Category Archives: Pantheism

Posted March 30, 2017

By: Kimberly Luste Maran, North American Division

On March 22, 2017, two former Kellogg employees made their appeal to the United States Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit after a lower court found insufficient evidence that the two Adventist plaintiffs were treated unfairly when they were fired for failing to work on Sabbath. A decision from the court of appeals, located in Denver, Colorado, is expected in approximately three months.

The United States District Court for the District of Utah granted Kelloggs motion for summary judgment on the claims for disparate treatment, reasonable accommodation, and retaliation on July 7, 2016. At that time the court also accordingly denied Richard Tabura and Guadalupe Diazs motion for summary judgment.

Tabura and Diaz were both fired in 2012 from their manufacturing jobs at a Kellogg USA, Inc. plant in Utah for missing work on Saturdays as they honored their religious belief to observe Sabbath. In 2011, Kellogg increased production and implemented a new work scheduling program known as continuous crewing. This program created four separate, rotating shifts in which employees were to work approximately two Saturdays a month26 Saturdays a year. While both plaintiffs made attempts to use paid days off and work swaps with other employees they eventually were assessed too many absence points within a 12-month period and, after what Kellogg describes as progressive-discipline measures were exhausted, were terminated.

The plaintiffs lost at the trial court level, said Todd McFarland, associate general counsel for the General Conference (GC) of the Seventh-day Adventist Church. The court said that Kellogg offering the use of their vacation time and swaps was enough. They didn't have to actually eliminate the conflict; they just had to give them the opportunity to do it, and that the fact that there wasn't enough vacation time or enough people to swap with wasn't Kellogg's problem.

The GC Office of General Counsel was part of the Tenth Circuit appeal. The appeal argues that the district court erred in holding that an accommodation can be legally sufficient even if it does not eliminate the conflict between a work requirement and a religious practice. It also contends that treating the forfeiture of vacation and sick time as a legitimate accommodation is not appropriate.

It's a cold comfort to an Adventist to say, You only have to break half the Sabbaths. If you don't have to eliminate the conflict, then that does no good, said McFarland. So this [case] is important to people of faith about what's required from employment to accommodate Sabbath.

For some, the irony is unavoidable. Kellogg, a food manufacturing company, was founded as the Battle Creek Toasted Corn Flake Company in 1906 by Will Keith Kellogg and John Harvey Kellogg. John Harvey, at the time, was a Seventh-day Adventist and director of the Battle Creek Sanitarium, owned and operated by the Adventist Church. The sanitariums operation was based on the churchs health principles, which include a healthful diet, regimen of exercise, proper rest, and abstinence from alcohol and tobacco.

According to the Kellogg website, the brothers changed breakfast forever when they accidentally flaked wheat berry. Will Keith kept experimenting until he was able to flake corn, creating the recipe for Kelloggs Corn Flakes. John Harvey eventually turned away from church beliefs, espousing what many believe was a form of pantheism.

Follow this link:
Adventist Church Goes Back to Court to Defend Sabbath Keepers - Adventist Review

Subscribe today for full access on your desktop, tablet, and mobile device.

Let friends in your social network know what you are reading about

Pete Brady, Bainbridge Island

Try Another

Audio CAPTCHA

Image CAPTCHA

Help

CancelSend

A link has been sent to your friend's email address.

A link has been posted to your Facebook feed.

Letters 11:44 a.m. PT March 22, 2017

In the case of Arlene's Flowers (Barronelle Stutzman), Washington Supreme Court justices Fairhurst, Johnson, Madsen, Owens, Stephens, Wiggins, Gonzalez, McCloud, and Yu got it utterly and wantonly wrong.They all ought to be removed from office.In their decision they have completely abandoned virtue for vice.In order for there to be discrimination as they perfidiously aver, "sexual gratification" (of any kind) has to be a defining characteristic of the human person.It is not.It is, instead, merely behavior that which we may or may not do but it is not integral to who we are.We are meant to rise above base impulses/sensitive appetites, not be enslaved by them.

The decision encourages homosexuality and suppresses (persecutes) the Christian religion.The latter is patently clear in Justice McClouds opinion that state non-discrimination law is precedent even if it substantially burdens the constitutional right to Freedom of Religion.So much for the Constitutions inalienable and enumerated rights!So are we to now understand that if this florist is asked to provide an arrangement by a member of a Satanic or Wiccan cult for their use that she must provide it in violation of the 1st Commandment?That is just anti-Christian bigotry in judicial robes.

This decision is a continuation of the ongoing effort to make a hodgepodge of neopaganism (pantheism, new age, self-idolatry, etc) the de facto religion of the state.Thus, the 60 percent of Washingtonians who are Christian must Resist!

Pete Brady, Bainbridge Island

Read or Share this story: http://www.kitsapsun.com/story/opinion/readers/2017/03/22/arlenes-flowers-case-abandoned-religious-protections/99500874/

0) { %>

0) { %>

Originally posted here:
Arlene's Flowers case abandoned religious protections - Kitsap Sun

Pantheism is the belief that God and the universe are one and the same. There is no dividing line between the two. Pantheism is a type of religious belief rather than a specific religion, similar to terms like monotheism (belief in a single God, as embraced by religions such as Judaism, Christianity, Islam, the Baha'i Faith, and Zoroastrianism) and polytheism (belief in multiple gods, as embraced by Hinduism and a wide variety of pagan cultures such as the ancient Greeks and Romans).

Pantheists view God as immanent and impersonal. The belief system grew out of the Scientific Revolution, and pantheists generally are strong supporters of scientific inquiry, as well as religious toleration.

In being immanent, God is present in all things. God didn't make the earth or define gravity, but, rather, God is the earth and gravity and everything else in the universe.

Because God is uncreated and infinite, the universe is likewise uncreated and infinite. God did not choose one day to make the universe. Rather, it exists precisely because God exists, since the two are the same thing.

This does not need to contradict scientific theories such as the Big Bang. The changing of the universe is all part of the nature of God as well. It simply states there was something before the Big Bang, an idea that is certainly debated in scientific circles.

The pantheistic God is impersonal.

God is not a being one converses with, nor is God conscious in the common sense of the term.

Pantheists are generally strong supporters of scientific inquiry. Since God and the universe are one, understanding the universe is how one comes to better understand God.

Because all things are God, all things are connected and ultimately are of one substance.

While various facets of God have defining characteristics (everything from different species to individual people), they are part of a greater whole. As a comparison, one might consider the parts of the human body. Hands are different from feet which are different from lungs, but all are part of the greater whole that is the human form.

Because all things are ultimately God, all approaches to God can conceivably lead to anunderstanding of God. Each person should be allowed to pursue such knowledge as they wish. This does not mean, however, that pantheists believe every approach is correct. They generally do not believe in an afterlife, for example, nor do they find merit in strict dogma and ritual.

Pantheism should not be confused with panentheism. Panentheism views God as both immanent and transcendent. This means that while the entire universe is a part of God, God also exists beyond the universe. As such, this God can be a personal God, a conscious being that manifested the universe with whom one can have a personal relationship.

Pantheism is also not deism. Deist beliefs are sometimes described as not having a personal God, but in that case, it is not meant to say the God has no consciousness.

The deist God actively created the universe. God is impersonal in the sense that God retreated from the universe after its creation, uninterested in listening to or interacting with believers.

Pantheism is not animism. Animism is the belief - animals, trees, rivers, mountains, etc. - that all things have a spirit. However, these spirits are unique rather than being part of a greater spiritual whole. These spirits are frequently approached with reverence and offerings to ensure continued goodwill between humanity and the spirits.

Baruch Spinoza introduced pantheistic beliefs to a wide audience in the 17th century. However, other, less known thinkers had already expressed pantheistic views such as Giordano Bruno, who was burnt at the stake in 1600 for his highly unorthodox beliefs.

Albert Einstein stated, "I believe in Spinoza's God who reveals himself in the orderly harmony of what exists, not in a God who concerns himself with fates and actions of human beings." He also stated that "science without religion is lame; religion without science is blind," underscoring that pantheism is neither anti-religious nor atheistic.

See more here:
Demystifying the Beliefs of Pantheism - thoughtco.com

More than 100 million adults in America claim to have a biblical worldview, according to a recent survey by George Barna and the American Culture & Faith Institute.

Could that possibly be right?

Or are tens of millions of Christians and Jews deceiving themselves?

Its an important question because everyone has a worldview. Its a set of beliefs that shapes our decisions, our choices and our actions.

Those who believe in secular humanism, postmodernism, existentialism, pantheism or nihilism will clearly make different personal, political and lifestyle choices than those who hold a biblical worldview. And, for those who hold a biblical worldview, we believe its the best hope for a free and self-governing society.

So what did Barna find?

It found that only 10 percent of American adults hold to a biblical worldview not 100 million. Not close. If, indeed, 100 million American adults had a biblical worldview, that would represent almost 50 percent of the adult population. So, instead of 100 million Americans, the number is closer to 24 million.

Furthermore, the survey found that the younger an adult is, the less likely he or she is to have a biblical worldview. Among adults 18 to 29 years old commonly referred to as millennials just 4 percent do. The number rises to 7 percent among those in the 30-to-49 age bracket; it doubles to 15 percent between 50 and 64; it peaks at 17 percent among those 65 or older.

Are we in trouble as a nation?

Yes, but all is not hopeless.

That some 100 million American adults want to identify with a biblical worldview is good news.

That they do identify with the values of the Bible, but dont fully understand what it means, suggests a problem with the shepherds. There are too many lost sheep and not enough shepherds equipped to track them down and feed them properly.

I believe most of those who self-identify as Christians and Jews the people of the Book dont really understand the Book.

And thats why I wrote The Restitution of All Things: Israel, Christians and the End of the Age.

Its an unusual book. In many ways, its shockingly radical. But its 100 percent Scripture-supported and the result of more than 40 years of study.

Would you like to have a Christian worldview?

Maybe this book will help. It was written with that specifically in mind, but it occurs to me that it can help.

There are too many denominations of Christianity in the world today. They cant all be right. Its entirely possible none of them have it totally right.

Therefore, every follower of Jesus has a responsibility to search the Scriptures like Bereans to determine if their beliefs are correct and to ensure they are on the straight and narrow road that leads to salvation and discipleship.

I am convinced this book can help simplify and clarify your earnest search for the truth.

Get Joseph Farahs The Restitution of All Things: Israel, Christians and the End of the Age.

See the book trailer for The Restitution of All Things:

Media wishing to interview Joseph Farah, please contact media@wnd.com.

Here is the original post:
Do you have a biblical worldview? - WND.com

Buoyed by a recently released poll by Public Policy Polling which showed her leading President Donald Trump 47-40 in a hypothetical 2020 match-up, daytime talk show queen Oprah Winfrey (shown) is said to be toying with the idea of making a bid for the White House.

Of course, Trump trailed Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton throughout most of the 2016 campaign, by as much as 15 points in some polls, so polling almost four years in advance of an election is often dismissed as meaningless. After all, if polling that far in advance was conclusive, then we would have had presidents Dewey, Muskie, and Dukakis instead of Truman, Nixon, and George H.W. Bush.

But, considering that few gave Trump much of a shot, even when he was performing well in polls early in the Republican nomination battle in late 2015 and early 2016, we should not dismiss a run by such a well-known media personality as Winfrey. Trump had achieved high name recognition as the host of the popular TV show The Apprentice, and Winfrey, if anything, enjoyed even higher name I.D. from her TV fame.

Given the popularity you have, and that we havent broken the glass ceiling yet for women, you could actually run for president and you could be elected, talk show host David Rubinstein told Winfrey, urging her to consider the idea.

Trumps path to the White House as a celebrity is seen by some such as Rubinstein as an indication that the voters are now looking at style over substance; however, while Trump had a greater name I.D. than most of his Republican rivals, his positions on issues were just as critical to his success. He tackled such subjects as disastrous international trade deals and the tsunami of illegal immigration that the other candidates generally avoided, demonstrating an ability to connect with voters.

Though Winfrey is undoubtedly noted for her ability to connect with her many fans, whether that talent will translate into political success remains to be seen.

Left-wing CNN commentator Van Jones, who has a communist background, boldly predicted that Winfrey would not only defeat Trump, but that she would beat him a historic landslide. Speaking on Bravos late-night show Watch What Happens Next, Jones argued, It takes a superstar to beat a superstar. And I think if Oprah Winfrey ran, shed win all 50 states.

Jones also mentioned Democrats Senator Kamala Harris (Calif.), Senator Corey Booker (N.J.), and Congressman Joe Kennedy III (Mass.). All three, of course, are conventional politicians, and Trump showed that celebrities can surprise such professionals.

Winfrey has already demonstrated that she has political clout at least within the more liberal base of the Democratic Party. It was her support of fellow Chicagoan U.S. Senator Barack Obama in 2007 that is seen as giving him the extra credibility he needed to upset Hillary Clinton to win the 2008 Democratic Party nomination.

Her open endorsement of Obama was the first time that Winfrey had publicly backed a political candidate. She held a fundraiser for him in September 2007 at her estate, and then three months later she joined Obama for a series of rallies in the early primary states of Iowa, New Hampshire, and South Carolina. Some have estimated that she could have swung more than one and a half million votes for Obama, providing the difference in his eventual victory.

What had given her such exceptional pull with voters, especially among those who cast votes in the Democratic primaries? Certainly it was the trust her many fans placed in her, especially women who were given the unofficial go-ahead to abandon the female hopeful, Hillary Clinton. This emotional bond was built over several years because of Oprah's highly popular daytime talk show.

How did Winfrey rise from poverty to become the wealthiest black woman in American history? She apparently possessed an ability to talk and connect with an audience as early as high school, when she had a job in radio; at age 19 she co-anchored the local evening news. Of course, her entry into television was helped immensely when she won the Miss Black Tennessee beauty pageant at age 17.

Her unusual name of Oprah was certainly another factor in her success. Named Orpah on her birth certificate, after the biblical character, that name proved difficult for others to pronounce, and she eventually became known as Oprah. In the Bible, Orpah was the daughter-in-law of the Israelite Naomi who returned to her Moabite gods when Naomis other daughter-in-law, Ruth, chose to instead accept the God of Israel. (Ruth was an ancestor of King David, and eventually, of course, of Jesus Christ).

Raised a Baptist, the young Oprah was taken to church by her grandmother, where Oprah was dubbed The Preacher for her ability to quote Bible verses. But Winfrey has certainly abandoned the adherence to the Scriptures her grandmother and the Baptists attempted to instill in her. She rejected the more conservative Baptist faith when she heard a minister say, The Lord thy God is a jealous God. Oprah said at the moment the preacher said the word jealous, there was something about that [that] didnt feel right in my spirit because I believe that God is love and God is in all things.

The belief that God is in all things is better known as pantheism. Indeed, Winfrey has often advocated the views of New Age spiritualist Eckhart Tolle on the web and in her TV shows. "I took God out of the box, she says of her efforts. One of the mistakes that human beings make is believing that there is only one way to live. There are many paths to what you call God. (Emphasis added). At another time, she indicated that her concept of God is not orthodox, asserting, God is a feeling experience and not a believing experience. If your religion is a believing experience ... then thats not truly God.

She has also even been quoted as saying, I have a church with myself: I have church walking down the street. I believe in [a] God force that lives inside all of us, and once you tap into that, you can do anything. This sounds more like a line from the Star Wars movies than something found in a Christian church.

Soon after the September 11 attacks, Winfrey came to the defense of Islam in a program she called Islam 101, calling it a peaceful religion and arguing that it was the most misunderstood of the three major religions.

Her religious views may not damage her political chances within the more liberal base Democratic Party; however, it is uncertain whether such theology would be acceptable to a general election audience.

Sociologist Vicki Abt criticized Winfrey in her book Coming After Oprah: Cultural Fallout in the Age of the TV Talk Show. Abt charged that Winfreys show was critical in blurring the lines between normal and deviant behavior. Of course, supporters, on the other hand, credit her for making the LGBT movement, for instance, mainstream and more socially acceptable.

Besides Oprah's social views, her political opinions are certainly not conservative, either. In 2009, she traveled to Denmark to praise its socialist system. According to Winfrey, the Danes are the happiest people on earth, who particularly enjoy living in very small houses. (Apparently Winfrey likes a bigger house than these happy Danes.)

People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) honored her as the 2008 Person of the Year for her work in uncovering mistreatment of animals and her advocacy of a vegan diet. She also refused to wear fur or even allow it to be shown in her magazine, O.

It is uncertain, of course, whether Winfrey will actually make a presidential bid. She would be 67 years old in 2020 still younger than either Trump or Clinton was in the last election (and though it didn't seem to matter to the 70-year-old Trump, Clintons health definitely was a matter of some discussion).

But if she were to run, when one considers the present state of the American electorate, she would have to be taken seriously.

Photo of Oprah Winfrey: AP Images

Originally posted here:
Left-wing Oprah Eyes Possible Presidential Bid in 2020 - The New American

An Interview with Emmanuel Donate, JD Director, Hispanic American Freethinkers

Emmanuel Donate is a member of the board of directors for the Hispanic American Freethinkers. Professionally he works as a mathematics, science, and martial arts teacher and as an immigration and family law attorney. He has a B.S. in mathematics from the University of Puerto Rico, Rio Piedras Campus and a J.D. from Mercer University, Walter F. George School of Law. He is currently a graduate student at the University of Georgia where he has completed an M.S. in Physics and is finishing his dissertation in Astrophysics with a research focus in radio astronomy.

You are the director of Hispanic American Freethinkers. What tasks and responsibilities come with this position?

I am one of seven directors of the Hispanic American Freethinkers. My position on the board is a bit unique. I was HAFrees attorney for four years prior to joining the board in 2016. My biggest role on the board has been to advise on legal issues. This ranges from controlling content that gets released to the public to writing, researching and editing documents that pertain to HAFrees non-profit status or our intellectual property.

Whats your family and personal background in terms of freethinking? What was your experience of becoming, of living, as a freethinker? Your moment of awakening?

I became a freethinker at 16. I had been raised Catholic and was living a life of a lot of privilege. My family didnt have a lot of money but my father was in the military so we lived well, we were provided for and we travelled often. I had good grades and made enough friends to make school life mostly pleasant and enjoyable. When I was about to enter high school, my father was in the process of retiring from the military and so we moved back to Puerto Rico.

When I went to school in Puerto Rico, I faced a large culture shock that took me into a big depression. My solution was to pray more and get more involved with the church. The idea was that I was facing these difficulties because I had strayed the path and that if I were more dedicated God would help put things back in their place. Things only got worse as I got more into religion.

Eventually I realised the praying wasnt working. I didnt know who to talk to or what to read since everyone around me was a Christian. In an amazing stroke of luck, we got our first Internet connection at home around this time.

The Internet gave me way to do research that was covert. I could read about philosophy and any questions I wanted without getting in trouble with family. I found pantheism and at the time it made sense, so I stuck with it. As time passed I lost the label of pantheist but continued to evolve my thinking patterns into what I am today,.

Culture in Puerto Rico is very religious. People there are more willing to come out and claim atheism, secularism, or freethinking more freely now. However, it was mostly unheard of when I was a teenager in 1997. I didnt find friends who had the same ideas until I was in my second year of college.

In general, the process of becoming a freethinker was difficult for me because it included a culture shock, the loss of my religious community support system, and a lack of support from my family and friends. Once I found that group of friends in college, being a freethinker became much easier. I was able to develop my relationships and ideas within a supportive and inquisitive community. Ive kept all of those friends and, now, thanks to HAFree, Ive made even more friends across the globe whoshare the same ideas and want to contribute to a greater community.

What makes a good freethinker?

I hesitate to answer this question because it seems like it includes a moral/value judgement. I am not the right person to say what makes or doesnt make a good freethinker. Im more confident in talking objectively about what makes a freethinker rather than a good freethinker.

The scientist in me says that a freethinker is a person who fits the definition of a freethinker. Obvious right? If you form your opinions based on logical reasoning and evidence and you do not from your opinions on the basis of tradition, authority, or faith, then I would say calling yourself a freethinker would be accurate.

Subjectively, Id say that whether someone is a good freethinker depends on whether that someone is a good person. Who are you in the world, what do you do? What is your way? I dont think there is a way to define that in words. If the people around you feel that you are positive force in the world and you happen to be a freethinker then I would feel that you are a good freethinker.

There was a time where I thought that freethinking could be associated with a code of values, but I dont believe that to be true any longer. I think I believed this because religiosity is always connected to a code of values. So it seemed natural that once you left your religiosity, whatever occupied that space would include a code of values. However freethinking as a lifestyle necessitates that you assume fewer things to be true or objectively clear-cut.

Freethinking does not occupy the same space as religion in the mind because it functions as a negation of knowledge. Religiosity imposes a foundation of information from which to draw conclusions about reality. As a freethinker, you question yourself and ideas far more often than when you are religious about any given fact or opinion. When you are less sure of your knowledge. it is harder to develop an objective code of values around that knowledge. Hence, there is no cut and dry way to establish goodness solely on the basis of words. Your goodness is a function of your self; only those that interact with you could ever tell you if your self is any good.

Where do you most differ from mainstream freethinking in its definition, aims, and activism, if at all?

Ive been through a lot of changes in how I go about being an activist. I had a firebrand period where I argued against and criticised religion. This period coincided with the debates that made Christopher Hitchens and Sam Harris a force within the freethinking community. I admired them, and during that time I emulated their behaviour. Going through law school also increased my willingness to engage in debate.

The debate-prone version of myself continued until about 2012 when I went back to school to do a PhD. Since that time, I have focused more on community and bridge building. Where law taught me to fight science taught me to reconcile. I wanted to find more ways of making the freethinking community get closer together and of forming conversation and positive communication pathways between the religious community and the freethinkers. Lately, Ive had more success with conversation than I had with debate.

The current socio-political climate suggests to me that we have to do better about coming together and building a governmental system that is inclusive and protects individual liberties more than we have. This is in order to come together in order to highlight our metaphysical differences in the public square. There is always a place for intellectual debate, and I always enjoy watching the debates. I certainly do not believe that the activists who are engaging in the debates or the firebrand activism need to stop or be less forceful. However, I dont personally have that passion anymore. I leave that to those who have the controversies as their personal mission and enjoy their work from the side-lines.

What are the main reasons, within your experience, people become freethinkers? For example, arguments from logic and philosophy, evidence from mainstream science, or experience within traditional religious structures.

What I see the most are two things: i) people open minded enough to have rational epiphanies and ii) people who have gone through some kind of trauma or difficult situation in which religion is directly responsible.

Most of my friends and family whose religiosity has eroded as adults continue to hold on to the idea of a greater power. The scientific and rational arguments are not lost on them when it comes to the fantastic parts of their core religions, but the god figure is still very present in their belief systems. On the other hand, the friends (Im the only agnostic-atheist in my family) who lost their religiosity at a young age, say teenagers, were far more likely to burn the whole thing down and let go of the god figure.

The older a person is, the harder it is to get the to move on to the freethinking side of things and change their cognitive theory of the universe. If you base your understanding of reality on god for a long time, it will take a long time before you can pull that god pin out of your system without the whole thing crashing down around you. Although it does no physical harm to have your cognitive reality fall apart, it can include some psychological damage depending on your level of belief and engagement. It takes a good bit of mental fortitude to crossover to freethinking and start your model of the universe from the beginning again, especially if you have passed your youthful rebellious phase.

What is the best reason you have ever come across for freethinking?

Science.

For me its obvious that the success of science is the only reason any of us are here and particularly able to have this conversation. A freethinker accepts logic, reason and critical thinking and rejects tradition, authority, and faith as paths to knowledge. What this means is that when Kepler was trying to understand the orbits of the planets he put away any faith in an earth-centred universe. What we see is that in order for us to be successful as a species, it requires us to accept that we do not have real answers a priori; real meaning answers that accurately reflect our physical reality. Put very loosely, human ideas about how reality works are consistently wrong but we still convince ourselves we are consistently right.

Our tendency to think we are right and be wrong is very dangerous; it means we will continuously make mistakes. So how do we accept and take into account our error prone human nature when we are trying to decide how to live on the planet and amongst each other? Our philosophy and psychology have to take into account our natural state of being. The best way to do that is to think and act in such a way that our behaviour naturally uncovers our mistakes. We have to revisit and analyse our decisions, their consequences, and the implications of those consequences.

If we are to improve our state of living, as individuals and as a species, then we must be freethinkers. We must, as a species, adopt the understanding that we do not have all the answers and that everything must be questioned. It is the best way to safeguard against catastrophically wrong ideas that are the root of many of our traditional institutions and political discourse.

Two simple examples of this are the denial of climate change and the teaching of evolution in schools. These are ideas that are only accepted because of arguments founded in faith, tradition, and authority. A freethinking public would not likely be guilty of teaching creationism or denying climate change.

This is the greatest success of science and freethinking. The scientists made freethinking the foundation of their institution. With this foundation, science has been able to survive against traditional backlash for centuries. Not only has science successfully weathered human crises, but it has also been the driving mechanism for implementing the solutions to those crises as they have arisen. There is no better reason for free-thinking.

Is it more probable for freethinking to be accepted among the younger sub-population than the older sub-population?

Yes, but I think this is more a function of humanity than it is a function of freethinking as a concept. Young people are more open about things because in general they have learned less about life than older people. Even in religious or non-freethinking societies the young tend to be more revolutionary and looking for change, positive or negative.

Older people had to fight different fights and so they chose to ignore the fights they could not win or fights that werent as important to win. Younger folks walk in with the freedoms of those battles ready to take on new battles. The new atheist or freethinking revolution would not have happened the way it did a few years ago had it not been for the social civil movements other marginalised populations mobilised for in the past.

What are the popular community activities provided by Hispanic American Freethinkers?

HAFree offers monthly meetups encouraging its members to get together for social and educational purposes. Since its foundation in 2010, it has an annual picnic, sometimes inviting other secular groups such as Ex-Muslims of North America. Many of its members participate in tabling at conferences, festivals, and similar in order to inform the public about critical thinking, science, and scepticism of everything, especially the so-called supernatural claims. HAFree works with other organizations on everything from separation of religion and government issues, to educating people on death with dignity issues. HAFree also partners up with other organisations such as Humanistas Seculares de Puerto Rico and American Atheists to put together conferences that are beneficial to the communities we are trying to serve.

What are some of the demographics of Hispanic American Freethinkers? Who is most likely to join Hispanic American Freethinkers? (Age, sex, sexual orientation, and so on.)

Hispanics (a minority ethnic group in the U.S.) are made up of people of all races. Some are born here and some were born abroad. Some speak Spanish, some speak English only, and mostare bilingual to one degree or another. Family backgrounds come from every country in the Americas and, even if not self-identified as Hispanic or Latino, they are all welcomed as freethinkers. Most members and supporters tend to be between age 16 and 60 with the bell curve leaning towards the late 20s and early 30s. HAFree has transgendered, gay, straight, male, and female, but we dont keep much records on such demographics.

What have been the largest activist and educational initiatives provided by Hispanic American Freethinkers? Out of these, what have been honest failures and successes?

In the past 5 or so years, HAFree has provided speakers for a couple of dozen conferences, exposing the organisation and its members to the greater growing secular community in the U.S. These presentations throughout the country have helped inform mainstream Americans about the plight of Hispanics, including the specific targeting done by religious groups including Muslims, Jehovah Witnesses, Pentecostals, and Mormons just to name a few. HAFree gives seminars in high schools and colleges on critical thinking, careers in STEM, technology futurism, etc. and its members are often asked to participate in panels about minorities in secularism.

HAFree produces a podcast in Spanish whereby topics of science and controversial issues such as abortion are discussed as well as some debates with Christian pastors in the form of conversations about religion claims and counterclaims. Once or twice a month, HAFree members host the television show Road to Reason A Skeptics Guide to the 21st Century in which religion, pseudoscience, superstitions, and other claims are carefully examined through the lens of science. HAFree produces a lot of online debates, brochures, t-shirts, bible stickers, buttons, and similar to help people understand better the flawed thinking of faith-based claims. In general, everything has been very successful.

On the weakness side, being an all volunteered organisation and one that is in general more mobile than most other communities (yes, Hispanics tend to move a lot), it is challenging to have continuity in some of the projects. This will sometimes lead to pauses in activities that were going well (i.e. you will notice some difference in times when publishing the HAFree podcast). Although the organisation is 100% volunteer, funding is extremely challenging because our target communities are already far less affluent than mainstream Americans and volunteers are already tasked in doing what they are most passionate about educating people about freethought within the Hispanic/Latino cultural environments of our Nation. Currently, HAFree has been working in creating a documentary film about Latinos in the U.S., their beliefs, and challenges as both religious and freethinkers.

Who/what are the main threats towards freethinking as a movement?

The erosion of church and state separation is the biggest problem as far as I can see. Some parts of government and religion have never been separate, despite what the constitution says. If we can continue to win those battles and not lose ground on the battles we have already won, then I think the movement will continue to flourish and improve humanity. Otherwise, things will go back towards theocracy and the freethinking movement will have to start from the beginning again.

How can people become involved with the Hispanic American Freethinkers? Theres the meetup group, and TwitterandFacebook.

Any of those are great. The directors are all available on those platforms and any of us would enjoy talking with folks that are interested in talking to us.

Any closing thoughts or feelings based on the discussion today?

No, thank you for interviewing me. Please let me know if you have any follow up questions you would like me to address.

Thank you for your time, Emmanuel.

More here:
An Interview with Emmanuel Donate, JD Director, Hispanic American Freethinkers - Conatus News

Several weeks ago a writer on this page pontificated at length about a lingering Christmas display in downtown Mt. Pleasant. Seems holiday lights not removed immediately at 12 a.m. December 26 are a garish, patchwork menace to the common good. Hoo boy.

If this cranky-pants observation didnt resonate with readers theres his sharing of opinions on inconsistent enforcement of city codes, hair-pulling on the Oakland County town of Rochester (a soulless, stamping plant suburb with the same interchangeable identity as every other town in the metro Detroit blob) and, why not?, human complicity in the whole climate-change magilla because plugging in Christmas lights past a certain date kills polar bears or something.

Whats next? Sucking lemons in front of the horn section of the high-school marching band?

It seems somebody needs his blankie, a glass of warm milk, a cookie, a lullaby and a hug. Perhaps a visit to the wonderful little town of Rochester is in order as well as a science lesson from reputable scientists rather than the self-aggrandizing pronouncements of Bill Nye (not a scientist), Neil deGrasse Tyson (not a climate scientist) or any number of pundits in this space claiming to have found the one true faith within their brand of environmentalism.

Advertisement

Ahhh, but in this day and age it becomes necessary to attack Christmas decorations as god awful and ugly as sin in order to bolster a secularist faith in Christianitys stead. Get the religious irony of the lower-case g and the presupposition of sin, albeit sins according only to pantheistic sensibilities?

You gotta serve somebody, rasped Bobby Zimmerman, and better a secularized, pantheistic version than a celebration of the birth of Jesus, at least according to the writer(s) and celebrities mentioned above. Not for some the light curtains on a downtown eatery in a small, Midwestern college town, but, by all means, construct monstrosities across the rural landscapes of the United States that serve as the secular iconography of the environmentalist religion. Let us bow our heads and offer prayers to Gaia.

Just never you mind that you cant see the forests for the turbines, birds are pureed by the thousands, and light flicker and noise combine to generate a general health nuisance. Oh, yeah, all in the name of an energy source of questionable capabilities thatll never attain base load status and relies heavily on continued public subsidies. But, yeah, by all means, lets focus on Christmas lights because city codes should be enforced to every jot and tittle to appease the aesthetics of a malcontent in the service of the secular environmentalist Baal or some such poppycock.

Francis Bacon noted that knowledge is power sometime during the Renaissance. Its been a consistent ploy ever since the Renaissance to promote what passes for knowledge over meditation rather than a balance of the two. Hence the religious and ideological fervor displayed by the followers of scientism rather than real science; in their typical ends justify the means manner, scientists at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration deliberately misled the world with fabrications refuting the 20-year hiatus in increasing global temperatures.

As it turns out, the priests at NOAA led by Tom Karl jooked scientific standards not to further science but to circumvent it by using incomplete data that cannot be verified for experimental results that cannot be duplicated, which is, you know, what real science is supposed to be. This past month, retired NOAA climatologist John Bates threw a flagrant manipulation of scientific integrity guidelines and scientific publication standards flag on the 2015 report lead-authored by Karl on Judith Currys Climate Etc. blog.

By all means, lets protect the environment as good stewards stewards applying real scientific knowledge and faith-based meditation, rather than merely the pronouncements of the charlatans of scientism and Christmas-light killjoys.

Bruce Edward Walker (walker.editorial@gmail.com) is a Morning Sun columnist and freelance writer.

Visit link:
Walker: Christmas lights and environmental pantheism - The Daily Tribune

Albert Einstein was one of the worlds most brilliant thinkers, influencing scientific thought immeasurably. He was also not shy about sharing his wisdom about other topics, writing essays, articles, letters, giving interviews and speeches. His opinions on social and intellectual issues that do not come from the world of physics give an insight into the spiritual and moral vision of the scientist, offering much to take to heart.

The collection of essays and ideasThe World As I See It gathers Einsteins thoughts from before 1935, when he was as the preface says at the height of his scientific powers but not yet known as the sage of the atomic age.

In the book, Einstein comes back to the question of the purpose of life on several occasions. In one passage, he links it to a sense of religiosity.

What is the meaning of human life, or, for that matter, of the life of any creature? To know an answer to this question means to be religious. You ask: Does it many any sense, then, to pose this question? I answer: The man who regards his own life and that of his fellow creatures as meaningless is not merely unhappy but hardly fit for life, wrote Einstein.

Was Einstein himself religious? Raised by secular Jewish parents, he had complex and evolving spiritual thoughts. He generally did not shy away from talking about religion and the possibility of the scientific impulse and religious thoughts coexisting.

"Science without religion is lame, religion without science is blind," said Einstein in his 1954 essay on science and religion.

Some (including the scientist himself) have called Einsteins spiritual views as pantheism, largely influenced by the philosophy of Baruch Spinoza. Pantheists see God as existing but abstract, equating all of reality with divinity. They also reject a specific personal God or a god that is somehow endowed with human attributes.

Himself a famous atheist, Richard Dawkins calls Einstein's pantheism a sexed-up atheism, but other scholars point to the fact that Einstein did seem to believe in a supernatural intelligence thats beyond the physical world. He referred to it in his writings as a superior spirit, a superior mind and a spirit vastly superior to men. Einstein was possibly a deist, although he was quite familiar with various religious teachings, including a strongknowledge of Jewish religious texts.

In another passage from 1934, Einstein talks about the value of a human being, reflecting a Buddhist-like approach:

The true value of a human being is determined primarily by the measure and the sense in which he has attained liberation from the self.

This theme of liberating the self is also echoed by Einstein later in life, in a 1950 letter to console a grieving father Robert S. Marcus:

A human being is a part of the whole, called by us "Universe," a part limited in time and space. He experiences himself, his thoughts and feelings as something separate from the resta kind of optical delusion of his consciousness. The striving to free oneself from this delusion is the one issue of true religion. Not to nourish it but to try to overcome it is the way to reach the attainable measure of peace of mind.

In case you are wondering whether Einstein saw value in material pursuits, heres him talking about accumulating wealth in 1934, as part of the The World As I See It:

I am absolutely convinced that no wealth in the world can help humanity forward, even in the hands of the most devoted worker in this cause. The example of great and pure characters is the only thing that can lead us to noble thoughts and deeds. Money only appeals to selfishness and irresistibly invites abuse. Can anyone imagine Moses, Jesus or Gandhi armed with the money-bags of Carnegie?

Cover photo:

Portrait taken 06 February 1938 at Princeton University of physicist Albert Einstein, author of theory of relativity. (Photo credit: AFP/Getty Images)

Read more from the original source:
Albert Einstein's Surprising Thoughts on the Meaning of Life | Big ... - Big Think

Being laid up with the crude for over a week has given me a chance to do some in-depth reading and calculating. Im just not wired to sit, but I have not felt like doing anything but whining. Mostly to the walls! While in bed, I saw books on shelves that needed to be wiped off, one by one. Curtains that should be shaken out to throw off the dust, blinds holding a buildup of dust from last spring, and the overhead light fixture dimmed by grime. I calculated how much dust was on the TV screen, gathered from the sunlight, and streaks on the mirror over the dresser that needed some Windex. I never noticed when I was well.

To rid myself of those thoughts, I ambled to the den. Given ample time, I could have calculated problems there but picked up a book instead. My first reading was a new work by local attorney Jim Howard entitled the Miracle of Man, a fascinating account of mans relationship with God and various beliefs of today. He will be a guest on Susan and Carol-Unscripted Tuesday, March 7 and have a book signing that same week. As I was reading, I was taken back to my college American Literature classes where varying beliefs from Pantheism to Puritanism existed. This is not a fluff book.

When I finished Jims work, I downloaded, The Cornbread Mafia A Memoir of Sorts (2016) by Joe Keith Bickett, released from federal prison in 2011 for his marijuana involvement in Marion County and surrounding counties. In this book, he tells of the Raywick of his youth and fascinating stories of raising acres of pot, out-running (or outsmarting as he might say) the law, but finally getting caught.

James Higdon actually wrote the first book about the group in Marion County, The Cornbread Mafia (2013). (Higdon has worked for the Louisville Courier-Journal, the New York Times and other publications.) This book focuses on the most notable member of the Mafia, Johnny Boone, called by some the ringleader. He fled after being arrested twice and facing a life sentence if caught. He lived in Canada until he was recently detained. The famous slogan, Run, Johnny, Run was the source of T-shirts and recordings and was a subject of Americas Most Wanted.

Sally Bentons The Bluegrass Conspiracy first (to me) exposed drug rings in Kentucky. Remember hearing about the guy who parachuted to his death carrying hundreds of thousands of dollars in cash and 150 pounds of cocaine? All of these are available on Amazon or in bookstores.

Back in the '80s, I had a homeroom with just a few students until the trade school buses arrived. During this time, students often engaged me in their conversations. One time a boy said, Miss Perkins, I can take you to a marijuana farm that has an iron, padlocked gate and guard dogs. I stopped him. At the time, I thought he was exaggerating, but he actually could have probably taken me there.

Somewhere in the middle of a corn patch or a tobacco crop may be rows of marijuana right under our noses. Every time I hear a helicopter overhead, I think of the Cornbread Mafia. Put these four books on your reading list, and you wont be sorry.

Here is the original post:
4 books tell stories of Ky. drug world - Glasgow Daily Times

Spinozism (also spelled Spinoza-ism or Spinozaism) is the monist philosophical system of Baruch Spinoza which defines "God" as a singular self-subsistent substance, with both matter and thought being attributes of such.

In a letter to Henry Oldenburg Spinoza wrote: "as to the view of certain people that I identify god with nature (taken as a kind of mass or corporeal matter), they are quite mistaken".[1] For Spinoza, our universe (cosmos) is a mode under two attributes of Thought and Extension. God has infinitely many other attributes which are not present in our world. According to German philosopher Karl Jaspers, when Spinoza wrote "Deus sive Natura" (God or Nature) Spinoza meant God was Natura naturans not Natura naturata, that is, "a dynamic nature in action, growing and changing, not a passive or static thing."

In Spinozism, the concept of a personal relationship with God comes from the position that one is a part of an infinite interdependent "organism." Spinoza argued that everything is a derivative of God, interconnected with all of existence. Although humans only experience thought and extension, what happens to one aspect of existence will still affect others. Thus, Spinozism teaches a form of determinism and ecology and supports this as a basis for morality.[citation needed]

Additionally, a core doctrine of Spinozism is that the universe is essentially deterministic. All that happens or will happen could not have unfolded in any other way. Spinoza claimed that the third kind of knowledge, intuition, is the highest kind attainable. More specifically, he defined this as the ability for the human intellect to intuit knowledge based upon its accumulated understanding of the world around them.

Spinoza's metaphysics consists of one thing, substance, and its modifications (modes). Early in The Ethics Spinoza argues that there is only one substance, which is absolutely infinite, self-caused, and eternal. From this substance, however, follow an infinite number of attributes (the intellect perceiving an abstract concept or essence) and modes (things actually existing which follow from attributes and modes). He calls this substance "God", or "Nature". In fact, he takes these two terms to be synonymous (in the Latin the phrase he uses is "Deus sive Natura"), but readers often disregard his neutral monism. During his time, this statement was seen as literally equating the existing world with God - which is why he was accused of atheism. For Spinoza the whole of the natural universe is made of one substance, God, or, what's the same, Nature, and its modifications (modes).

However, one should keep in mind the neutral monist position. While the natural universe humans experience in both the realm of the mind and the realm of physical reality is part of God, it is only two modes - thought and extension - that are part of infinite modes emanating from God.

Spinoza's doctrine was considered radical at the time he published and he was widely seen as the most infamous atheist-heretic of Europe. His philosophy was part of the philosophic debate in Europe during the Enlightenment, along with Cartesianism. Specifically, Spinoza disagreed with Descartes on substance duality, Descartes' views on the will and the intellect, and the subject of free will. [3]

Spinoza defines "substance" as follows:

This means, essentially, that substance is just whatever can be thought of without relating it to any other idea or thing. For example, if one thinks of a particular object, one thinks of it as a kind of thing, e.g., x is a cat. Substance, on the other hand, is to be conceived of by itself, without understanding it as a particular kind of thing (because it isn't a particular thing at all).

Spinoza defines "attribute" as follows:

From this it can be seen that attributes are related to substance in some way. It is not clear, however, even from Spinoza's direct definition, whether, a) attributes are really the way(s) substance is, or b) attributes are simply ways to understand substance, but not necessarily the ways it really is. Spinoza thinks that there are an infinite number of attributes, but there are two attributes for which Spinoza thinks we can have knowledge. Namely, thought and extension.[5]

The attribute of thought is how substance can be understood to be composed of thoughts, i.e., thinking things. When we understand a particular thing in the universe through the attribute of thought, we are understanding the mode as an idea of something (either another idea, or an object).

The attribute of extension is how substance can be understood to be physically extended in space. Particular things which have breadth and depth (that is, occupy space) are what is meant by extended. It follows from this that if substance and God are identical, in Spinoza's view, and contrary to the traditional conception, God has extension as one of his attributes.

Modes are particular modifications of substance, i.e., particular things in the world. Spinoza gives the following definition:

The argument for there only being one substance (or, more colloquially, one kind of stuff) in the universe occurs in the first fourteen propositions of The Ethics. The following proposition expresses Spinoza's commitment to substance monism:

Spinoza takes this proposition to follow directly from everything he says prior to it. Spinoza's monism is contrasted with Descartes' dualism and Leibniz's pluralism. It allows Spinoza to avoid the problem of interaction between mind and body, which troubled Descartes in his Meditations on First Philosophy.

The issue of causality and modality (possibility and necessity) in Spinoza's philosophy is contentious.[6] Spinoza's philosophy is, in one sense, thoroughly deterministic (or necessitarian). This can be seen directly from Axiom 3 of The Ethics:

Yet Spinoza seems to make room for a kind of freedom, especially in the fifth and final section of The Ethics, "On the Power of the Intellect, or on Human Freedom":

So Spinoza certainly has a use for the word 'freedom', but he equates "Freedom of Mind" with "blessedness", a notion which is not traditionally associated with freedom of the will at all.

Though the PSR is most commonly associated with Gottfried Leibniz, it is arguably found in its strongest form in Spinoza's philosophy.[7] Within the context of Spinoza's philosophical system, the PSR can be understood to unify causation and explanation.[8] What this means is that for Spinoza, questions regarding the reason why a given phenomenon is the way it is (or exists) are always answerable, and are always answerable in terms of the relevant cause(s). This constitutes a rejection of teleological, or final causation, except possibly in a more restricted sense for human beings.[4][8] Given this, Spinoza's views regarding causality and modality begin to make much more sense.

Spinoza's philosophy contains as a key proposition the notion that mental and physical (thought and extension) phenomena occur in parallel, but without causal interaction between them. He expresses this proposition as follows:

His proof of this proposition is that:

The reason Spinoza thinks the parallelism follows from this axiom is that since the idea we have of each thing requires knowledge of its cause, and this cause must be understood under the same attribute. Further, there is only one substance, so whenever we understand some chain of ideas of things, we understand that the way the ideas are causally related must be the same as the way the things themselves are related, since the ideas and the things are the same modes understood under different attributes.

In 1785, Friedrich Heinrich Jacobi published a condemnation of Spinoza's pantheism, after Gotthold Ephraim Lessing was thought to have confessed on his deathbed to being a "Spinozist", which was the equivalent in his time of being called a heretic. Jacobi claimed that Spinoza's doctrine was pure materialism, because all Nature and God are said to be nothing but extended substance. This, for Jacobi, was the result of Enlightenment rationalism and it would finally end in absolute atheism. Moses Mendelssohn disagreed with Jacobi, saying that there is no actual difference between theism and pantheism. The entire issue became a major intellectual and religious concern for European civilization at the time, which Immanuel Kant rejected, as he thought that attempts to conceive of transcendent reality would lead to antinomies (statements that could be proven both right and wrong) in thought.

The attraction of Spinoza's philosophy to late eighteenth-century Europeans was that it provided an alternative to materialism, atheism, and deism. Three of Spinoza's ideas strongly appealed to them:

Spinoza's "God or Nature" [Deus sive Natura] provided a living, natural God, in contrast to the Newtonian mechanical "First Cause" or the dead mechanism of the French "Man Machine." Coleridge and Shelley saw in Spinoza's philosophy a religion of nature[9] and called him the "God-intoxicated Man."[10][11] Spinoza inspired the poet Shelley to write his essay "The Necessity of Atheism."[10]

Spinoza was considered to be an atheist because he used the word "God" [Deus] to signify a concept that was different from that of traditional JudeoChristian monotheism. "Spinoza expressly denies personality and consciousness to God; he has neither intelligence, feeling, nor will; he does not act according to purpose, but everything follows necessarily from his nature, according to law...."[12] Thus, Spinoza's cool, indifferent God [13] differs from the concept of an anthropomorphic, fatherly God who cares about humanity.

German philosopher Karl Jaspers believed that Spinoza, in his philosophical system, did not mean to say that God and Nature are interchangeable terms, but rather that God's transcendence was attested by his infinitely many attributes, and that two attributes known by humans, namely Thought and Extension, signified God's immanence.[14] Even God under the attributes of thought and extension cannot be identified strictly with our world. That world is of course "divisible"; it has parts. But Spinoza insists that "no attribute of a substance can be truly conceived from which it follows that the substance can be divided" (Which means that one cannot conceive an attribute in a way that leads to division of substance), and that "a substance which is absolutely infinite is indivisible" (Ethics, Part I, Propositions 12 and 13).[15] Following this logic, our world should be considered as a mode under two attributes of thought and extension. Therefore, the pantheist formula "One and All" would apply to Spinoza only if the "One" preserves its transcendence and the "All" were not interpreted as the totality of finite things.[14]

French philosopher Martial Guroult suggested the term "panentheism", rather than "pantheism" to describe Spinozas view of the relation between God and the world. The world is not God, but it is, in a strong sense, "in" God. Not only do finite things have God as their cause; they cannot be conceived without God.[15] In other words, the world is a subset of God. American philosopher Charles Hartshorne, on the other hand, suggested the term "Classical Pantheism" to describe Spinoza's philosophy.[16]

Similarities between Spinoza's philosophy and Eastern philosophical traditions have been discussed by many authorities. The 19th-century German Sanskritist Theodore Goldstcker was one of the early figures to notice the similarities between Spinoza's religious conceptions and the Vedanta tradition of India, writing that Spinoza's thought was "... a western system of philosophy which occupies a foremost rank amongst the philosophies of all nations and ages, and which is so exact a representation of the ideas of the Vedanta, that we might have suspected its founder to have borrowed the fundamental principles of his system from the Hindus, did his biography not satisfy us that he was wholly unacquainted with their doctrines... We mean the philosophy of Spinoza, a man whose very life is a picture of that moral purity and intellectual indifference to the transitory charms of this world, which is the constant longing of the true Vedanta philosopher... comparing the fundamental ideas of both we should have no difficulty in proving that, had Spinoza been a Hindu, his system would in all probability mark a last phase of the Vedanta philosophy."[17][18]

It has been said that Spinozism is similar to the Hindu doctrines of Samkhya and Yoga. Though within the various existing Indian traditions there exist many traditions which astonishingly had such similar doctrines from ages, out of which most similar and well known are the Kashmiri Shaivism and Nath tradition, apart from already existing Samkhya and Yoga.[19]

Max Muller, in his lectures, noted the striking similarities between Vedanta and the system of Spinoza, saying "the Brahman, as conceived in the Upanishads and defined by Sankara, is clearly the same as Spinoza's 'Substantia'."[20]Helena Blavatsky, a founder of the Theosophical Society also compared Spinoza's religious thought to Vedanta, writing in an unfinished essay "As to Spinozas Deitynatura naturansconceived in his attributes simply and alone; and the same Deityas natura naturata or as conceived in the endless series of modifications or correlations, the direct outflowing results from the properties of these attributes, it is the Vedantic Deity pure and simple."[21]

Continued here:
Spinozism - Wikipedia