Re: a comment on The Battle of Fort Bragg by Dovina	ALChemy 24.74.100.11	11-Apr-06/1:07 PM
You should know better than to use poetics in an argument on a poetry site Dovina, SHEEESH! ;D
Re: a comment on The Battle of Fort Bragg by Dovina	ALChemy 24.74.100.11	11-Apr-06/1:03 PM
I could tell you that I think your great-great-great grandfather became after he died a gay ghost butt pirate and that he is the real origin of the aids virus or at least the equivilant of that. Is there a possibility it's true? sure. Am I insulting you, your intelligence and your lineage. Sure looks it. Your doing the same thing as the people who insult people who believe that aliens exist somewhere. What about mind reading? Does that exist in your book or do you compare them to pirate ghosts and pixie fairies too. I see why you believe so much in -=Dark Angel=-, you certainly carry his mentality towards others beliefs. I don't "define" God as everything that is unknowable. I've only said that maybe his proof of existence hasn't been discovered yet. Kinda like alien's proof of existence. Why do you keep twisting what I'm saying and spitting it back at me as the same insultive, patronizing rhetoric. I don't assume anything about it. If it turns out to be proved that God doesn't exist or if it turns out he looks like the God from South Park cartoons I won't Keel over from shock. What you guys did and are doing to Dovina and me is malicious and uncalled for. It's worse than those Jahova's Witnesses knocking at your door and then not going away when you ask them to(that's the only thing I regarded as silly). I've defended you guys when the preachers started preaching in your comment boxes under your poems and I'll defend Dovina's right to not be attacked for her belief system also. My God this isn't even a religious poem. I know what Occam's Razor is. I already know your response: "Yeah but what me and Zodiac are saying is entirely logical". My response: Thanks for the insult. p.s. I still admire you greatly. ;-D
Re: a comment on The Battle of Fort Bragg by Dovina	Dovina 70.38.78.229	11-Apr-06/12:55 PM
"Dovina's smugness": I suppose it's because I used a smug rooster for comparison, and called myself a hen. Perhaps I should have explained that they are animals incapable of human reasoning, and that I used them as metaphors for possible incapabilities of humans. We just might be incapable of certain undefined mental processes that go beyond our treasured logical abilities. Smug? - Yes, I suppose it is in an unknown way.
Re: Letting go by Caducus	Dovina 70.38.78.229	11-Apr-06/12:45 PM
I almost laughed at the ending - the old-time style of it. The rest has some pretty good lines, but I don't think the funny spacing helps.
Re: a comment on The Battle of Fort Bragg by Dovina	ecargo 167.219.88.140	11-Apr-06/7:26 AM
I know you didn't say that, AlChemy. I flipped it for two reasons: 1. To fuck with you a little bit. ;) 2. Because *for me* it IS adding, not eliminating. Do I allow for the possibility that your grand architect exists? Sure--in the same way I allow for pirate ghosts and unicorns. It's possible that somewhere, on some level or dimension or whatever, that pirate ghosts exist. Their existence may explain a lot of things (all those missing socks, for one thing). But they're not necessary to my world view. They are to yours (well, okay, pirate ghosts may not be). That's entirely fine with me. I have no interest in converting you to my way of thinking. I thank you for affording me the same courtesy. Seriously--if you define God as "that which is unknowable," and I believe that there are things that are unknowable (at the present moment or in the future), then, sure, I suppose by your definition, I believe in "God." (I don't call that God though. I call it "things that we don't know yet but may one day." Of course, that makes "God" a shifting target or goal.) Dovina's smugness and your assumptions aside, just because I'm not a deist doesn't mean I'm a Vulcan, you know. I'm not ruled entirely by logic. I take a lot of things on faith. (For example, I believe quite firmly that our magnificent -=Dark Angel=- is the existential dragon from John Gardner's _Grendel_. And, also, one hell of a gumshoe.) I wouldn't get out of bed in the morning if I didn't. Spirituality or, if you prefer, self-actualization (to go all Maslow on you) is likely as important to me as it is to you. Millions of people manage to live lives full of hope and joy and spiritual fulfillment without any deity involved. To think otherwise is pretty fucking arrogant. And one last thing: I don't see anything terrible about having an argument based on logic/Occam's Razor about God's existence or lack thereof. I don't see it as an attack on anyone's faith, and I wonder that you do. Logic is all about ways of thinking and arguing. For me, the logic/Occam's/scientific method part of this discussion was what was interesting. By the way, Zodiac gave a good description of what Occam's Razor is. It's not so much what's "simple" as what's nonessential (to my way of thinking). And it's a logic platform. That's all. Thanks for the discussion. I found it interesting. Now I suppose I'd better go do what they pay me to do. ;-D See ya later.
Re: Letting go by Caducus	ALChemy 24.74.100.11	11-Apr-06/5:48 AM
I think you might need some commas but maybe you meant to do omit them. Some of it gets a little hokey but some of the images like the last one are gems. Extra points for teaching me something about botany.
Re: Letting go by Caducus	Caducus 86.141.200.191	11-Apr-06/3:09 AM
a change of style for me.
Re: a comment on The Battle of Fort Bragg by Dovina	ALChemy 24.74.100.11	10-Apr-06/9:28 PM
Yeah, that's probably the entirely wrong word. I think you know what I was trying to say though. Your the wordsmith, help a fellow Irish American out here. What I mean is God may(or may not) exist on a different plain of reality that we don't quite understand yet in the same kind of way that scientist think there may be undiscovered dimensions. Then again he may be the old guy with a beard and he just chooses remain silent like in my poem and hide outside the confines of science as to allow us complete freedom to naturally come to our own conclusions. Who knows? I say believe what you need or want to believe. Whether you believe in God or not Zodiac, I still think the same about you. I still think your a good person either way.
Re: a comment on The Battle of Fort Bragg by Dovina	zodiac 209.193.9.3	10-Apr-06/9:03 PM
Hm. I guess I did say that. Sorry. Me now thinks me then was being a snit, but who knows. I am stuck on your usage of comprehend because that's the only characteristic of God I've been able to grasp out of this conversation. Now I find out that not only is God incomprehensible, but living in Alaska is incomprehensible and by extension *every experience or person that is not your own or yourself* is, in the end, incomprehensible. I'm incomprehensible to you and vice versa, if by comprehend you mean "know to the supremest extent exactly what it is like to be you/me". So being incomprehensible is not a special quality of God. It's a quality of everything. So we're back to square one. Got any more ideas?
Re: a comment on The Battle of Fort Bragg by Dovina	ALChemy 24.74.100.11	10-Apr-06/8:31 PM
I don't think like that. So in that way I agree with Occam. Had you not said: "Yes, of course I'm using Occam's razor as an argument against God's existence." we wouldn't be having this (and I agree it's) nonsensical conversation. I also don't care for the way he uses the word simple.
Re: a comment on The Battle of Fort Bragg by Dovina	ALChemy 24.74.100.11	10-Apr-06/8:23 PM
There can be one comprehensible at this time. Just not mine. The fact that you want me to believe in the God that you can much more easily debunk is what is nuts. This is what you said verbatim: "Yes, of course I'm using Occam's razor as an argument against God's existence." Sorry, apperantly you just pasted all that stuff for entertainment and not to prove to me God didn't exist. How did I ever misinterpret that? Your really stuck on my usage of the word comprehend aren't you? I mean to fully understand and observe something in a way that you can precisely define what exactly it is and be sure that there is no mistake.(I'm sure your going to think of wasting time by using God in a sentence or bringing up a Dictionary.com definition). You can comprehend the apple and even the man holding it but you can't comprehend exactly how or why it appeared out of thin air. Sure you could say he told it to appear but that really doesn't explain anything does it. You can have theories but that doesn't mean you understand it exactly, does it? I could try to comprehend what Alaska feels like but does that mean I know for sure what it feels like? No, I can only imagine, but yes imagine is another kind of meaning for comprehension. It's just not the one I was using and I appologize for confusing you.
Re: The Battle of Fort Bragg by Dovina	zodiac 209.193.9.3	10-Apr-06/8:02 PM
To go back to Occam for a minute: This morning, if you are like most people, you woke up and took a piss. Why did you take a piss? The simplest explanation is that your bladder filled up while you slept with liquids you'd drunk the night before. Yes, you could also say that God made you piss, and that could be true. But the first explanation makes sense, is predictable, and follows certain basic rules, such as that liquids can't just disappear. The God explanation requires, yes, assumptions. These are: 1. God exists, 2. God has the power to make you piss, and 3. God is interested in whether or not you piss. To say the least. None of these is certain or even proveable, WHETHER OR NOT they're true. Occam says that, for the purposes of studying and predicting results, the God-made-me-piss explanation is unnecessary, unuseful (except for getting into Heaven, yes), and even harmful if, for example, you're trying to predict when you're going to need to piss and ignoring the properties of full bladders. This is THE ONLY THING OCCAM'S RAZOR SAYS. Everything else that has been suggested about Occam here is nonsense.
Re: a comment on The Battle of Fort Bragg by Dovina	ALChemy 24.74.100.11	10-Apr-06/7:45 PM
With an invisible beard, silly.
Re: a comment on The Battle of Fort Bragg by Dovina	zodiac 209.193.9.3	10-Apr-06/7:43 PM
Why can't there be a God who's comprehensible at this time? Because we don't understand the Big Bang? That's nuts. If you believe in God, you should believe God just created the universe in an instant out of nothing, which is comprehensible if you believe God can do whatever he wants, which you should. "You're the one trying to offer proof that God doesn't exist." -- As ecargo pointed out, Occam is pretty poor "proof". "You're the one trying to offer proof that God doesn't exist. That's where this whole thing started." -- Why don't you search this page for the words PROOF and PROVE, then try saying that again? "my guess is that if there is something so grande that it could make everything from nothing then it is likely it would be well beyond our grasp to truly understand it." -- Well, that's not my guess. Try this: If you'd never heard of God or omniscient omnipotent deities, and you heard that someone had created the universe in an instant from nothing, would you really automatically assume that that "someone" was beyond comprehension and could do everything else? Why would you? Suppose, to use your example, you heard that a person created an apple out of nothing. Would you believe that person was incomprehensible? Would you believe that person was omnipotent?
Re: a comment on The Battle of Fort Bragg by Dovina	ALChemy 24.74.100.11	10-Apr-06/7:36 PM
At this moment I have a beard... I have no idea what that should mean. Maybe I'm God.
Re: a comment on The Battle of Fort Bragg by Dovina	ALChemy 24.74.100.11	10-Apr-06/7:31 PM
When I said comprehensible I meant at this time. I thought you knew that. Although it may never be comprehended. We just don't know. I don't deny the possibility that there is no god and never will. You're the one trying to offer proof that God doesn't exist. That's where this whole thing started. You even said that was what you were doing. I'd be very happy if I found out that God was simple and easily comprehensible. I don't rule out that possibility either but my guess is that if there is something so grande that it could make everything from nothing then it is likely it would be well beyond our grasp to truly understand it.
Re: a comment on The Battle of Fort Bragg by Dovina	Dovina 70.38.78.229	10-Apr-06/7:25 PM
Both are incomprehensible, speaking as a hen.
Re: a comment on Semaphores from the Chaos by cyan9	zodiac 209.193.9.3	10-Apr-06/7:24 PM
Silly, pedantic me. It's still misspelled.
Re: Narcolepsy by Sunny	zodiac 209.193.9.3	10-Apr-06/7:23 PM
"shudders" - heh. This poem isn't about narcolepsy at all.
Re: a comment on The Battle of Fort Bragg by Dovina	zodiac 209.193.9.3	10-Apr-06/7:20 PM
Maybe your problem isn't that you find God incomprehensible, it's that you find beards incomprehensible.