brushbred,you are right.Israel and the USA are out of control.The distressing reality is that China wants to be exactly like them.

The West have destroyed themselves by seeking power through an monetary system,and China has ursurped us by productivity.

The USA has the weaponry and is trying to starve China of energy to slow their progress.This is why Japan entered WW2.Have we learnt nothing?

DavidF
you have not substantiated your position on Marx or Marxism, and your links between the philosophy and subsequent practice, like your link between Jesus and the Inquisition, is tenuous and anachronistic; indeed, if the flap of a butterfly's wings is registered a thousand miles away, OLO might be incubating the tyranny of tomorrow.

DavidF: "Capitalism has many flaws, but Marxism is no alternative. The environmental destruction in the Soviet and Maoist China was worse than in the capitalist states. Capitalism is blamed for the consequences of industrialisation".

Your logic is a little binary for me; Marxism is no alternative so it's capitalism by default?
Capitalism does indeed have many faults. It is an engine that is on the point of exhausting its fuel and collapsing, laying waste to the planet in the process.
While capitalism has often been congratulated for pulling millions out of poverty, this has only been in order to exploit them. Moreover, capitalism and the false prosperity it's engendered is single-handedly responsible for our population explosion--ergo in Australia our politicians are talking up a population boom. This expedient has two motives, to promote economic growth and to protect our borders, both absolutely necessary responses in the global climate, and both unsustainable.
It amuses me (grimly) when parochial simpletons winge about population growth in Australia being "unsustainable"; they're still incapable of thinking in the global context--witness the annual Australia Day nonsense, a pie throwing celebration the Three Stooges would be proud of! Besides, population growth is fundamental! Build more infrastructure, desalination plants, new agriculture, urbanise the desert---more growth! Regional threats too are good--talk up nationalism, militarise---weaponise, more economic growth!
Ironically world government, the paranoiac fear of the Ostrich Right, is inevitable and spells the demise Capitalism. Marx might have the last laugh yet.

I agree about not accepting mumbo jumbo as doctrine, not Marx's or Christianity's. I'm certainly not in favour of Marx's vision of the future--that would be anachronistic. But he sure had capitalism pegged.
But let's agree to disagree, it's not a fair debate anyway--you have the wind of ideology at your back.

David you asked me to substantiate my claim that the essay “relies so heavily on a fundamentalist style of discourse that it makes me think he is scared of where a more rational, honest and evidence-based discourse would lead.”

Your essay is entitled: “God is a human invention”

And you begin with the assertion that: “We invent God, religion...”

But this statement is not substantiated. Instead it is merely posited as the premise of the rest of the essay starting with the question: “How did the invention of God come about? We can make a guess.”

And so David in my eyes you become just another one of those people who say “We have the truth!” which as you say “is a recipe for oppression and conflict”.

Why is it such a recipe? Because in the absence of a reasons to support the assertion, any concerted attempt to propagate of such ideas must invariable lead to oppression and conflict.

David, you have not provided any reason for us to accept your premise that “God is an invention”. There are other atheists who say the same thing and are quite willing to incite hatred to propagate this sort of belief.

There are a number of points at which i would like to challenge your premise, but only if i could be convinced that you are not one of these atheists but someone who can accept that “God is a human invention” is a premise that needs to be defended/supported by reason and evidence, and not simply accepted as a matter of faith.

So tell me, is your proposition that “God is an invention” refutable in your eyes? If so what would be the criteria? Do we appeal to pure logic or is it a matter of looking at the evidence and only accepting your proposition if it can be proven beyond a reasonable doubt? Or should it be treated as the maintained assumption, so we only reject it if we can do so based on the balance of evidence (beyond a reasonable doubt)? And what sort of evidence would you require?

Dear George,

It is my CV.

Western philosophy would not be what it is were it not for Plato. I think many of his insights were harmful. The doctrine of the forms with their degeneration supported the idea of Original Sin when the neo-Platonists influenced Christianity. Unreasoning guilt, neurosis and all sorts of unhealthy ideas have proceeded from the idea of the forms. I wrote a book going into the subject at length, but it is unpublished since I got into an argument with the publisher. As a consequence of the argument I no longer felt like publishing as I felt it should be completely worked over. I have lost interest in working it over.

In that I identify with Perelman. Once you have done something the joy may simply be in the doing. The joy was in developing the ideas. The world has a plethora of books. It can do with one less.

I identify with Perelman in another way. From his bio: “A hobby from back in Russia that Perelman described to friends was hunting mushrooms on hikes in the woods.” My wife and I belong to the Queensland Mycological Society, and I am giving a paper on cultural attitudes toward fungi.

From page 19 of Fungi by Roy Watling

“The reasons for the lack of scientific knowledge of fungi compared with groups such as mammals, fish, birds and flowering plants originate with the early naturalists. They usually considered the fungi to be connected with the devil, and studying them at all was frowned upon by the church, right up to the 19th century, when the rest of natural history was blossoming. As a result of this taboo, scientific understanding of fungi, and especially their classification, has been hindered so much that it is no exaggeration to say that it lags almost 100 years behind that of many organisms. Thankfully, this unfortunate state of affairs is now rapidly changing as biologists appreciate the importance of these remarkable organisms and are searching for them in previously unexplored habitats.”

The above is English. Perelman and I have a different attitude.

Many thanks, Arjay!

First, my main worries as a mature age political scientist and historian, is that our OLO seems to be avoiding what it was originally designed for, major global problems.

However, apart from global warming, it seems the preference seems to be with our own OLO right now, apart from Global Warming, mostly every day stuff, religions of course, and personal problems, being part of it.

It reminds me so much of our Mandurah U3A (Uni' of the 3rd Age), which I was asked to take over the major suggested topic from Universities, World Affairs.

Helped a lot by Murdoch I battled through for nearly 13 years, but found the interest was still mainly on local affairs, or just High School age stuff.

One of the suggested topics when I first began was a Uni' topic Aboriginal Affairs, which not only produced grumbles from our U3A group, but also a stern local call to myself from a well known descendant of an early Mandurah family.

The same worries me right now with our OLO, especially the lack of feminine interest, which we believe is so important to repair a troubled world. I

Regards, BB, WA.

Squeers wrote: you have not substantiated your position on Marx or Marxism,

Dear Squeers,

I have shown where the manifesto calls for murder and specifies tyranny. That and the mounds of corpses substantiate my position. There is no reason to think that more of the Marxist garbage will not yield more corpses. I want something better than capitalism. However, Marxism is worse. I see no point in further discussion.

Dear grateful,

You wrote: "Your essay is entitled: “God is a human invention”"

True, but I submitted it under the title "Human Inventions." OLO changed it. I don’t care for the title.

I really don't see how ideas without a verifiable reality can be categorised as other than a human invention. If you had grown up in Rome over 2,000 years ago you would have been taught about a supernatural consisting of a number of humanoid gods. There is no more reason to think that the present deity of the monotheists has any more reality. You probably are an atheist regarding the Roman pantheon. There is no more reason to accept the belief currently popular. No matter how many people believe in the existence of an entity that is not evidence for its existence. I cannot see where that view is not rational, honest and evidence-based discourse. There simply is no evidence for the existence of a supernatural of any kind.

I don't say I have any truth. I do say that I see no reason for believing in anything where there is no evidence to support the belief.

One who makes an assertion should produce evidence to support that assertion. There were several proofs of the existence of God at the time of the German philosopher Kant. There have been no new ones since. Kant found none of them valid. However, he maintained a belief in God. Perhaps the fact that he was a professor at a Lutheran institution had something to do with his belief. I think it is up to those who maintain there is a God to show that such an entity is other than an invention.