The Scarlet Letter Lounge

[Stormcat]

An old stone cathedral seems a strange place to gather for those who doubt the existence of a deity, But the irony of it all makes it all the more delicious. In place of pews, we have rich velvet sofas. Instead of holy water, our fountain contains wine, and where there was once images of saints, we have bookshelves full of scientific literature.

The solid oak doors are open now, beckoning all Atheists, Humanists, Agnostics, skeptics, and even curious believers. If you've ever been told that you were going to hell for not believing as "They" do, you are welcome here. But remember to keep things civil, this place is a sanctuary above all else.

[Maets]

Count me in, but it may be hard to keep it civil. Go to Youtube and search for Amazing Randy for a skeptics view of the world.

[Wormster]

Creeps silently in and starts reading about the latest Brunel project in the "The Engineer".

[Fairley B. Strange]

[Saunters in, twirling his moustaches caddishly.]

Hmmm, so where are all these charmingly adulterous hussies..?

Oh.
Sorry, I thought it was a letter 'A', from out in the street that ornate 'H' appears to join at the top.
You might want to fix that. Or not.

[Stormcat]

[Saunters in, twirling his moustaches caddishly.]

Hmmm, so where are all these charmingly adulterous hussies..?

Oh.
Sorry, I thought it was a letter 'A', from out in the street that ornate 'H' appears to join at the top.
You might want to fix that. Or not.

Well, unfortunately, the Adulterous "A" looks very similar to the anarchy "A" as well as the Atheist "A". Methinks at least two of these groups need a logo redesign.

[Stormcat]

So anyway, feel free to express exasperation at the current state of religiosity in your general area!

Just saw a woman with a "God's not dead" Sweatshirt. I just rolled my eyes.

[Maets]

Doctor recovers from Ebola after millions spent on hospitals, doctors, nurses, labs, etc and he and the news call it a miracle.

[J. Wilhelm]

Dear ladies and gentlemen:

I don't consider myslef an aetheist, and agnostic seems somewhat nondescript, as if I was saying "I don't knoow." But given my science background, I have carved myself a niche in the quasi-religious scientist category, even if that bothers everyone around me.  My basis for opening up a bit on the supernatural, is that when you go very high up in the ladder of science, like in graduate level mathematics and physics, you begin to see gigantic gaping holes in the logic that we use to explain the natural universe.  Simply put there are major flaws in mathematical logic the higher up you go, and all modern science is now nased on mathematics because many phenomena are not directly (or even indirectly) observable.  I won't elaborate unless someone requests it but I have a trove of examples that I can give you from my days as a PhD candidate at the University of Texas...

I'm not alone, I could drop names (e.g. Albert Einstein) as examples of fully scientific minds who refuse to give up altogether on the existence of something higher than us, even if we can't describe exactly what it is (On request I can give a fairly unusual science based hypothesis I have on it- which I will simply dub "Fractal Man").  I'm in good company.  The price we pay for opening our minds is that we don't fit in with the hard-core "militant" atheist clique among scientists and simultaneously we simply can't fully fit in in any organised religious group (because we will simply call their s*^t).

So if I piss off both sides of the argument, I know I'm closer to reality    Reality is always somewhere in between.

Having presented myself in such a fashion, now let me share my Religious Gahhh! for the day:
Hot of the presses:  someone is claiming that the ALS Ice Bucket challenge is a satanic ritual.  Wait. What??    Apparent;y we are victims of the devil himslef who is making us bathe in ice cold water as some form of unholy baptism

http://www.politicususa.com/2014/09/04/als-ice-bucket-challenge-charity-satanic-ritual.html

Those news make me want to go on a skull-crushing binge...

[Moriarty]

I would like to request elaboration. I'm intrigued.

[grimnir]

I should probably point out Heathen is the name used by many of the groups who follow the Old Norse religions - Forn Seid, Asatru, Heathenry, ASH, they are all part of the pre-Christian Viking-era religions. They are also the second national religions in Iceland and, I believe, Sweden.

Heathen does not actually mean Godless, it simply means you're not a follower of the Abrahamic God.

[J. Wilhelm]

I would like to request elaboration. I'm intrigued.

Well the Fractal God of Fractal Man is quite simple, really.  It based on the simple observation that sentience is the by-product of complexity.  Where immensely complex systems will develop "emergent properties" that are more than the apparent sum of its parts.

Fractals embody this idea, because out of a very simple set of instructions (small scale) if repeated, over and over with a small error introduced per iteration, the result can be very complex and varied.  In other words, the sum of the parts can look very different from the parts themselves and yet both the whole and the parts are technically the same, save that the parts are imperfect copies of patterns that repeat over and over to form the whole.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lmxJ1KDR_s0

This fits in my quasi-Christian ideology, because being created in God's image makes perfect sense to me.  We are the same not physically, but in terms of our sentience. We can be very similar microscopically, but very different collectively in the large scale.   In this context the fractal iteration is man, and the whole is God. Our typical error in faith is believing that we are "produced" as separate from God and subservient entities.  In that sense most organised religions have it dead wrong.  It's a "chicken or the egg" kind of question.

If you free yourself from the concept that you alone are very important, and accept that you are but a tiny speck in the universe while acknowledging the importance of your own sentience (you can't negate that, no matter how atheist you are!), you will see that you are tiny cog of a much greater system.  The natural universe DID in fact reach sentience as a whole - and we are the proof positive of that, because we comprise that intelligence along with the billions, or even trillions of other sentient beings that must exist elsewhere in the universe.  The problem seems to be that we cannot prove the sentience of the whole, (or perhaps we can't see it yet), and yet we know we are sentient ourselves.

What once were thought as being a random processes in nature (anything through geometry to population patterns, through even natural selection processes) have been discovered to be in fact a type of fractal progression.  And the fact that everything came from a Big Bang, means that the whole is self contained and finite, and yet partitioned, and continuously partitioning into infinitesimal parts.

Since I believe in a single God, then everything that exists must be the same as Him and every sentient component is one of us.  The sum of the components comprises a finite system that achieved sentience.  In other words, We are God.

Alas, it's 3:30 AM in the Colonies, and I must go to sleep as I start work at 11AM in my very unglamorous job tomorrow (today).  I will return with more details later on...

JW

[Arabella Periscope]

I like it.  A lot.  It makes sense to me.  Your mind is wasted in your present job, Admiral!!!

[J. Wilhelm]

I like it.  A lot.  It makes sense to me.  Your mind is wasted in your present job, Admiral!!!

I know my mind is being wasted (a common complaint of mine  ), but as tedious as my job is right now, at least it's helping me look at clothes' sizing and such for my upcoming Steampunk outfit 

[Arabella Periscope]

I am enjoying the combination of ancient stone cathedral and velvet sofa very much.  I would like to put this question as I also enjoy the wine --

"What Banged?  Where did it Bang?  What caused it to Bang?  And why would this causeless, timeless, spaceless Bang create fractals or life or sentience or anything else?"

[Stormcat]

I am enjoying the combination of ancient stone cathedral and velvet sofa very much.  I would like to put this question as I also enjoy the wine --

There are also bookshelves full of heathen literature, and we're thinking about installing a hot tub.

[J. Wilhelm]

I can see myself simmering in a hot tub, reading a copy of the Necronomicon (waterproof edition) 

[J. Wilhelm]

I am enjoying the combination of ancient stone cathedral and velvet sofa very much.  I would like to put this question as I also enjoy the wine --

"What Banged?  Where did it Bang?  What caused it to Bang?  And why would this causeless, timeless, spaceless Bang create fractals or life or sentience or anything else?"

That is the highest of mysteries.  Stephen Hawking himself doesn't believe that you can gain any information preceding the explosion of energy that we call the Big Bang, or about the matter which falls into black holes for that matter, so there is no way of knowing according to his brand of science.

What I can tell you is that one way to experience all possible permutations of existence in this universe is to subdivide into an infinite number of beings, each experiencing a different facet of this universe. You don't start with an infinite number, the original just subdivides as many iterations as possible, each subdivision diving itself so you reach an exponential growth rate.

The purpose of life is simply the exploration of all that can be within this universe.

[Kieranfoy]

Having presented myself in such a fashion, now let me share my Religious Gahhh! for the day:
Hot of the presses:  someone is claiming that the ALS Ice Bucket challenge is a satanic ritual.  Wait. What??    Apparent;y we are victims of the devil himslef who is making us bathe in ice cold water as some form of unholy baptism

http://www.politicususa.com/2014/09/04/als-ice-bucket-challenge-charity-satanic-ritual.html

Those news make me want to go on a skull-crushing binge...

Don't look at me, it wasn't us!

Grimnir said: 

I should probably point out Heathen is the name used by many of the groups who follow the Old Norse religions

Very true, oh hooded one, I was about to mention it, but it needs reposting. Perhaps you lot need a name change?

Wish we could easily change thread names. Burned myself like that once or twice.

[Stormcat]

Having presented myself in such a fashion, now let me share my Religious Gahhh! for the day:
Hot of the presses:  someone is claiming that the ALS Ice Bucket challenge is a satanic ritual.  Wait. What??    Apparent;y we are victims of the devil himslef who is making us bathe in ice cold water as some form of unholy baptism

http://www.politicususa.com/2014/09/04/als-ice-bucket-challenge-charity-satanic-ritual.html

Those news make me want to go on a skull-crushing binge...

Don't look at me, it wasn't us!

Grimnir said: 

I should probably point out Heathen is the name used by many of the groups who follow the Old Norse religions

Very true, oh hooded one, I was about to mention it, but it needs reposting. Perhaps you lot need a name change?

Wish we could easily change thread names. Burned myself like that once or twice.

fair enough. any suggestions for new names?

[Kieranfoy]

Just take off the 'place for heathens' bit.

That's the only bit in dispute.

[MWBailey]

My question is the same as one of the comments in regard to that article:

Does that mean that taking a cold shower is a satanic ritual?
There might be demons in my Irish Spring, oh nooooo...

[J. Wilhelm]

My question is the same as one of the comments in regard to that article:

Does that mean that taking a cold shower is a satanic ritual?
There might be demons in my Irish Spring, oh nooooo...

The problem is that fundametalists' IQ will tend to zero in some circumstances, and they will categorize anything they disagree with as "satanic," the go-to excuse when anything went awry during the middle ages, e.g. witch hunts in 1600 English America.  

[Kieranfoy]

My question is the same as one of the comments in regard to that article:

Does that mean that taking a cold shower is a satanic ritual?
There might be demons in my Irish Spring, oh nooooo...

Cold showers shrivel the genitals and kill fleshly desires. More akin to the Yahweh of Fundamentalism than to any Satan I've worshipped!

[MWBailey]

The problem is that fundametalists' IQ will tend to zero in some circumstances, and they will categorize anything they disagree with as "satanic," the go-to excuse when anything went awry during the middle ages, e.g. witch hunts in 1600 English America.  

I've run into that before. I've been into non-english alphabetical systems purely from a quasi-cryptological/archaeological angle since my early pre-teen years, and you would not believe how many times people have looked over my shoulder at the notebook I've compiled over the years of various alphabets and started shouting about "those damn' satanic letters in yer book!" I have to admit I kind of like scaring fundamentalist idiots shitless (pardon the term), but yeesh, if Linear B, or staveless runes are satanic, then I'm Saruman the White.

Spoiler: ShowHide

I'd keep railing on about fundamentalists and cretinism if it weren't for the fact that I'm kind of benighted myself in several ways. I can just feel all the fingers waiting to jab back at me...

[Rory B Esq BSc]

I can picture it well,

In my local 'lanes' there are churches that now are 'antiques centers' / and art galleries (i've got an exhibition in one in may) and a 'community space.

A red velvet sofa would be so good for a 'private view' but I think they might object to converting the font to a bar-b-que!

A crypt makes such a perfect wine cellar. ideal conditions for any vintage.

Thick rugs are essential as a stone floor is cooling for about 4 months but autum, winter, spring a good rug is a great comfort if you're sitting there for a few hours.