After reading about Thomas Aquinas and talking about the floating man with no senses in class and got to thinking about somthing. Each person believes in the idea of "god" or no "god" differently. I, for example, am a christian and have always been one because I grew up with it in my family. For most people their beliefs and view coincide with what they've been taught and what they've experienced.
My Question is - If we all grew up with no experiences or beliefs and we were given equal knowledge of how the earth might have developed - what would we believe?
Are some people more apt to believe in god then another?
Are some going to rely on a more logical explanation rather then supernatural explanation of things?
I truthfully don't know what I would believe - I'm a christian now because I grew up that way, and I will probably never stop believing in god because of my experience with the religon. But at the same time, our culture has been given this horrible stereotype of what religon is - theirs so many stereotypes of christians, catholics, jews, buddists, athiests - whatever, their all so stupid.

What it really comes down to is that you believe in an all powerful god or not - yes its much more complex then this depending on the religon but a lot of the rest just has to do with culture and how god was interpreted throughout history.

What many philosophers agree with is one argument - Their may or may not be a higher being that created what we live on today. whether you believe is is up to you.
let's try and think about that without the ideas of what religon is today.

For me, I'm completely respectful for what others might believe, but what I think is that their are way to many "coincidences" in our world for their not to be some sort of higher being.

Thomas Aquinas

Thomas Aquinas was a philosopher who talked about faith and reason. He believed it was good to be logical and rational in our world - which was called the order of natural knowlege and then their was the supernatural order - things that could not be explained and exceded our knowledge in which we have to use faith (divine truth under god)

Aquinas states that faith is a neccessary part of life because their are things that will always be left with no logical answer - with this he came up with five proofs:
the mover argument - somthing is only set in motion because of somthing else moving - their had to be a first "mover" for anything else to move
the second is the creator- created theory - "did the chicken or the egg come first" aquinas believed that god created one of them first and this created the process
the third - contigency - the idea that what we observe isn't neccesary but if somthing wasn't neccesary why would it excist? - so god is why its all necessary
4- in order to see somthing as good or bad we must have somthing better to compare it to and that would be god
5 - the idea of us working towards a goal and somthing has to direct the entire thing and that would be god

The thoughts of Aquinas are obviously argued with non believers and other philosophers but I have to say that I completely agree with all of aquinas's arguments - they make complete sense - Aquinas was crowned a saint because of his ability to create religon as a science and as logical thinking.

Philosophy and Science

Even though reading Avicenna’s “On Nature” and understanding his ideas toward light was like eating raw meat to me, I found it interesting because he tried to apply his philosophical thoughts to science. Then, here comes the question. Can we say that science is a philosophy? According to the basic concept of philosophy that we have learned in class, philosophers tend to talk about wisdom while scientists handle knowledge. Although it is hard to say wisdom and knowledge are the same, it is true that they are closely related to each other. An American philosopher Will Durant once said, “The sciences are the windows which philosophy views the world.” In other words, philosophy handles the bigger topic but scientific methods can help it reach the ultimate goal, which is to understand the world. So, what’s the relationship between science and philosophy? In my opinion, they are like a married couple, though philosophy is currently having an affair with religion.

Learning from life, St.Augustine

The experience that impacted how I think about life is when my Grandmother was diagnosed with, and battled breast cancer. My family calls my Grandmother, “Bubbie” and she is incredibly supportive to me and my entire family. Bubbie loved taking me to movies, plays and museums throughout my childhood to help me experience life in general throughout my childhood. We have always been very close, as we talk about school, friends and things we deal with each day in life. Overall, Bubbie is a powerful role model and helped shape me into the person that I have become.

13 years ago my entire family was shocked to find out that Bubbie was diagnosed with breast cancer. We gave her a set of toy army men because she kept telling us that she is ready to fight the battle, beat cancer and learn from this experience. I suddenly stepped back from my Friday night dinners and going to events with Bubbie and realized just how previous life is, each and every day. Bubbie had such a positive attitude, a calmness about her situation and she researched breast cancer so that she was prepared to maximize her medical care. This experience changed my perspective about life. I was a happy kid taking on what life dealt me in a happy, go lucky mind set. Bubbie’s positive mental attitude and warmth inside of her really showed me what life is all about. I learned to cherish every day of my life. Enjoy and appreciate experiences with my family and friends. Above all, be responsible in taking on the challenges that life brings my way and be positive and learn from these challenges. My Bubbie has been free from cancer for 12 years now and she continues to support me and my entire family every single day. I now realize just what a powerful and incredible woman she is in my life, and I have learned to be prepared to overcome all challenges, learn from them and become a better person.

I love Ibn Sina's and Aristotle's ideas and thoughts toward light and illumination. It's amazing how much information they were able to get with so little technology and available knowledge.

The idea of extramission and intromission are both great theorys for vision although the idea of extramission has been much more popular in history.
Plato describes color to be the mixing in air of two beams of fire, one from the the eyes and one form the object being viewed. Aristotle, like many of Plato's theorys, disagreed and thought that color was carried in only one direction - light reflecting off of objects.

The idea of sight and color and how we're able to see things has always and always will be a huge discussion in history.

what a sight.

I find it rather spectacular that, without much of the technology we use today to understand the complexity of vision and how light and color play fundamental parts in the process, Avicenna was able to logically describe his discoveries on vision.

As artists I feel that this sort of scientific process to philosophy plays a big role in how we deal with the problems we engage in with our art. More specific to Avicenna's first discoveries on vision and all that we know about it now, the majority of us consider ourselves artist that deal majorly in vision and how our work is taken in optically.

Thoughts on Sin

sinnoun1 a sin in the eyes of God: immoral act, wrong, wrongdoing, act of evil/wickedness, transgression, crime, offense, misdeed, misdemeanor;archaic trespass.
After our discussion in class concerning the ideas of sin I decided to combine it with my favorite meditation.
"No Matter what anyone says or does, my task is to be good. Like gold or emerald or purple repeating to itself, No matter what anyone says or does my task is to be emerald, my color undiminished."
-Marcus Aurelius
So first i'd like to take a moment to explain what I observed and the relation of our opinions on 'sin'. We all had very similar views on the subject wether we considered ourselves to believe in Religion or not. We all understood that sin was indeed some kind of wrong against something or someone. It's an action done and as a repercussion has and effect on those around us. It is something that causes harm or makes the mind feel a certain kind of weight. I think most of what we believe to be wrong is developed by those around us, in the society that we are apart of. The influence of others and what we observe on a daily basis. Therefore since our opinions were very similar I can't help but believe that has to do with the chunk of land that we've landed on. I looked up the word sin and after finding that the definition of sin was a combination of both Godly law and man made law i've decided to rest on this theory as one that works for me and for others.
I believe in sin, I believe in the repercussions of sin. I've seen bad decisions change lives including my own. This is were the Marcus's meditation comes in. They idea of striving and longing to live a virtues life is the way I want to live my life.

What is sin?

After last week's discussion I was almost surprised to see that our ideas and thoughts on sin, in relation to God and also in our own opinions were very similar. Despite the fact that we all come from different backgrounds it appears to me that we share very similar thoughts. The exercise helped me realize that while I often challenge the principles of my religion, its views and ideals have been deeply instilled in me.

I do struggle often to remain a practicing Catholic. It wasn't until recently that I have come to find so much distaste for its fundamentals. Unlike St. Augustine, for me it has often been easier to turn away from my faith than two it during hard times.

During my readings of this piece, I found it almost easier to recite out loud. I would say in comparison to the other readings this was on of my favorites. I found St. Augustine to be almost funny or sarcastic at times. Of course that could just be me putting myself in the reading. I'm finding myself to enjoy the readings that I can put myself into more.

Ave Maria, Respect the True Meaning of Sex

While we were hearing about the foundations of the Christian beliefs during the lecture last week there was one part of the lecture that correlated the "Virgin birth" with a negative outlook towards sex.

As some of you may know from Art History or your own knowledge, the Annunciation is when the Angel Gabriel appeared to Mary and told her that she was going to conceive in her womb a son named Jesus, the son of God. In the Gospel of Luke 1:34-35 it says, "But Mary said to the angel, "How can this be, since I have no relations with a man?" And the angel said to her in reply, "The holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you. Therefore the child to be born will be called holy, the Son of God." Mary proceeded to say in verse 38, "Behold, I am the handmaid of the Lord. May it be done to me according to your word."

Rebecca was correct when she stated that Mary conceived the son of God through the holy Spirit, but I don't agree that this was a reason for Christians to have a negative perspective towards their sexuality. The reason I feel this way is because Mary was conceived by her parents Anna and Joachim without sin. This means that she was the only human to be born without the stain of original sin. This is referenced by the greeting Gabriel gives to Mary in the Gospel of Luke 1:28, "And coming to her he said, "Hail Mary full of grace! The Lord is with thee." The angel Gabriel greets her as "full of grace" and for Mary to fully accept her vocation to bear the son of God, it was necessary that she be born in grace instead of sin.

The phrase "full of grace" comes from the Greek word "kecharitomene" which is a word used for characteristics. Being born with sin is a characteristic, but in her case she was born "full of grace", which is a characteristic of her birth. A characteristic is something that is natural. So naturally we are born with original sin (the fall from Adam and Eve), and so naturally Mary wasn't. Mary was the exception. The grace given to Mary is at once permanent and of a unique kind. "Kecharitomene" is a perfect participle of the Greek word "charitoo", meaning "to fill or endow with grace" Since this term is in the perfect tense, it indicates that Mary was graced in the past, but with continuing effects in the future. So the grace Mary enjoyed was not a result of the angel's visit, but of when she was created.

Mary's exception doesn't really correlate with a negative outlook on sex because it doesn't compare with how the rest of humankind, conceived in sin, conceives children. Christians don't have a negative view towards sexuality they just don't believe it is recreational. A person gets a negative view of sex from the fall of man, because after Eve and Adam sinned they noticed that they were naked. This causes us to have the temptation to lust instead of seeing past someones body for who they were created to be. God breathed in the "breath of life", inspiring our bodies. So as humans we are not just a body but somebody. Sometimes when we make out for no reason or lust we forget that.

A Sexist Saint? I think not :)

The last lecture given briefly touched upon three major religions, Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. One thing that stuck out during the lecture to me was the reference to St. Paul and the New Testament. It was rightly stated that Christians believe that you should love God and your neighbor.

St. Paul's view of women was brought up by Rebecca when she told us about Colossians 3: 18-19 which says, " Wives, be subordinate to your husbands, as is proper in the Lord. Husbands, love your wives, and avoid any bitterness toward them."

In our modern culture it is fairly easy to mistake St. Paul as a "sexist" when one reads this part of Scripture. We must remember that this was written a long time ago and that as modern day people we shouldn't interpret the Bible literally word for word. This is because the words we are currently reading from the Bible have a different cultural context. The Bible is intended to be timeless.

When one takes the time to understand the Scripture they comprehend that St. Paul actually is promoting true self-giving and authentic love between husband and wife. When the passage says "Wives be subordinate to your husbands...", it means that as wives, women should receive the sacrifice of their husbands and respect them because their husbands give a respectful sacrifice.

Traditionally, men are the givers and women are the receivers. This notion is paralleled with Christ and his sacrifice for the church, us. Christ freely bled and sacrificed his life for his bride, us. This was not only done to redeem the sins of the world, but it was also done as an example to all men. Husbands are suppose to protect, sanctify and lift up their wives. A husband's main goal should be the sanctity and innocence of his wives soul, as should the wives be for their husbands. Men should treat women with pure love, which is selfless sacrifice. This means that they give up the temptation to manipulate and use their wives to achieve their own selfish desires. A selfish desire could be asking her to provide all income because you want to stay home out of laziness. The wife should serve her husband in the same spirit as that of the church's service to Christ and husbands should care for their wife with devotion of Christ to the church.

The love a husband needs to have for his wife is expressed in the New Testament passage, Ephesians 5:28-30. This Scripture says, " So [also] husbands should love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself. For no one hates his own flesh but rather nourishes and cherishes it, even as Christ does the church, because we are members of his body." Throughout the Bible their are many variations of this passage, which shows that the equal respect between man and woman is greatly important to Christians.

Christ loved and still loves all of us on this earth, not just his followers but everyone single human being whether they were moral or immoral. He accepted his fate when he was persecuted and crucified although in all reality he hadn't committed any sort of crime. St. Paul is saying that men need to learn from his example and be a real man of sacrifice for women.

So yes, with a brief glance this passage Rebecca mentioned may come off as "sexist", but when it is truly examined one finds that it highlights the equality of men and women and promotes true femininity. Just like you would treat your neighbor with respect, you should treat your spouse the same!

Quite Meditations

" Hope is removing the rose colored glasses; reality."

"Revelation, Incarnation, Communion, Restoration."

"Love can't wait to give and lust can't wait to get."

Learning from life

Tonight's posting suggestion: St. Augustine was greatly troubled by the death of his friend, which made him reconsider how he thought about life. Have you had an experience that caused you to change how you think about the world and/or your place in it? What was the experience, and how did it change how you think?

What I enjoyed about Augustine's Confessions was that they were relatable. The reading talked about what Augustine was thinking at times in his life, which are also things we'd think about in our society like making money and how someone might think at different periods in life, augustine at the beginning of his career thought about mythological fables and such, while later he abided with god and then looked into aristotle's readings as well. In the reading we are really able to understand the philosopher's way of thinking and how it's not completely misunderstandable but that he's an actual person who has to make a living and enjoys approaching new ways of thought.

3 Meditations

I love that Marcus Aurelius wrote these little bits of advice to himself and lived his life by them. I think we all can relate to that because we all hear things in songs and on TV that really stick with us and affect our lives. Last week you asked us to write three of our own meditations that we live by. Here are three pieces of advice from popular culture that have really affected the way I think and act.

1. "People are just people, they shouldn't make you nervous." -Regina Spektor

2. "If you want to be different, then be different." -The Janitor, "Scrubs"

3. "Hate is baggage." -"American History X"

No Such Thing as Justice

This doesn't really relate to any of the specific readings or topics we've been discussing, but I was thinking about it the other day, and it does have to do with ethics and the way we live our lives.

Justice, at least my own interpretation of it, is the idea that "good" people should be rewarded for their deeds, and "bad" people should be punished. I think most people see justice, and the judicial system as a way to carry out the latter. When people say "I want justice", mostly they mean, "I want revenge." I don't believe in revenge because revenge does not change the original bad deed committed, it does not encourage the person involved to do the right thing next time, and it causes people to enjoy the misfortunes of others, something I believe people should strive to avoid.

The justice system is vitally important to our government and legal system. We need it in order to keep order. Without it we would have no organized way to settle disputes or to determine the guilt and sentences of criminals. However, that does not make it an ethics system.

In order to get a mule to go forward, you dangle a carrot before it and hit it's rump with a stick. People are not mules. We should not see things so simply as to do good things just to be rewarded and avoid doing bad things because we will be punished. What is right and what is wrong, in my own opinion, is too murky a lens with which to classify people, and justice is really the aftermath of that division, not the cause.

Straight, Not Straightened

The reason why I enjoyed reading Marcus Aurelius’ “Meditations” is because it handles many aspects of life in a simple, straightforward way unlike previous readings. Among his various meditations, my favorite one is this, “Straight, not straightened.”

Chinua Achebe, the Nigerian novelist, once said, “Nobody can teach me who I am. You can describe parts of me, but who I am and what I need, these things I have to find out myself.” We constantly learn how to be righteous throughout our lives. However, we have to remember that even though we have learned various pieces of wisdom from others, it is useless if we do not apply them into our lives. In other words, others can teach us some morals but it does not mean they can make us righteous, too. We have to be virtuous on our own, not by others. “Straight, not straightened.”

Note to Myself

Remember.

Remember that you were born to remember.


And never forget.