Hi

[Arik]

"gather around the table children, I am Pastor Arik, today we are going to witness Gods power. Here is a candle and we are going to sit here and pray  and ask God to make the candle flicker.......now everyone pray and watch closely..................

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okay, it's a bit hot in here, Ima gonna open up this window a little......

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........... HEY DID YOU SEE IT FLICKER? THAT IS THE POWER OF PRAYER AND THE POWER OF GOD.......let's all pray.....

Not at all mate.

Brother Arik does not ask God for any material things.

To ask God for material things would be like a son that ask his father for food and that would be ridiculous and a mockery.
Only religions ask God for material things.
I have nothing to do with religions.

I only pray God to be closer to him and that's all I ask but that is more a wish than a prayer. 

[Mike Cl]

Two chaps walk and walk in search of something that would put an end to their trouble.
After sometime they see a mango tree full of ripe and beautiful mangoes.

One chap start looking and analyze the tree and his branches and his leaves and the number of the fruit in it while the other chap start straight away to pick up the mangoes and eat them.

Now you tell me........who is the smarter and more intelligent?

Depends upon the situation.  If neither had seen nor heard of a mango tree was nor what it's fruit was like, the smartest one was the analyzer.  It could be a deadly tree to eat from.  So, the guy digging in right off the bat would be taking a chance that he could die. 

[Baruch]

Specious reasoning ... I can prove, with bad axioms and good deduction, that Socrates is a merman.  The intellectual can help us articulate some things, that are hard for us to articulate.  But he won't harvest any mangoes.  That is for the people outside the ivory tower.

[Unbeliever]

I can prove, with bad axioms and good deduction, that Socrates is a merman.

You can? OK, let's see you do that.

[Mike Cl]

  The intellectual can help us articulate some things, that are hard for us to articulate.  But he won't harvest any mangoes.  That is for the people outside the ivory tower.

Bullshit!!  And you really do seem to have a corner on bullshit lately.  The intellectuals of this country can not only articulate some things (which is very important, btw) but can also get down and dirty with any typical worker.  They may not harvest the mangoes now, but very well could have worked doing that earlier earlier.  And they will help figure out how to harvest them faster and better and how to improve the crop generally.  Historically, the intellectual has taken a beating in this country.  And they still are.  You are the type of person Trump and his ilk of know-nothings, that put intellectual and intellect down.  You seem to revel in those who are ignorant and proud of it, and seem to find that a virtue.  You wallow in your fictional god and seem to think that that is a good thing.  Your brand of ignorance and intellectual hating is repugnant at best and destructive at worst. 

[Unbeliever]

Now Mike, try not to get too worked up over Baruch's bullshit, you know he's only trying to push our buttons, and when he sees that he's done that he only gets worse.

[Baruch]

You can? OK, let's see you do that.

Athenians are mer-people
Socrates an Athenian man
Therefore ... Socrates is a mer-man.

But the first axiom is not true.

Reasoning involves both good deduction, but also good axioms.

Where do we have the best example?  Euclid's Axioms.  It had a few holes, that took 2200 years to complete patch.  But almost all the rest of human reasoning is a sieve of specious reasoning.

Intellectuals = Plato ... Greek mother fuckers for 2400 years ... sophisticates aka Sophists.  The ancients were reasonable to exile or execute such enemies.

[Unbeliever]

Uh, those aren't axioms, they're premises - there's a difference. That first one is called the major premise, I promise.

[Baruch]

Uh, those aren't axioms, they're premises - there's a difference. That first one is called the major premise, I promise.

Yes, two promises, one conclusion.  But If I feel strong, then my axiom is your BS, and vice versa.  That is why philosophy/theology gets us nowhere.  As it is, the Euclidean Axiom that two points define a straight line ... turns out to be false (because there are unstated assumptions behind it).  This wasn't clarified until 1899 (it wasn't just a problem with the Parallel Postulate).

https://www.storyofmathematics.com/20th_hilbert.html  His work in geometry is briefly noted.

A lovely web site all in all.  Hilbert's modified Euclidean Geometry is consistent in a way that Arithmetic is not (per Godel theorems).  DH EG is complete (all well formed formulas can be proven true or false within the system) ... which is not possible with Arithmetic.  There are valid arithmetical statements that can't be derived from any finite list of axioms.

Of course regular logical debate (say in a court room) has more to do with Socrates than with Euclid.  And pretty much falls apart (without the addition of empirical physical evidence), because only math pretends to be rigorous.

[Cavebear]

Not at all mate.

Brother Arik does not ask God for any material things.

To ask God for material things would be like a son that ask his father for food and that would be ridiculous and a mockery.
Only religions ask God for material things.
I have nothing to do with religions.

I only pray God to be closer to him and that's all I ask but that is more a wish than a prayer.

I acknowledge Arik's view that he prays to his particular deity in complete purity of hope that he will reside by the Great One in some sort of afterlife.  I have no doubt that he believes it.  But people buy lottery tickets, wager in casinos, and bet on sports events, too.  And I suspect Arik's hopes are less likely than the others.

Many people engage in irrational beliefs (religion, lotteries, gambling).  He isn't the first, and he won't be the last.  What saddens me is that someday, when he is old and dying, he will still believe that failed superstition, whereas he COULD have had a full realistic life free of such nonsense. 

[Arik]

Depends upon the situation.  If neither had seen nor heard of a mango tree was nor what it's fruit was like, the smartest one was the analyzer.  It could be a deadly tree to eat from.  So, the guy digging in right off the bat would be taking a chance that he could die.

Well, in this case both may die but with a difference.

The one who eat mangoes die with the full stomach but the intellectual that doesn't eat will starve to death.

Much better to die quickly by poison that die slow by starving so once again the smarter is the one who eat mangoes and the fool is the one who slowly starve in agony.

[Cavebear]

Well, in this case both may die but with a difference.

The one who eat mangoes die with the full stomach but the intellectual that doesn't eat will starve to death.

Much better to die quickly by poison that die slow by starving so once again the smarter is the one who eat mangoes and the fool is the one who slowly starve in agony.

That may qualify as the weirdest justification for a bad argument I have EVER heard in my life...

[Mike Cl]

Well, in this case both may die but with a difference.

The one who eat mangoes die with the full stomach but the intellectual that doesn't eat will starve to death.

Much better to die quickly by poison that die slow by starving so once again the smarter is the one who eat mangoes and the fool is the one who slowly starve in agony.

You constantly prove that reasoning is not your strong suit--or any suit at all in your case.

[Baruch]

He was trying to bring it down to y'all's level ... but as pseudo-intellectuals you don't get it.

[Unbeliever]

Well, as Lo Pan said, we are not brought upon this world to get it.