I would like to see the following refuted:
The statement There is a God is one for which there is no evidence; the statement There is no God is one for which there is no evidence to contradict it.
This seems to me unanswerable. It is no good getting lofty (You're simply unable to understand the mysteries of Faith) or offended (Are you really suggesting I'm just making this up ?). Neither of these actually answers the point.
I am aware that there is no evidence for the existence of God, but I find belief in him/her/it comforting, consoling, & it gives me strength & direction seems to me an honest position. To go beyond this & assert there IS a God is simply that, pure assertion, asserted more shrilly the more it is questioned.
To those who say Without God what is the basis for ethics & morality ? I say - how can something that doesn't exist, i.e. God, be the basis for anything ?
Click on the label atheism to see all of my thoughts on this topic on this blog
Sunday 15 July 2012
Sunday 8 July 2012
Willard meets the General
The following is a transcription of part of the magnificent scene near the start of Apocalypse Now where Captain Willard goes to General Corman's compound to get his orders. He is asked questions by the General's subordinate, Colonel Lucas, played as you will all remember by Harrison Ford, while the General and a spook look on silently. I transcribed it because Stu & I wanted to get straight exactly what it said:
Harrison Ford as Colonel Lucas
Lucas: You've worked a lot on your own, haven't you, Captain ?
Willard: Yes, sir, I have.
Lucas: Your report specifies intelligence, counter-intelligence with COMSEC/I-CORPS.
Willard: I am not presently disposed to discuss those operations, sir.
PAUSE
Lucas [reading from file]: Did you not work for the CIA in I-CORPS ?
Willard: No, sir.
Lucas: Did you not assassinate a government tax collector, Quang Tri province, June 18, 1968 ...... Captain ?
Willard: Sir, I am unaware of any such activity or operation [clears throat], nor would I be disposed to discuss such an operation if it did in fact exist - sir !
In Fossgate Books
One afternoon I was in a second-hand bookshop called Fossgate Books which is owned and run by my friend Alex. We were chatting about this and that. A young couple came in and disappeared off to browse. Later they reappeared. The man had two books to buy. His partner said in mock reproof, "You don't need those books." To which he simply replied, "You never need any books," and bought them. They left. It made both Alex and I think about the justice of what they'd each said. I remarked that by definition almost anyone who is in a bookshop has no business being there, since they probably already have more books than they know what to do with.
It makes me think now - can you put a limit to the book-lover's desire for books ? There is always some rationalisation, more or less satisfactory, for buying the next book or books. Some of them are justified (e.g. buying a guide book to the city you are going to visit) or almost so, some merely plausible, some impudent, some scarcely even believed by the book buyer themselves. "I want this because it is by X, or about Y , or fits with Z, which I am interested in." Prudence could well reply, "You seem to have a remarkably wide range of interests." The book buyer buys anyway. He or she is satisfying their obsession.
Some stray favourite stories now about book buyers & their libraries.
When Darwin, who as we know was a very methodical man, was thinking about getting married, he drew up a list, for & against, so that he could consider his options carefully. In the against column he wrote, "Less money for books."
Michael Foot's father, Isaac Foot, was supposed to have the largest library in private hands in England at that time. When I heard this fact, my instant reaction was "I want a bigger one." Isaac Foot also taught himself French at one point so that, as he said, he could read Montaigne in the original . This is one of the best reasons I have ever heard for anyone doing anything.
When Stanley Kubrick was alive, he once saw a television programme by the journalist Jon Ronson which he admired, so he invited Ronson to come & see him at his home, Childwickbury Manor in Hertfordshire. Ronson recalls that there was one room filled from floor to cieling with books about Napoleon. (Kubrick long planned a film about Napoleon which was ultimately never made. He had many discussions about it with Ian Holm, who he wanted to play the Emperor.) The existence of this room & its contents makes perfect sense to me, & if I could have such a thing I surely would.
One mad book collecting idea I have is this (many of my friends will have heard this one): I would like to get a copy of every single book of Christian theology ever written, then build a city of libraries to house them. When they were all assembled, & the city was complete, I would stand in the middle of it, stretch my arms out to indicate the millions of books all around and cry, "IT'S ALL NONSENSE !" Of course one could do this with the books generated by any monotheistic religion. But there has to be a limit somewhere.
It makes me think now - can you put a limit to the book-lover's desire for books ? There is always some rationalisation, more or less satisfactory, for buying the next book or books. Some of them are justified (e.g. buying a guide book to the city you are going to visit) or almost so, some merely plausible, some impudent, some scarcely even believed by the book buyer themselves. "I want this because it is by X, or about Y , or fits with Z, which I am interested in." Prudence could well reply, "You seem to have a remarkably wide range of interests." The book buyer buys anyway. He or she is satisfying their obsession.
Some stray favourite stories now about book buyers & their libraries.
When Darwin, who as we know was a very methodical man, was thinking about getting married, he drew up a list, for & against, so that he could consider his options carefully. In the against column he wrote, "Less money for books."
Michael Foot's father, Isaac Foot, was supposed to have the largest library in private hands in England at that time. When I heard this fact, my instant reaction was "I want a bigger one." Isaac Foot also taught himself French at one point so that, as he said, he could read Montaigne in the original . This is one of the best reasons I have ever heard for anyone doing anything.
When Stanley Kubrick was alive, he once saw a television programme by the journalist Jon Ronson which he admired, so he invited Ronson to come & see him at his home, Childwickbury Manor in Hertfordshire. Ronson recalls that there was one room filled from floor to cieling with books about Napoleon. (Kubrick long planned a film about Napoleon which was ultimately never made. He had many discussions about it with Ian Holm, who he wanted to play the Emperor.) The existence of this room & its contents makes perfect sense to me, & if I could have such a thing I surely would.
One mad book collecting idea I have is this (many of my friends will have heard this one): I would like to get a copy of every single book of Christian theology ever written, then build a city of libraries to house them. When they were all assembled, & the city was complete, I would stand in the middle of it, stretch my arms out to indicate the millions of books all around and cry, "IT'S ALL NONSENSE !" Of course one could do this with the books generated by any monotheistic religion. But there has to be a limit somewhere.
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