Religion in a Box...
Moderators: Clemsy, Martin_Weyers, Cindy B.
-
- Associate
- Posts: 8
- Joined: Wed Mar 04, 2009 3:06 am
- Location: New York
- Contact:
-
- Associate
- Posts: 8
- Joined: Wed Mar 04, 2009 3:06 am
- Location: New York
- Contact:
Jonsjouney asks:
Quote:
How is our sense of individualism tied in with our disposable lifestyle and our religious/spiritual/mythological belief systems?
Jonsjourney, this is such an interesting question and so relevant. I've recently been immersing myself in the East / West convergence of thought and identity. If it were represented in an image; West would be vertical, East would be horizontal. Thomas Friedman's "The World is Flat" is speaking in economic terms but I also feel it applies to our philosophical acquisition of each other's seemingly foreign rituals and myths. Both have valuable offerings and this excites me about our future. Perhaps there is something to this "we generation." The individual with an outward reach and an inward touch. It's never been done on this scale. I'm hoping it leads to a collective exhaustion with materialism but it may take a while.
Quote:
How is our sense of individualism tied in with our disposable lifestyle and our religious/spiritual/mythological belief systems?
Jonsjourney, this is such an interesting question and so relevant. I've recently been immersing myself in the East / West convergence of thought and identity. If it were represented in an image; West would be vertical, East would be horizontal. Thomas Friedman's "The World is Flat" is speaking in economic terms but I also feel it applies to our philosophical acquisition of each other's seemingly foreign rituals and myths. Both have valuable offerings and this excites me about our future. Perhaps there is something to this "we generation." The individual with an outward reach and an inward touch. It's never been done on this scale. I'm hoping it leads to a collective exhaustion with materialism but it may take a while.
Grant
-
- Associate
- Posts: 3191
- Joined: Fri Oct 17, 2008 3:24 pm
- Location: Earth
Hmmmm. Freewill?I would assume it does with choice. An individual can choose to be morally upstanding and an individual can choose to be immoral. If it suits my ‘individualism’ to go with the crowd, I go with the crowd. If it suits my individualism to go against the crowd I can go against the crowd. For example, when everybody is divorcing because marriage became a disposable contract of unity in our times, I can choose to go with the crowd OR I can say ‘stuff that, I can do better’. No? -Grant
"He was a dreamer, a thinker, a speculative philosopher... or, as his wife would have it, an idiot." -Douglas Adams
grantcollier wrote:
However, I think that if a person's interest is only on survival, "What to I need to survive?", then the 52" HD Plasma TVs don't look so good since you can't eat it, and it doesn't keep you warm.
I know that Plato thought that materialism among the populace could not be eliminated. I think as long as we have "mass media" reinforcing us to "buy, buy, buy", "now, now, now" it's not likely to happen.I'm hoping it leads to a collective exhaustion with materialism but it may take a while.
However, I think that if a person's interest is only on survival, "What to I need to survive?", then the 52" HD Plasma TVs don't look so good since you can't eat it, and it doesn't keep you warm.
Infinite moment, grants freedom of winter death, allows life to dawn.
-
- Associate
- Posts: 3191
- Joined: Fri Oct 17, 2008 3:24 pm
- Location: Earth
Both? How is that for finding the fulcrum!Is materialism the issue? Or is balance the issue? (There goes Clemsy and his teeter-totter metaphor again!)
I think that Clemsy often alludes to this idea of balance, especially when he talks about students having relatively few mythological/religious tools to help them achieve a sense of balance. If we are bombarded with images of the glories of consumerism and there is no polar opposition, where does that leave the young mind?
"He was a dreamer, a thinker, a speculative philosopher... or, as his wife would have it, an idiot." -Douglas Adams
-
- Working Associate
- Posts: 10645
- Joined: Thu Apr 04, 2002 6:00 am
- Location: The forest... somewhere north of Albany
- Contact:
Yes! Because there is no balance, the predominance of the one side becomes a problem.Both? How is that for finding the fulcrum!
Any mind. However i don't think we necessarily need opposition so much as perspective... the acknowledgement of a balancing viewpoint that puts owning stuff into its proper place.If we are bombarded with images of the glories of consumerism and there is no polar opposition, where does that leave the young mind?
Give me stories before I go mad! ~Andreas