One of the problems with the "academisation" of thinking & doing is that it's so bloody ineffective, as has been shown in what passes for teacher-"training" and nurse-"training" in universities, where even the very word "training" is sneered at: results - teachers who can't hold their own in classrooms and nurses whose attitude seems to be that "I didn't do 4 years at uni to wipe your droopy old bum". Now we have media reports that newly "trained" doctors can't tell patients' aortas from their arses, since time is taken up with neo-Marxist interpretations of the [insert name of anatomical] system. Pre-Dawkins [Dorkins ?] didn't we have some efficient and practical CAEs that turned out qualified and trained people who could actually DO/MAKE/BUILD/CONSTRUCT THINGS, and free to think for themselves ?

BD
I first raised the polygamy issue with a look at the song of solomomon, a poem written by a man with sixty wives and 80 concubines preparing to seduce yet another virgin. He seemed happy.

Lets us be clear,
Ex 21 is the same as the 10 commandments. It is not (I think) gods law that we must have children, yet that is the relationship that the law "honour your father and mother" is based on. So polygamy is no more or less a law than procreation, just a fact of life that god’s law facilitates.

In light of your concerns about eternal damnation, perhaps it is dangerous for you and others to be defiantly misrepresenting the inspired word of god.

happy to continue this discussion on the sex ed. thread.

Philo

Again you seem to have a very dim view of human beings, that without a rigid structure we will all start raping and murdering ourselves. This is the philosophical argument for fascism. I tend towards the anarchist philosophy that human beings, if freed from hierarchical social structures and illusions will behave co-operatively and lovingly.

Jesus said that we must become like children to enter the kingdom of heaven.
The unborn child at some stage, I don't know when, develops it's own consciousness. This consciousness is devoid of social constructs just as the ideal meditative state does - there is the link. As children are exposed to social constructions their innocence is polluted and this is where childrens behaviour problems come from. Same with adults.

21 infants is a big task that I have never tackled. I have however (in the past) fostered 6 siblings who were suffering all sorts of crises including incest. Their behaviour problems were immense and I say it was a direct result of their mis-treatment and not their natural selves. I watched them heal. None completely and some more than others. The value and structure that my family adopted in this case, that I believe caused the healing, was the joy of freedom.

Keiran said:

[Why not celebrate fragmentation, provisionality, chaos, ambiguity, skepticism, conflict, vastness, disorientation, questions, confusion and incoherence? By all means challenge minds with reason, free inquiry, dignity, participation and imagination.]

Umm.. I think a society which took this approach would last 5 minutes !
I'm wondering Keiran how 'far' you would extend this celebration ?
To social morality ? lets be diverse.... the bloke next door is married to his sheep and on the other side, that bloke is having sex with his kids, across the road there is an old man who has a worrying interest in young boys....

Yep.. moral relativism at its best.

Sorry Keiran, but that is the logical end game of what you are saying.
by all means celebrate diversity of 'opinion' about scientific things, and struggle for greater truth in this field, but social morality ? now thats a different story.

Puh-lease don't try to suggest that we all share the same innate sense of 'right' when it comes to sex and morals, we don't!

21For although they knew God, they neither glorified him as God nor gave thanks to him, but their thinking became futile and their foolish hearts were darkened. 22Although they claimed to be wise, they became fools 23and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images made to look like mortal man and birds and animals and reptiles.

24Therefore God gave them over in the sinful desires of their hearts to sexual impurity for the degrading of their bodies with one another. 25They exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshiped and served created things rather than the Creator—who is forever praised. Amen.

26Because of this, God gave them over to shameful lusts. Even their women exchanged natural relations for unnatural ones. 27In the same way the men also abandoned natural relations with women and were inflamed with lust for one another. Men committed indecent acts with other men, and received in themselves the due penalty for their perversion. (from Romans 1)

Boaz, when people discuss any issue they are likely to do so through different ..... even mutually exclusive ..... and often a priori sets of assumptions or beliefs about the nature of reality and the human place in it. For all perceptual, emotional, and behavioral purposes, people in fact can live in quite different realities. With such species dissociation, it is not unusual for different groups and individuals to be psychologically unable to draw compatible conclusions from the same fact. How do people then cope with this situation? Democratically? Heard of that Boaz? If we are to celebrate anything and especially morality and ethics, it needs to be within the context of democracy.

Boaz you certainly live in a choice neighbourhood with your comments ...... "the bloke next door is married to his sheep and on the other side, that bloke is having sex with his kids, across the road there is an old man who has a worrying interest in young boys....". How this man married a sheep has got me bleat but isn't it peculiar how we often find this abuse, and more, in exclusive religious playpens and often carried out by teddy cheerleaders. 'Corse, none of these teddies do democracy, plus never have/never will. Just seems you, Boaz, have a very serious strain of the teddy mind virus and represent seriously damaged goods....... a literal rote learner too. Care to enlighten all how you became infected?

ALSO, perhaps ewe can explain how it wasn't a bit sinful of Jesus not to give a straight answer when he supposedly said "Who do people say I am?" and "Who do you say I am? I feel his desires were inflamed with a lust for power over a few simple folk.

Boaz,
I would not bother to engage with Keiran, his basis of society has been tried back in primitive times, when every man did what he felt was right according to his own values. Where are those societies today? He calls this democracy. Moral democracy is a failure, as any society with strength and vision abides by a common and agreed set of moral values. It is just that Keiran has not evolved or developed in the social conscience mind. Obviously he is the type of person that would easily violate the law. How much dope has affected his mind we may not know but something is sure clouding his thinking.

Yes Boaz, I agree. Do not engage with differing opinions as you may find yourself considering something you are not supposed to, and ending up in hell. This is relevent to the topic as the major degeneration of acedemic institutions in the past few hundred years is that they have evolved flawed and sinful processes such as exploring the relationships between different philosophies and encouraging students to analyse, and even critique them.
You know how hard it is to find christian subcultures that adhere to gods word at the exclusion of heathen influence, do not allow this list to pervert what is left of your light. Put your head back in the sand before it is too late, you have allready admitted the normalness of Old Testament polygamy, who knows what these demons will force you to accept next next.

Follow coaches lead and ignore the tricky issues, it is the only safe thing for a good christian to do.

(Boaz, I appreciate our conversations including your willingness to engage from your own perspective. You are not the only perspective I disagree with on this and other forums but the reason I post on these lists is because I can discuss things with people who I would otherwise not meet, especially those with different perspectives) .