21st-century version be?
To my more modern way of thinking:-
POVERTY means simple living. NOT lack of money PER SE, nor privation, nor not working..... "Live simply so that others may simply live" Gandhi. Green living, consuming less...
CHASTITY means appropriate use of sexuality. NOT it's extinction - which is impossible really....
chastity in relationships.
To say that a male (or female for that matter) has to be totally celibate and not be sexually active in any way is probably possible but unreasonable and unnecessary....
Relationships are a different thing....
and
OBEDIENCE means to the "UBI CARITAS ET AMOR IBI DEUS EST" type of principle....
obedience to philosophy, to the intellect (?)
Monasteries were important as stores of knowledge and educational institutions.....
T.B.C...
"GIM": Green Intellectual Monk. :) :D Add the P if you want!
Signed
The (Franciscan) Gimp.
......
contemplan impasibles el amplio firmamento"
Antonio Machado.
------
Christianity in monasticism rightly emphasises....
poverty, chastity and obedience.
(St.Benedict. et al.)
Monasticism as a general concept PRE-DATES and in my opinion is superior to "economics" and "psychiatry" and their attendant lies.
It was also a dominant force in the maintenance and preservation of European culture and civilisation for a millennium at least.
What would a 21st-century version be?
To my more modern way of thinking:-
POVERTY means simple living. NOT lack of money PER SE, nor privation, nor not working..... "Live simply so that others may simply live" Gandhi. Green living, consuming less...
CHASTITY means appropriate use of sexuality. NOT it's extinction - which is impossible really....
chastity in relationships.
To say that a male (or female for that matter) has to be totally celibate and not be sexually active in any way is probably possible but unreasonable and unnecessary....
Relationships are a different thing....
and
OBEDIENCE means to the "UBI CARITAS ET AMOR IBI DEUS EST" type of principle....
obedience to philosophy, to the intellect (?)
Monasteries were important as stores of knowledge and educational institutions.....
T.B.C...
"GIM": Green Intellectual Monk. :) :D Add the P if you want!
Signed
The (Franciscan) Gimp.
......
Shares in the Amazon Rainforest?
I saw Panorama on BBC1 the other day.
It was about how a solution to the problem of the disappearing Amazon Rainforest is to be found in buying parts of it from governments and allowing people to buy shares in it etc.
The idea is to give the rainforest a monetary value commensurate with the services that the rainforest renders to the people of the planet.
Surely that entails the idea that someone could buy your shares and that the value could change?
Surely the rainforest is priceless.
Would it not be easier just to have them as National Parks that it is illegal in any circumstances to destroy? If buying them is what it takes then do it.
No one owns shares in the Lake District National Park in the north of England, do they?
It would be illegal for me to buy the Lake District from the government and build on it, would it not?
It should be the same for the Amazon.
The countries in question, Brazil and Guyana, are extremely poor and are developing countries that see the "development" of the Rainforest as one of the only routes to development.
The solution is to compensate them and give them other routes to development.
Buy up their rainforest if necessary and compensate them and allow them to develop in other ways.
It was about how a solution to the problem of the disappearing Amazon Rainforest is to be found in buying parts of it from governments and allowing people to buy shares in it etc.
The idea is to give the rainforest a monetary value commensurate with the services that the rainforest renders to the people of the planet.
Surely that entails the idea that someone could buy your shares and that the value could change?
Surely the rainforest is priceless.
Would it not be easier just to have them as National Parks that it is illegal in any circumstances to destroy? If buying them is what it takes then do it.
No one owns shares in the Lake District National Park in the north of England, do they?
It would be illegal for me to buy the Lake District from the government and build on it, would it not?
It should be the same for the Amazon.
The countries in question, Brazil and Guyana, are extremely poor and are developing countries that see the "development" of the Rainforest as one of the only routes to development.
The solution is to compensate them and give them other routes to development.
Buy up their rainforest if necessary and compensate them and allow them to develop in other ways.
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