Dear Yuyusu,

You wrote, "Spirituality counters that approach and teaches that we are not bodies, hence we need not become slaves to their instinctual desires and suffer the ensuing misery."

Kids don't need to be taught spirituality and other nonsense. We have instinctual desires. Responding to our instinctual desires either giving in to them or controlling them if it doesn't seem in our interests to give in to them is being a functioning human being.

Mankind has created myth that there is a spirit or soul which is apart from our bodies. There is absolutely no evidence to support such a contention. Spirituality is just another name for superstition and ignorance.

It seems that the Iran 'womens'soccer team is made up of men. Oh well like many lesbians its only for a period that they feel like men. The education department obviously thinks its fine.

Dear David,

There is no evidence that either giving in to our instinctual desires or controlling them is in our interests, because it is merely your subjective or arbitrarily axiomatic idea as if functioning as a human being is a good thing worth striving for, hence considered an "interest". The fact is that no values can be found in nature - use microscopes or telescopes or whatever other instrument you like: you won't find "values" anywhere, neither value-particles, value-waves nor value-forces, zilch! superstition!

For example, some people commonly say: "it is good for the vacuum-cleaner to be emptied once in a while", but it only reflects their preconceived idea that making the vacuum-cleaner continue to function for many years is good. The vacuum-cleaner doesn't care either way whether it is emptied or not. A child may claim: "the doll is tired, it wants to sleep", but that would only reflect the child's subjective preference - the doll doesn't care whether her eyes are opened or closed.

Hence, neither of us is rational, nor what we teach our children.

There is no vacuum in the minds of our children: if they receive no spiritual instruction, then they absorb and succumb to the prevailing superstition as if the desires of their bodies are important and ought to be fulfilled, including their sexual desires.

Dear Yuyutsu,

Nevertheless, spirituality is nonsense.

Dear David,

Nevertheless, materialism is harmful and even if you regard it as nonsense, you can find nothing better than spirituality to counter materialism.

Perhaps your understanding of spirituality is skewed, as expressed by you earlier: "Mankind has created myth that there is a spirit or soul which is apart from our bodies".

As far as I am concerned, if such a spirit/soul exists and can be evidenced, then it is material, not spiritual, perhaps a different kind of material, yet still material, so just to be clear, when I talk of spirituality I am not referring to any of that.

Spirituality for me is achieved by stripping materialism away, including the illusion of existence. It is an act of subtraction rather than of addition or the introduction of new elements, imaginary of otherwise. That I AM is undeniable. The spirit, or so-called "soul" is simply a name for what I truly am that remains once the illusion of the realness of matter (and/or whatever else is untrue) is subtracted. Being immaterial (which you prefer to call "nonsense"), it cannot be positively described, yet can you deny that you are?

Yuyutsu,
davidf, denies he a living person, as the life of the body is the soul. The reasoning and convictions of the mind is the spirit of the person. He denies both exist, so he is dead!