Jim’s views and goals

[Jim]

I’ve posted many times in many places about my views and goals, but I thought that sometimes people might like to have one place to look for them and ask questions about them if they want to.

My life revolves all around trying to learn to follow Bahá’u’lláh. Part of that for me is helping to publicize His story, and helping people learn to follow Him if they want to. I think that’s the best thing that can happen to anyone, and what the world needs most of all, for all good purposes.

I have some ideas and ways of thinking of my own about science, religion and gods, but for me those ideas and ways of thinking are just mental devices, to facilitate my thinking, and communicating with people who want to communicate with me.

My goals in these forums have changed and changed again. For now I’m just trying to have friendly conversations with people, and to try doing what some other people have told me that they’re trying to do, to help me be a better listener for them. For that purpose I’ve been saying more about a light that I see in science and in some religions, which I think is being hidden and defamed by what people do with what they think they know that they call “science,” and what they think they know from religious scriptures.

 

[David T]

You have nailed the hammer.

Oh wait!!!

Yes the two domains are pulling apart in the same brain!!! Ouch......interestingly that leaves the middle clearer and clearer! Like a plant growing. We dont run the show but its facinating being in it and watching it at the same time!

From My perch on this tree bob i suspect it goes back to the beginning of time. (so said the idiotic leaf to the smart leaf). We are both going to fall down into that abyss soon. I wonder what happens after we hit the ground.
OMG WE ARE GONNA DIE!
LoL
Makes each breath that much sweeter i say.

 

[David T]

Btw my "on the tree analogy" that was darwins great failure out the gate.
Our thinking even has to be on the tree as well or its separated and thus the tree isnt felt living, its seen separate from the observer quantified dead abstract. Living itself is a quality that cant fully be quantified like love. Feel the love bob. Quality the tree is a quality. St francis called this, the family of god. Stood right here on this tree felt it said it. I am correct on this.

"I think" is disconnected from the tree. Mistake scientifically speaking. "i think" does not feel its dead.

 

[Jim]

I had a new thought today, that some fallacious thinking might be part of how people excuse unloving attitudes and behavior. If they feel an impulse to make up excuses for unloving behavior, that might mean that they have loving impulses that they’re trying to deny or repress. I’ll be thinking about how to respond better to people’s love, to help it grow and overpower temptations to think, talk and act in unloving ways. That fits together very well with the love for nature that has been discussed in the thread about responsible management of resources as a spiritual issue.

 

[Jim]

I was thinking about what I want to practice and promote in Internet discussions. I’ve been thinking that it would be ways for people to get ideas and encouragement from each other, in whatever good each of us is doing and hoping to do. I wanted to see if anyone else had any other ideas about the best possibilities in Internet discussions.

 

[Jim]

Now my plan is to try to understand what people are thinking, and tell them some things that I’m thinking, keeping these things in mind:
- The light that I see in science and in some religions, and what I think is blinding people to it and repelling them from it.
- Excluding groups and categories of people from my thinking except as targets of prejudice and discrimination.

I’ll be reading some articles about sustainable development as a spiritual issue, and posting thoughts about it.

 

[Jim]

I’m reviewing and updating this for some people who have asked me about it in another thread.

A week or two ago I decided to set aside everything I was doing, and just try to have friendly conversations with people on all sides of some divides. Most recently I was doing that in this thread. Then I was curious about “scientific consensus” and some ways that people think about evolution theory, so I did some research and thinking about those, and posted some questions and comments to try to understand better what people are thinking and are doing. I also posted some of my thoughts about it, for anyone who might be interested.

There’s a recent history in my posts above, of what I’ve been doing in these forums, and in the threads How might people learn to love with the kind of love that the world needs? and Learning not to lump people together in belief groups and categories.

There’s more here about the history of what I’ve done in these forums.

 

[Jim]

Someone posted that I might be a creationist, so I decided to post my views here about evolution and creation. I agree with all of evolution theory, including the premise of common ancestry, being taught in public schools. I know very little about what religious factions are promoting to be taught along with it, but I haven’t seen anything that I would agree with.

Until a few days ago, I always imagined that all life on earth has a common ancestor. Now it seems more likely to me that it does not. Until a week or two ago I always imagined that the earth is millions or billions of years old. It still seems unlikely to me that it’s less than 10,000 years old, but I am starting to wonder.

I don’t think of any history, including natural history, as being true or false. I think of all history as modeling something, without even understanding what it is that we’re modeling. Models are not true or false. They are more or less useful, depending on how they are used and what they’re used for. The people that I think would be best qualified to put together a history of life would be paleontologists.

What I think needs to happen, will happen and might already be happening with evolution theory is for people doing evolution research, with and without a premise of common ancestry, to encourage and support each other, and learn from each other. During this time when people are being stigmatized for not believing in common ancestry, people doing research without a premise of common ancestry might need to get their funding from religious factions. That will of course corrupt the research, but even so, I think it will help make evolution research more fruitful and beneficial.

 

[Revoltingest]

Someone posted that I might be a creationist.....

I once had a poster vehemently claim that I was one too.
It was indeed a very strange conversation.