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POPSJefferson Bible reveals Founding Father's view of God, faith "Like many other upper-class, educated citizens of the new republic, including George Washington, Jefferson was a deist. Deists differed from traditional Christians by rejecting miraculous occurrences and prophecies and embracing the notion of a well-ordered universe created by a God who withdrew into detached transcendence. Critics of the time regarded deism as an ill-conceived attempt to reconcile religion with scientific discoveries. For rationalists in the Age of Enlightenment, deism was one of many efforts to liberate humankind from what the deists viewed as superstitious beliefs."
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POPSIrigaray Silence sensible transcendental http://209.85.135.104/search?q=cache:VpMWnk24OMsJ:etd.gsu.edu/theses/available/etd-04162008-170108/unrestricted/Dulaney_Susan_200805_MA.pdf+Irigaray%E2%80%99s+Ontology+of+Sexual+Difference:+the+%E2%80%98Sensible+Transcendental%E2%80%99+and+%E2%80%98Gesture.&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=8&gl=uk&client=firefox-a
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POPSBarack is a survivalist
A few months ago, when the Rev. Jeremiah Wright first came to national attention, Obama was nearly demure when he said: “I can no more disown (Wright) than I can disown my white grandmother.” He may not have disowned his white grandmother, but Obama didn’t exactly paint a sympathetic — or loving — portrait of her either. He essentially threw her under the bus, saying that she had made racist remarks while he was growing up, a statement that served only to highlight Obama’s own remarkable transcendence. After several weeks of balancing his professed love for Wright with the controversial statements of his chosen father figure and spiritual mentor, Obama eventually left his church of 20 years. But why then, after all those years, did Obama finally find the door? What changed was the degree of his self-interest. As long as Wright was helping Obama burnish his bona fides within the African-American community, it didn’t matter that the minister’s rhetorical flights of fancy border
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POPSThe Hedonistic Imperative This manifesto outlines a strategy to eradicate suffering in all sentient life. The abolitionist project is ambitious, implausible, but technically feasible. It is defended here on ethical utilitarian grounds. Genetic engineering and nanotechnology allow Homo sapiens to discard the legacy-wetware of our evolutionary past. Our post-human successors will rewrite the vertebrate genome, redesign the global ecosystem, and abolish suffering throughout the living world.
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POPSJoseph Campbell and the Hero * Woman as Temptress (the subsequent horror--woman now represents the flesh, which must be transcended) * At-one-ment with the Father, who is also "good" (merciful, provident) and "bad" (threatening, terrible)--initiation into the Father's office * Apotheosis--attainment of divine state beyond ignorance: transcendence of oppositions male/female and time/eternity * The Ultimate Boon--immortality (often depicted as inexhaustible matter, e.g., food and drink) = perfect illumination, transcendence of all being 3) Return: benefit to group/human race (selflessness) * Refusal of the Return--again, only a possibility: if the hero wants to remain in the ecstasy of illumination * The Magic Flight (if necessary--i.e., if there is opposition) * Rescue from Without (if necessary) * The Crossing of the Return Threshold--hero must "survive the impact of the world"
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POPSHillary vs. Obama: compare weakness
"The caricature of Clinton's self-defeating pragmatism isn't easy to reconcile with the competing caricature of Clinton's self-defeating rigidity. You can argue that the exaggerated pragmatism is an overreaction to the Hillarycare debacle, in which Clinton, arguably, was undone by her rigidity... Perhaps the resolution of this seeming contradiction is that once Hillary is done eliminating everything brave or original from a policy proposal, she defends it to the death." "Obama has hedged on single-payer, he's kept mentions of the Social Security fix out of his Web site's policy pages on taxes and the elderly, and he wasn't in the Senate when the war resolution was voted on. To some extent, Obama's hedging on many of his more controversial stands is smart politics. But an unfortunate result is that he often ends up hiding behind airy generalities and vague-but-uplifting rhetoric, and I can understand why Wolcott would conclude that Obama is too saintly for the Oval Office."
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POPSChristianity Today interviews Lamin Sanneh (2003) Lamin Sanneh was raised in a scholarly, noble Muslim family in Gambia. As a young adult, he converted to Christianity, although Western Christians first treated him with suspicion. He now teaches at Yale Divinity School.
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POPSThe God gene: Is it in you? What makes some "know" there is God and others refute it as idiocy? It has been said that faith is a gift from God and as it turns out thegift may be hardwired to the genome. The path to God was never meant to be other than an individual pursuit. Om Nama Shivaya.
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POPSResearch of "Second Life" with a view of "virtual reality" This article explores historic and current discourses on the construction of real and virtual spaces and selves, and considers the cultural and scientific construct of "virtual reality." Follow-up: https://lists.secondlife.com/pipermail/educators/2006-January/000215.html
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POPSFollow Your Bliss "Yet it is important to note that following one's bliss, as Campbell saw it, isn't merely a matter of doing whatever you like, and certainly not doing simply as you are told. It is a matter of identifying that pursuit which you are truly passionate about and attempting to give yourself absolutely to it. In so doing, you will find your fullest potential and serve your community to the greatest possible extent."