Oannes

Gerry Quinn · 20 Mar 2012, 20:16 · from 2012-March.txt.gz

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From: gerry at bindweed.com (Gerry Quinn)
Date: Tue, 20 Mar 2012 20:16:58 -0000
Subject: (urth) Oannes
In-Reply-To: <SNT123-W268630D71B58B649EC440BCF430 at phx.gbl>
References: <SNT123-W268630D71B58B649EC440BCF430 at phx.gbl>
Message-ID: <70CED8D71761457D97489AD5A6CDC1C6@Rover>

From: Lee Berman 

> > Antonin Scriabin: I might have misunderstood Lee initially, but I think he was
> > saying that they were all equally unable to claim knowledge of absolute
> > truth, not that they were all valid and true.

> You got me right, Antonin. I think the misunderstanding came from Gerry, perhaps 
> due to a certain anti-relativist position he may share with many Americans of my 
> acquaintance. Within this ideology, moral relativism is confused with immorality 
> or amorality and denounced. 

What I objected to was your assertion that ?this means all religions are equally valid and/or equally false.?  If you meant something different from what this says, the misunderstanding is not mine.

As for relativism, I spoke of the ?silly end? of it, which should suggest that I do not find the concept of relativism silly in its entirety.  This applies not only to moral relativism, but to the cultural relativism that is relevant here.

> For Gerry, it might be intellectual relativism which really bothers him.
> He may not be a Christian but I think he believes that for every question there is
> a true and correct answer waiting to be found which does not depend on the point
> of view of the questioner. Kinda like math. I am interested to know if Gerry
> agrees.

I don?t think that that applies to all questions.  One could invoke paradoxes by asking questions which pertained in part to the point of view of the questioner.  One could consider questions about what someone ought to do.  And one could point to surprising observations such as the absence of counterfactual definiteness in quantum theory.

But in general, I do think that most well-formed questions have correct answers.

> I started a thread once called "What's So Great About Ushas" and I'm not sure the
> question ever really was answered. My answer is that Ushas is better than Urth because
> it is closer to Christianity. Worship of The Outsider is better than worship of Pas
> and his family because it is closer to Christianity.

Ushas is better than Urth because Urth is a moribund planet that will be dead in a few chiliads.

Worship of the Outsider is better than worship of Pas because it is closer to the truth.

- Gerry Quinn

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