Sunday, October 13, 2013

Theodicy

Do you believe in the karma theory or some kind of divine justice?
Do you believe that mean and selfish people will be punished after death?
Do you believe that you will reap as you sow, in this life?

How do you explain that many people who have become stinking rich
by exploiting poor people in suffocating Asian sweatshops,
don't get any punishments, while many good and honest people
can be sentenced to immense hardships?

Do you believe that the people of the Asian sweatshops
who work twelve hours a day, seven days a week, under horrible conditions
are serving sentences for crimes they have committed in past lives?

Do you believe that children get leukemia and skeletal cancer
because God tests them?

How do you explain that some people have to suffer so much
while others barely have to suffer at all?

Do you believe in a good and just God?
Do you believe in ghosts?
Do you believe in gnomes and fairies?

Do you think that it is possible to live well without superstition,
whitewash, rationalizations, hypocrisy and endless lies?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theodicy

Thursday, October 10, 2013

The thinking ape

What if wonder, speculation, rumination, search for meaning,
philosophy, religion and such pursuits
are byproducts of our ability to talk.

Humans are talking apes.
Language has evolved from vocalizations during our evolution in Africa
and it proved to be a useful ability during our hunts.

With language came then all the useless questions
that were mixed with those that were useful.
Where do we come from and where are we heading?
How was the world created?
Has it always existed?
What is right and what is wrong?
How are we to live?
Will we live on somewhere after death?

And with language came also all the answers;
right answers, wrong answers, ridiculous answers,
lies, white lies, speculations,
slander, stories, fairy tales...