Alan is your view of god open to scrutiny, with respect? It appears to be a statement of facts rather than an open debate on possibilities.Your friend Xris..

the holy ghost chain rattling comment is still disingenuous emotional manipulation

Respectfully xris I don't have a God that god I wrote about is the result of a lively imagination, why people get so hot under the collar about it perplexes me. What I wrote could be my version of Genesis chapter 1

This is how I perceive God

back before anything was conceived , I was "infinite pure "mind" and "thought"



I am the boundless Mind, Original Self-Awareness the cause of everything, relative to nothing I am "This" I am "That" I "Was" and I "Am" and I always will "Be" I am "Eternal Awareness" I am "Every Where" I know "Everything" I am
"Everywhen" I am the "Ever Existing One"

I am the Prime Mover and there was no proponent to my "First Cause". I am the "Immovable Rock" and the" Alpha point". I took these first numbers and weaved them into the fabric of the reality, creating all the limitless universes on the infinite timeless foam of nothing, which now makes all up existence. Indeed, I am the Almighty One. If you are, wise.

Don't worry about it Twirl I retract all previous posts in a totally Emotionally non- manipulative manner. This isn't worth fighting about.

I see you have now removed your post #12 (which accused me of posting in a way which was not genuine), and replaced it at 3:44 p.m. today with something like "zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz".

This is trolling.

Why should you be hopping mad? Doesn't one transparent emotional manipulation deserve another?

Twirl:
I was refering to your comments on the Holy Ghost. Unless the OP said something specifically like "I dare you to take a sacred thing and make fun of it" your comment was also transparent emotional manipulation aimed at making a certain segment of the population feel uncomfortable and/or stupid. Like i said above one trans... blah balh deserves blah blah.

Oh i wasn't and am not offended by what you said, I just wonder why you would be upset at someone pulling a post when yourpost was not genuine itself

As I understand it, "emotional manipulation" means something like taking advantage of people's better nature by acting the part of a victim when one has not in fact been victimised. How do you understand the term, and how do you make out that I have been manipulating anybody?

---------- Post added 03-24-2010 at 03:47 PM ----------


No-one got hot under the collar about it. I made fun of it. There is a difference.

A piece of creative writing does not become exempt from criticism, or even from mockery, just because its topic is religious.

Of course, a piece of writing should not be criticised or mocked just because its topic is religious.

But that is a completely different point, and the difference between these two points is a simple point of logic.

This is a metaphysical question/ and a philosophy of mind question of ulimate self awareness, even if the post relates it to "God's" awareness

This is a cosmological question of primary cause.

The first person presentation, although intimated that God is speaking is also a valid existential series of statements.

As I understand it emotional manipulation is any sort of action intended to manipulate the emotions. Mockery, and sarcasm are included.

Many of us don't recognize manipulation when it occurs, mainly because manipulation violates our basic assumptions about how people should behave. We simply don't expect it. Manipulators engage in "covert aggression." They hide their anger toward the world in subtle ways and gain power over us in ways that are not obvious.
- We may sense, however, that we are on the defensive in their presence - and this serves as our first clue. We feel somehow that they are trying to overpower us.
Emotional manipulators are experts at playing on your emotions. If they sense that you respond easily to guilt, then they will try to make you feel guilty ("I feel embarrassed for you when you play with Dora's kids as if they were your own - and it's all because you've never had children"). Manipulators also play on our sympathy by playing the role of victim ("All I do is work, work, work - You'll be sorry when I have a heart attack"). Or they might blame you for your anger, even though they have induced it ("Look, you're the one who can't control your emotions, not me"). Emotional manipulators have difficulty in expressing their desires or emotions directly, but by playing on the emotions of other people they covertly get their way.


Many of us don't recognize manipulation when it occurs, mainly because manipulation violates our basic assumptions about how people should behave. We simply don't expect it. Manipulators engage in "covert aggression." They hide their anger toward the world in subtle ways and gain power over us in ways that are not obvious.

- We may sense, however, that we are on the defensive in their presence - and this serves as our first clue. We feel somehow that they are trying to overpower us.
- They come across as caring, hurting, defending, vulnerable - almost anything but fighting - and these tactics obscure their real motives. You might pay attention to your need to take care of them, but you don't recognize that they are trying to take advantage of you. "I care so much about you and now I've twisted my ankle. Can't you give up your afternoon to drive me around?"
They negate what you say by outdoing you. If you want to talk about what a rough day you've had, they'll come back with an account of their exceedingly brutal day, which makes your experience look like a day in the park. "Well, if you think that's bad, listen to what I've been through today." They bring attention back to themselves so that you find it difficult to feel any degree of validation. This is how emotional manipulators distance themselves from you and gain the upper hand. They lack the ability to relate to others with healthy boundaries and maturity.

part of the path to enlightenment is learning to let that which does not matter... truly slide.

You can't fake that though. You have to look at why something was bothersome... why it's important. Name it and see it.

Imagine that,the OP is back up[, and] the holy ghost chain rattling comment is still disingenuous emotional manipulation

Fine. I have never said that either the original post #1, or my response #2, or my response #3 to Alan's removal of the original post #1, matters.

I did not get angry, or in any other way emotionally worked up, over any of these four things (and I am extremely tired of having to explain that).

What has got me emotionally worked up is being repeatedly accused of being unreasonable, intolerant, bigoted, and even abusive, when not one single poster other than myself has said a single word about the fact that two posters to this thread have deliberately, consciously, and calculatingly altered the public record of the conversation, in such a way as to induce well-meaning people to blame me for some sort of non-existent religious bigotry, and other offences against reason and decent behaviour, when it is this deliberate fabrication of the public record and this alone which has all along been the cause of my anger.

Now, are you prepared, or is anyone else prepared, to say that such deliberate fabrication of the public record "does not matter"?

If so, then I'm out of here, because this cannot be a healthy forum, for me or for anyone else who values their sanity, or who values honesty.

To the administrator(s):

Either:

(1) bring back the original version of post #1 - in which case, I'll stand up and take any criticism which is truly coming to me for my immediate response to it, and for all my subsequent behaviour (all a matter of public record):

Or else:

(2) let this thread be permanently terminated and closed to any further posts, so that I (and everyone else) really can leave it behind.

I meant to add, but I forgot: I do not have the complete text of GoshisDead's original message #15, which he deleted and replaced with a string of dots and 'z's at 3:46 p.m. (GMT) today, but here is the part of it to which I replied (in two separate articles, #20 and #23):

We have noted your objections and in time I will expect it will be settled but lets not get this out of hand. We are human , dont expect perfection or you will be sadly disappointed.

It is hardly expecting "perfection" to ask that at least one other observer take objective note of tendentious alterations to the public record of events in this forum.

Whether there exists a perfect Recording Angel is a question of theology, which I am not qualified to address, and am not trying to address.

What I do know is that:

We do have software for retaining traces of our conversations, which appears to work almost perfectly, but which has been programmed to allow alterations to the record.

And:

In this case, these alterations have gone far beyond editorial changes (to which in general I have no objection, and which I often make myself).

And:

Even we mere human beings can attend quite truthfully (even if not perfectly truthfully) to the reality of our dealings with one another (both online and offline, and both private and public); and that dire consequences attend a failure to do so; and that so far no-one but myself has attended to the alteration of the truthful record of what has been happening in this thread.

The silence on this matter, when I have repeatedly, reasonably, and accurately drawn attention to it, is no mere "imperfection".

Anyway, do I now understand you to be informing me that some official note has been taken of the actual problem - and not just my personal "objections" - on which I note you carefully refrain from expressing any opinion of your own, even though some of the empirical evidence for my statements has in fact surely passed before your eyes, while you have been following the thread?

Must we humiliate by forcing people to eat their words publicly.

I hope to reserve the right to change my mind and my misstatements.

If (if!!!) it comes to a choice between that and me being held guilty of religious bigotry by a kangaroo court in the absence of evidence: then yes, Alan must eat his words.

But it is not a matter of expecting Alan to disavow anything he wrote in the original post #1.

(How many times must I patiently explain that that is not the issue?)

Even less is it a matter of anyone trying to "humiliate" Alan.

But we are answerable for our words in public. Do you disagree? Does anyone?

An attempt to evade such responsibility may be forgivable - but not if it means that someone else (me!) is pilloried for their words in response.

I'll take justice (even if I'm the one who ends up being found the villain in a fair trial), but not this absurdity, not this Orwellian rewriting of history.

---------- Post added 03-24-2010 at 07:35 PM ----------


Of course, that's what dialogue is all about! This is so crucial!

But changing one's mind (who hasn't? - Plato, Wittgenstein, Russell, over and over again - we're all in good company there) and correcting one's misstatements is not the same as rewriting history, not the same as denial that one ever said what one said before.

This is how I perceive God

There is no cause to my existence I simply "was", "were"...