Well, if we're going to speculate and throw labels around, I'll speculate that
it's very important to Roger to get the label correct because he's obsessive
compulsive. It's against his nature to allow you or me or anyone else to be
wishy washy about anything or for Mustafa to assert, what appears to Roger to
be, irrationalities. Things need to be neat, logical, and in their place. I
understand this well, having a bit of that tendency myself.
Miriam
-----Original Message-----
From: blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
<blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> On Behalf Of Carl Jarvis
Sent: Monday, December 10, 2018 11:22 AM
To: blind-democracy@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Cc: Miriam Vieni <miriamvieni@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Subject: [blind-democracy] Re: an open letter to God!
I just love speculation. I often wallow in it, sucking it into my lungs,
spitting it out like a fountain, and splashing it onto anyone who comes close.
So please don't let what I say next slow down the speculation.
*My dad was an Atheist from about the age of 12 until the day he died.
Dad and Cathy loved to debate the subject. Cathy tried to convert Dad to
Agnosticism, saying that Dad was too intelligent to claim that he knew God did
not exist. Dad said he was intelligent enough to know that he was an Atheist.
They would go tooth and tong until at least 3 in the morning.
Dad, the avowed Atheist, is one of my heroes.
A majority of my close personal friends are also Atheists. I only hang out
with "good People".
*I am entering that time in life where I reach for the precise word to express
my thought, and it slides sideways and hides for minutes or days. So I tuck in
another word or two, since close is better than nothing. Especially annoying
to me are Labels. Not only do I manage to get them mixed up, but even earlier
in life I found them confining.
If I say that Roger is a Socialist, that tucks him into a box marked, "All
About Socialists". We use Labels to define who we are, or who we think you
are. But we also use labels to create an impression about you. On the ACB
Chat list there is a fellow who loves to refer to me as a Marxist. He does
that, along with much more, to plant the impression in the minds of others on
the list. It certainly worked for Senator Joseph McCarthy, ruining many good
lives. I don't mind being labelled "White", or identified as being left
handed, or blind.
But look at that label, "Blind". Think of the baggage we blind people drag
around due to the long history of fear associated with being in that box.
Miriam is a Woman. A useful label. But also a limiting label. We men have
controlled the definition of, Woman. Labels like, Ugly, or Beautiful, can make
life changing impressions.
So we come back to Agnostic vs Atheist. While I would prefer that you respect
my reasons for being Agnostic, I am okay with whichever label suits you and
Miriam...and any others who want to get into this pointless debate.
With Respect and love,
Carl Jarvis
On 12/9/18, Roger Loran Bailey <dmarc-noreply@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
Miriam, Carl can speak for himself, but as long as he is not being
clear we can speculate. Here is a speculation. Maybe he shies away
from the word atheist for the same reason I did when I was asked for
the first time if I was an atheist. I have told this story before, but
let me remind you. When I was twelve years old I encountered my first
bible thumping religious fanatic. He was twelve years old too. He was
a real pest. He would not shut up about Jesus and harangued me to let
Jesus into my heart constantly no matter how much I told him that I
was not interested. Finally he flat out asked me if I was an atheist.
At that time I was aware of what an atheist was, but I had never even
thought of it in relation to myself. Actually, I was an atheist. I
just didn't know it. I was certainly nonreligious, but I didn't think
of myself as nonreligious either. I also did not think of myself as an
agnostic. I didn't think of myself as anything in relation to
religion. The whole question was just irrelevant to me. I was just me.
But then, I was only twelve and I had not had time to give a lot of
thought to matters like that and because I was so unthinking I
unthinkingly accepted things that I would later utterly reject. It so
happens that every time I had heard the word atheist it had been used
in contexts that it had connotations of evil and unspeakable horror
attached to it. I had just unthinkingly accepted those connotations.
Asking me if I was an atheist was like asking me if I was a horrible,
terrible, evil being. Of course, I denied being an atheist. But that
started me to thinking about what I was. If I was not an atheist then
what was I? I decided that I could not prove the pest's god to be
nonexistent and he for sure could not prove to me that it did exist.
So I decided that I was an agnostic. I continued to call myself an
agnostic for the next four years until I was sixteen and converted to
straight atheism. But even after I converted to straight atheism I
kept calling myself an agnostic for the next two years. Why did I call
myself an agnostic if I had given it up? At the time I was not quite
sure, but in retrospect I think it had a lot to do with my denying it
the first time I was asked. It was hard for me to shake those connotations of
evil that I had learned to associate with atheism.
Agnostic seemed like a much more acceptable word. So my speculation is
that perhaps Carl learned along the way, perhaps in his stint as a
born again Christian, the same connotations and he just can't bring
himself to call himself by a word that he was taught meant something
completely evil.
_________________________________________________________________
J.K. Rowling
“ I mean, you could claim that anything's real if the only basis for
believing in it is that nobody's proved it doesn't exist! ”
― J.K. Rowling
On 12/9/2018 4:21 PM, Miriam Vieni wrote:
So, you're an Atheist, probably, but you would prefer to define
yourself as agnostic because you don't have a final answer and in
addition, you're stubborn. Did I understand you correctly?
Miriam
-----Original Message-----
From: blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
<blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> On Behalf Of Carl Jarvis
Sent: Sunday, December 09, 2018 2:21 PM
To: blind-democracy@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [blind-democracy] Re: an open letter to God!
Miriam,
Probably I am not so succinct in my explanation.
What you wrote is pretty much what I'm thinking the differences are.
So I'll try to muddy up the waters a bit more.
#1, It doesn't matter.
#2, It makes no difference to me how other folks define me.
#3, Proving or disproving the existence of any Deity or some sort of
Afterlife is not possible with our present abilities.
#4, There are no such things as miracles or super natural events.
There are happenings for which we have no answers, given our present
level of knowledge.
Remember, I am a rehabilitation teacher for the blind and low vision
folks. I am not now, nor ever wanted to be, a scientist. I do
possess a natural sense of curiosity, and so I do speculate on such
subjects as whether God exists. But the God being worshiped around
today's world, in His many forms, is a Man made, two dimensional
Toothless Paper Tiger, not to be confused with answering the question
of whether or not there is a Super Natural Being.
Given everything I don't know, it would be presumptuous of me to take
a position.
When you ask a two year old child if the light goes out or stays on
when you close the refrigerator door, the child will ponder the
question and then guess. But given a few years and some training in
such matters, the young person will explain how the door pushes on
the button that interrupts the power to the bulb, thus causing the
light to go out when the door is closed.
It will take much longer for the human race to gain the knowledge to
determine how the universe began, and whether or not there is
"intelligent Life" controlling it all.
Carl Jarvis
On 12/9/18, Miriam Vieni <miriamvieni@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
Well Carl, I may be confused. These days, I'll admit to being
confused about a lot of things and I'd never want to interfere with
your identity or personhood or whatever so, this is what is in my mind.
People who identify themselves as Agnostics, do so because an
Agnostic is someone who isn't sure whether or not God exists. So the
person who calls himself an Agnostic is saying, "I can't take a
position on this matter because I just don't know".
A person who identifies himself as an Atheist, does not believe that
there is a God who rules the universe. It's as simple as that.
You, Carl, in numerous posts, over all of the years that I've been a
member of this list, have indicated your non belief in God. You
haven't said that you were not sure about whether or not God exists.
Therefore, from what I understand the definition of an Atheist to
be, you are one.
So, either you could find a definition of Agnostic somewhere that is
different from what I thought it was, or you could explain that, in
fact, you're not taking a position on the existence of God because
you're really not sure whether or not he/she/it, exists.
Otherwise, whether or not you acknowledge the fact, you are an Atheist.
With Love,
Miriam
-----Original Message-----
From: blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
<blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> On Behalf Of Carl Jarvis
Sent: Sunday, December 09, 2018 11:09 AM
To: blind-democracy@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [blind-democracy] Re: an open letter to God!
Dear God...if indeed you are God, and you do exist, and you are
listening to me and not running around in other universes or sitting
on your throne listening to the sound of billions of harps.
God, sir or madam as the case may be, I have such great respect and
caring for both Roger and Miriam, yet we have come up against a
roadblock. They tell me that I am an Atheist, while I declare
myself as an Agnostic. We are just three very stubborn humans, and
this matter is never going to be resolved by us 3 mortals. So if
you wouldn't mind, Sir or Madam as the case may be, if you wouldn't
mind, could you send an answer for us? One that we all 3 can understand.
None of this burning bush stuff. No plague or Flood. I know! If
you were to drop bundles of hundred dollar bills, like several
millions, onto my deck, instead of that nasty tasting Manna, that
would let Roger and Miriam know that You are really out there...or
up there, whichever way is up.
Hmm...I think I missed my point. But I would really do good stuff
if you could spare the money.
So, I close in the name of You, and of your Son, Jesus, and of the
Holy Smoke.
Carl Jarvis
(who is now headed for the deck to see if anything dropped out of
the sky"
On 12/8/18, Miriam Vieni <miriamvieni@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
I agree with Roger. I think that Carl is an atheist, but he doesn't
want to use the term either because he thinks that it means that he
is asserting that there's no God, rather than that he doesn't
believe in God or, because there are some public Atheists who write
about the subject and whose writing tends to be very unpleasant,
often including a good deal of bigotry along with their thoughts
about the non existence of God. Christopher Hitchens is one who comes to
mind.
Miriam
-----Original Message-----
From: blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
<blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> On Behalf Of Roger Loran
Bailey (Redacted sender "rogerbailey81" for DMARC)
Sent: Saturday, December 08, 2018 8:29 PM
To: blind-democracy@xxxxxxxxxxxxx; Carl Jarvis <carjar82@xxxxxxxxx>
Subject: [blind-democracy] Re: responding to Mostafa
You spend a lot of time here expressing an atheist position to be
shying away from the word atheist. Maybe you should just break down
and admit to being one. I told the story once here about how I came
to break down and admit it. It was when I was in a college class
and someone told me that I kept taking atheist positions so why
didn't I just call myself an atheist. I said that, okay, I'm an
atheist, and I haven't stopped calling myself that since. And I had
been an atheist, not the agnostic kind, for about two years at the
time. But when I was an agnostic form of atheist for about four
years, from the age of twelve to the age of sixteen, I had been
making the mistake of equating the probability of there being a god
and the probability of there not being a god. In retrospect I
realize that I just had not thought it through. I did not even
realize that I was equating the two propositions. I just thought
that I couldn't prove it one way or another.
So I didn't know whether there was a god or not.
_________________________________________________________________
J.K. Rowling
“ I mean, you could claim that anything's real if the only basis
for believing in it is that nobody's proved it doesn't exist! ”
― J.K. Rowling
On 12/8/2018 5:50 PM, Carl Jarvis wrote:
Roger,
I think that earlier I mentioned that I like the quote by Isaac
Asimov. I used to read his Science Article in Galaxy Magazine.
Later, when the Asimov Science Fiction magazine was published in
Braille, I subscribed in order to improve my Braille skills. I
was very disappointed when they cancelled the Braille edition. I
still get the recorded magazine from the Talking Book and Braille
Library, but only glance at it from time to time.
In fact, I do not consider that there is any chance that God
exists...or not. No 50/50 chance.
When I walked away from Christianity, it was because I tired of
people so certain regarding the existence of something they only
had second hand stories as proof. But I don't care what they believe.
And working with so many elderly people who express deep Faith, I
say nothing. Seldom do we discuss religion with our clients, but
once in a while we are pressed into a corner. Of course we could
say, "we are not allowed to discuss religion", but I refuse to be
bound by bureaucratic mumbling, either. So this woman said, "I'm
so glad good Christians have come to see me". I said, "Thank you,
but we're not Christian". She sat silent for a minute, and then
said, "But my dogs love you. If you were not Believers they would
not let you enter."
She continued along these lines for some while, not wanting to
accept my word that I was not a Christian. Finally, after going
around and around, I asked her, "Do you believe that God created
Adam and Eve, and put them in the Garden of Eden? Do you believe
that Noah built a boat big enough to put two of every animal on
board?"
"Yes", she confirmed. "Yes! God did exactly that." I said,
"Then we have nothing to discuss."
I often think about so many people I've known who feel driven to
force me to accept their beliefs. When I'm in the mood, I try to
get them to accept that there is really a Tooth Fairy". "I know
there is a Tooth Fairy," I assure them, "Because whenever I lost a
tooth, a dime appeared under my pillow in place of the tooth. And
my mother told me that it was the Tooth Fairy. She said she saw
it sneak in while I was sleeping." They act as if I'd lost my mind.
How could I honestly believe such silliness? "well," I tell them,
"you expect me to believe in an invisible God and His buddy the
Holy Spirit, and if you are Catholic, you also tell me that Mother
Mary is there to intercede.
And all of this is simply on the second hand word of long dead men
who wrote a book. By the way, did you know that Tinker Bell is real?
I saw her in a movie."
I'm told that I am being silly! I'm assured that Faith is very
complex and sophisticated. I tell them that if God's Word is so
complicated that it takes someone really smart, like them, then I
have to question just how truly wise God is. Don't you think He
would make His Word simple enough that the dumbest of us would
understand?
Religion is simply a tool of those in control. It may also be a
shield from the knowledge that we humans understand, our
mortality, something much of animal life does not deal with. But
in truth, believing in God answers nothing, including the proof it
would take to demonstrate God's presence. Hmm, I do believe I'm
going around in circles. That is scary. If I keep it up I might
find myself creating God.
Carl Jarvis
On 12/8/18, Roger Loran Bailey <dmarc-noreply@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
I still think you are falsely assuming an even chance between the
existence or nonexistence of a deity. As for the J. K. Rowling
quote, you might remember that I used to have a quote in my
signature line that I changed every month. I originally started
that because there were so many religious signatures on these
blind lists and I wanted to counter them a bit. But it was
getting harder to find a quote that I had not used and so when I
upgraded to Windows 7 and started using Thunderbird with it I
just went back to no signature just because it was easier that
way. But I use the Goodreads site. I have still not quite fully
explored it, though, even though I have now been using it for
years. But it turns out that Goodreads has a feature for looking up
genres of literature.
There are a lot of genres and I think Goodreads recognizes more
than the publishers do. Once you open up a page dedicated to a
particular genre you find lists of books in that genre including
new books, most popular books, lists related to the genre and so
forth. One of the features is a couple of quotations related to
the genre. So back in mid October I was looking at the genre page
for skepticism and under skepticism quotations was one by Isaac
Asimov that I really liked. So I decided to start putting a
signature line on my emails again and I pasted that Asimov quote.
It so happens that at the bottom of the quotations on that page
was a link to more skepticism quotations.
That was one of the features on Goodreads that I had never explored.
This time I clicked it and got a very long list of quotations.
For the most part I liked all of them. So I kept the Asimov quote
through the second half of October and all of the month of November.
Then came December and I thought it was about time to change my
signature.
I went back to the skepticism page and looked at the quotes again.
This time the two quotations were different.
I think Goodreads automatically rotates which quotations appear
on the genre pages. I did not bother to shop through the long
list of quotations that I would get if I had clicked the more
skepticism quotations link. After all, I like most of them. I
just took the first one and pasted it into my signature line. It
makes a point that I have to keep making over and over myself.
Someone will be beating me over the head with some matter of
superstition and I will ask how they know what they are telling
me is true. I get back, how do you know it isn't? As usual it is
because the probability of it being true is one in infinity.
So Rowling makes my point. There are an infinity of things you
could believe if you believed only because no one has ever proven
it to be false.
_________________________________________________________________
J.K. Rowling
“ I mean, you could claim that anything's real if the only basis
for believing in it is that nobody's proved it doesn't exist! ”
― J.K. Rowling
On 12/8/2018 11:32 AM, Carl Jarvis wrote:
Roger,
I enjoyed your quote: J.K. Rowling “ I mean, you could claim
that anything's real if the only basis for believing in it is
that nobody's proved it doesn't exist! ”
Nonetheless, I am an Agnostic, subset or not.
I neither care, nor believe, nor disbelieve in God or the Hereafter.
I know for certain that this life will end one day. While I
believe that will end my awareness, I'll not know for certain
until I either realize that I still exist in some form or
another, or that I do not.
I am doing all I can do in order to enjoy what years I will
continue in this life.
Carl Jarvis
On 12/7/18, Roger Loran Bailey <rogerbailey81@xxxxxxx> wrote:
Carl, an atheist is simply a person who does not believe that
there is a deity. That makes agnosticism a subset of atheism.
You are an atheist.
_______________________________________________________________
__
J.K. Rowling
“ I mean, you could claim that anything's real if the only
basis for believing in it is that nobody's proved it doesn't exist! ”
― J.K. Rowling
On 12/7/2018 11:13 AM, Carl Jarvis wrote:
Greetings Mostafa and all Believers and Non Believers First,
I am not an Atheist, but I do consider myself to be Agnostic.
To my associates that means I'm a Lazy Atheist. I prefer to
say, an uncaring Believer in not much of anything at all.
Second, you are going off again, grouping people under a
heading, even though they are as different as Human Beings can
be. I certainly think of you as being an individual,
different from my Muslim friends, who are also different from one
another.
You suggest that we exist in a "perfect universe". Where did
you get that notion? Look about you. This is not a perfect
universe.
But we do have to live here, imperfect as it is. Comets zoom
past our little Earth, sometimes slamming into it causing
great damage.
And just look out there and notice all the wasted space that
could be turned into farm land, with streams and lakes and
little towns where we might all live in peace. And we are
dashing out into the unknown at speeds we cannot conceive,
headed where?
Frankly, I would question my Faith if I believed that this
universe was the best that God could do.
And just one last thought. Do you truly believe that this
Earth is Perfect? It is part of the "perfect" universe. And
yet, we were created with the need to kill and devour other
life in order to
survive. If this is Perfection, I tremble to think of what
Heaven
looks like.
Carl Jarvis