Can you sum up a favorite book in five words? How about time-traveling optician dies again

brentan comments on May 25, 2018:

Dystopian archetypal family reinvents itself - Finnegans Wake

For a great read I'd like to suggest Suzy Hansen, "Notes on a Foreign Country-An American Abroad in ...

brentan comments on May 24, 2018:

That looks great. I think a criticism of how Americans think their way of life is superior to everyone else's is way overdue. My guess is that their education is to blame.

This is the book I'm currently reading - "finding Darwin's god".

brentan comments on May 24, 2018:

I hope you do a review when you're finished the book. I like books that look at both sides of the issue. I'm a big fan of Jordon Peterson and Rupert Sheldrake because they are not completely dismissive of things we call 'divine' or 'spiritual'.

I read God is not great by Christopher Hitchens.

brentan comments on May 24, 2018:

You might like Jordon Peterson's Maps of Meaning for the value of myth and religion to culture. The covers the material in his YouTube videos Maps of Meaning and also The Psychology of the Bible.

Ok so what is the g about the recessive allele on chromosome 16?

brentan comments on May 24, 2018:

Less chromosome 16 = more grams in body fat?

Who are your top 5 favorite authors starting with your most loved.

brentan comments on May 24, 2018:

I put them alphabetically because they're so different: Joseph Campbell Richard Dawkins William Horwood James Joyce Steven King

Quote of the Day: "Great spirits have always encountered violent opposition from mediocre minds".

brentan comments on May 23, 2018:

It sounds pompous but it seems to be true. The interesting thing for me is . These great thinkers can threaten the status quo, our comfort zone, but they also bring innovation.

As a formerly auburn-haired now-bald guy I am jealous of any whom are full-headed, whether ginger or...

brentan comments on May 23, 2018:

I have no time to waste on reading. I have to take care of my hair!

I have just joined.

brentan comments on May 23, 2018:

Hello and welcome! I'm very new too. I hope you enjoy the forum.

Hello fellow redheads.

brentan comments on May 22, 2018:

Hi. I enjoyed the word play! I try to use them to save my eyesight. I was listening to Stephen Fry's Mythos on YouTube the other day. Gosh, what a nice voice! It enhances a really good book. But every time he said something I didn't quite understand or didn't hear right, I had to jump up, stop the audio and search back to look for the exact place.

Let me put this out there.

brentan comments on May 22, 2018:

I don't think so. I used to use it a lot when i was a Christian. Maybe Paradise Lost? The same kind of English with a lot of imagination.

Is the self an illusion?

brentan comments on May 22, 2018:

I think self is bound up in consciousness too. Nobody knows much about how consciousness came about. I think Dawkins explains it as a result of the need to be aware of dangerous predators. If so, it has overgrown that need to become so complex it has turned in on itself. This self-awareness is a two-edged sword, especially nowadays where we spend so much time in our heads. I like Rupert Sheldrake's idea that consciousness resides outside of us in morphic fields and the brain imports the data it wants from outside of us, processes it and sends back for storage. Sheldrake's idea could also mean that our consciousness cannot die when we do because it doesn't reside in us.

Hello.

brentan comments on May 22, 2018:

I'm very new too. I like the forum. So far so good. I hope you like it too. It's nice to have a place to type out our thoughts.

Asexuality

brentan comments on May 22, 2018:

I often wish I was asexual. I'm a 63-year old man with no partner and I would rather just get on with other things. But my hormones still hop. It seems silly in a way because I'm not going to father or raise any more children. I suspect that our genes really control us in that way and they care about nothing but reproduction, even if you don't have the energy to raise the children after they born. But for people who have no interest, I think they are just taking their place on the spectrum of sexual life, where most are situated around the bell curve and lesser amounts to the two sides.

Don’t applaud Pope Francis’s stance on homosexuality – it’s still in line with Catholic ...

brentan comments on May 22, 2018:

The pope is playing with words to obfuscate the whole truth. "God loves gay people as they are". Yeah right, but God isn't half so accommodating if gay people act on their desires. Then the rules such as in Leviticus 18 and 1 Timothy 1 come into force.

What is everyone's favorite comedians and why?

brentan comments on May 22, 2018:

Chris Rock - I love the cheeky smile and the 'Yeah, I said it' catchphrase.

What's your favorite language and or foreign culture?

brentan comments on May 21, 2018:

Spanish - love the language. Love hispanic music.

Mom or my mom?

brentan comments on May 21, 2018:

My mom, or as we say in Ireland 'me ma'.

The Eighth Amendment.

brentan comments on May 21, 2018:

I read it's all down to the urban/rural divide. The urbanites view people more as statistics. The rural communities tend to hold traditional notions, many of those church-inspired. The bottom line to be decided next Friday is whether we continue to force Irish women to have their abortions done in England or in their own country.

Do you have several different versions of "you", in different settings? None of them quite right?

brentan comments on May 19, 2018:

I had a nervous breakdown at 17 and went back to the world after treatment not having the slightest idea who I was or who I should be. The only thing I knew was that the person I was did not have a place in the world. In less than a year I tried to do away with that person. For more than 40 years after that suicide attempt, I tried umpteen different versions of me and as you probably suspect, none of them worked any better than the person I vaguely remembered from the past. I’m old now and virtually retired so I don’t need to project a persona anymore. That means that I can be myself. The trouble is that I don’t know who that is.

Does anyone else talk aloud to themselves?

brentan comments on May 19, 2018:

I do it all the time. It might not be weirdness or old age. It might just be voicing your thoughts. And maybe its something to do with the two parts of the brain, one part dealing with the immediate and the other thinking about all the different options.

Is your life organized?

brentan comments on May 18, 2018:

Clean your room. Reduce your pain.

How many of you actually care about the royal wedding? I won’t tease you.

brentan comments on May 17, 2018:

Any notions I had of fairytale weddings went out the window with Charles and Diana. But the English feel that they get their money's worth from the royal family. They really seem to get off on the pomp and ceremony. I think we should be past all that nonsense (not that democracy is anything wonderful these days) but that the heck, it's their money.

When in your life have you been humbled?

brentan comments on May 17, 2018:

Ever not got the job? Ever not got the girl? Ever jump in and find yourself in the deep end? I've been humbled quite a few times. It worked out well. Now I am one of the humblest people you could meet.

Spread the love..

brentan comments on May 17, 2018:

Agape

Best musical score/soundtrack on a TV show? Tie: Dexter/Hannibal

brentan comments on May 17, 2018:

I loved the intro song for the first True Detective series. It was Far From Any Road by The Handsome Family. Shudder!

I've had a couple of people ask me if I've read "Men Are from Mars Women Are from Venus".

brentan comments on May 16, 2018:

I read it too. Remember nothing. I bet it's not on any feminist reading list. Lots of those women don't even accept we're biologically different, never mind coming from different planets..

“I like your Christ; I do not like your Christians.

brentan comments on May 13, 2018:

It's impossible to argue with that. But I don't think any religions live up to their ideals.

The Seattle 7

brentan comments on May 13, 2018:

So many victims in a time of so much. If only they were the real victims, not college students.

David Goodall: 104-year-old scientist to end own life in Switzerland | Australia news | The Guardian

brentan comments on May 13, 2018:

Good for him. It must be terrible to suffer because of other people's morals. We're about to vote on abortion in Ireland in about 2 weeks. I think euthanasia will be next.

What really makes you happy?

brentan comments on May 12, 2018:

Wine. Book. Great.

How do you feel about Jehovah’s Witnesses?

brentan comments on May 12, 2018:

I used to be one, for about 15 years. I simply did not know how to accept everything at face value so it was tough. I think the others recognised that I was not really part of the collective mind - the Borg as some wits call it. Every decency in life is sacrificed for unity in the JWs. Respect for independent thinking, sincerity, honesty and goodness are sacrificed on the altar of unity. It was a little like how I thought life must have been like in communist Russia.

Close Encounters Of The Religious Kind.

brentan comments on May 12, 2018:

Darned if I ever understood what Christians think their religion is about. All I ever thought was that it was about living your life using the fruits of the spirit that Paul talked about in Galatians - love, long-suffering etc. Maybe they think its about faith, usually meaning one school of faith, and their church doctrines, but their behaviour can indicate what fruit they live by.

What distopian world would you choose to live in?

brentan comments on May 11, 2018:

Lots of them have good points. I like the dystopian world of The Walking Dead because problems aren't so much psychological or complex anymore. It's like war, brutal but black and white. The one world I would not like is the one they had in the movie Idiocracy. Those guys frighten me more than zombies!

Which is more useful, intelligence or wisdom?

brentan comments on May 11, 2018:

I would not like to take wisdom to the marketplace, such as school or work. I think it would be at odds with the general spirit prevailing. I'm not a believer anymore but I think the Christian idea of 'not throwing pearls before swine' captured a real dilemma for aspiring people in a dog-eat-world.

Lack of open minded religious people

brentan comments on May 10, 2018:

I guess it's their conviction that they are right and you are wrong and your eternal salvation depends on listening to them makes many of them forget secular values like mutual respect and manners etc.

Looking for some good Audio books

brentan comments on May 10, 2018:

I think you might really enjoy Jordon B. Peterson's book 12 Rules For Life. If you're not familiar with him, you can get where he's coming from by watching some of his YouTube videos. I love the Psychology of the Bible series.

Was anyone else required to kneel and say a prayer before bedtime?

brentan comments on May 9, 2018:

That sounds extremely oppressive. I'm glad you survived it. We did the 'Now I lay me down to sleep' prayer too. But Dad was only interested in religion because it was respectable and Mum hated the church because it had no respect for women so they lost interest before we reached our teenage years.

Are you lonely?.

brentan comments on May 8, 2018:

I suspect I'm a bit autistic. I never know how to interact so socialising has always been torture and failure. So being alone is a relief. I'm old now so I have little reason to interact anymore. Peace, glorious peace of mind. Of course it's not ideal. But I'm content.

Haiku by me.

brentan comments on May 7, 2018:

As we danced to the Masochism Tango.....

I would like to thank those that have welcomed me to this site.

brentan comments on May 7, 2018:

I believe we are born into societies with their own different cultures, and religions are part of those cultures. It's less a matter of finding Jesus if you're born into a Christian culture, it is more a case of him being thrust upon you.

Morality, our achilles heel.

brentan comments on May 6, 2018:

I did not vote for what is good for humanity. Sometimes there is a conflict. For example, less people die in a society with no access to guns. Those who die for lack of a gun are collateral damage in this statistically better society. So I think society's morals should be aimed at the level of the individual and not the group.

What do you think about the idea that the "god experience" is within you, is part of being and ...

brentan comments on May 6, 2018:

I'm reading a little about Kabbalah lately in a desperate attempt to get some meaning from Finnegans Wake. Your post made me think of Adam Cadmon, who I think might be called the archetype of the perfect human. He has the divine attributes of the Kabbalist god. I must say I don't believe in an external god. I'm convinced that god is a name tag for the best of our human aspirations. I don't agree with your use of the word 'grace', coming from the tradition Christian understanding, but I know what you are communicating. I think this 'grace' is the net value of your own good thoughts, an idea already brought up by one of the other posters.

Adam naming animals

brentan comments on May 6, 2018:

That idea about Adam naming the animals as an extension of the idea of god creating all things through his word (speaking them into existence) is very interesting. The Jewish writers seemed to ignore or be unable to relate to allegory. They seemed to reduce all the data they had to literary truths. In Genesis 2:20, they seem to be saying that while god did the creating, Adam did the naming. So he was able to speak and choose words that he felt were appropriate labels for the animals. Some people say that in those days, words captured the essence of a thing. That brings me back to thinking about god creating the essence of things through words.

A cattle rancher died and at the reading of his will he left the ranch to his three sons under one ...

brentan comments on May 6, 2018:

Well-educated boys!

"Laments"   April'26, 2003 .

brentan comments on May 6, 2018:

I really like this poem called Spring and Fall by Gerard Manley Hopkins about a young girl's first sorrow for decay which anticipates sorrow for loss and death: Márgarét, áre you gríeving Over Goldengrove unleaving? Leáves like the things of man, you With your fresh thoughts care for, can you? Ah! ás the heart grows older It will come to such sights colder By and by, nor spare a sigh Though worlds of wanwood leafmeal lie; And yet you wíll weep and know why. Now no matter, child, the name: Sórrow’s spríngs áre the same. Nor mouth had, no nor mind, expressed What heart heard of, ghost guessed: It ís the blight man was born for, It is Margaret you mourn for.

I'm a bookseller, so this is probably the best way for me to get involved in the community.

brentan comments on May 6, 2018:

I'm an avid reader. I can't choose. But I've got the fondest memories of William Horwood's Duncton Wood books.