Flight of the Monarchs

On Witches and Witchcraft

Posted on September 17th, 2008 by Brian.
Categories: Writing.

I recently read this article on the Times Online website that seeks to discredit Sarah Palin due to her association with an evangelical pastor (from Africa) who believed a woman in his community was a witch. Now I’m not going to say anything about Sarah Palin, but I did read the article and the comments to the article, and I had the following response… (I’m posting it here because the editors of that website never seem to post my responses.)

The original article can be found here.

My response to which is here:

Rationality and scientific objectivity are two different things (for the layman). The belief in witches does not defy logic nor rationality, it simply defies observation. Just because you can’t see a spiritual realm with your own eyes, doesn’t mean it is non-existent; one possibility is that you are limited in your perception of that particular aspect of reality. If Mr. Muthee was accurate in his knowledge that this woman was harnessing the power of evil spirits (however strange that may sound) in an effort to further her own agenda, then that would make anyone who didn’t believe him a fool and Sarah Palin a wise woman. My point is that the devil may (or may not) exist regardless of your belief in him (or her/it). Unless you’re absolutely certain to the contrary (which you really can’t be), it would be wise to leave open the possibility. From there you can imagine a world where both good and evil (not so good to downright wicked) spiritual entities (I’m sure they prefer to be called beings) exist and assert themselves on physical reality accordingly. Does that defy logic or rationality? No, it simply defies observation, especially if those entities are very good at avoiding being detected. I hope that helps.

Peace,
Brian

5,617 comments.

My thoughts on libertarianism and anarchism…

Posted on August 19th, 2008 by Brian.
Categories: Writing.

If you know what the words in the title of this post mean (and God bless you if you don’t) then you might want to read what I wrote here. It’s in response to a weblog that I came across in which a person who was giving away a certain thing (I won’t go into the details of what the thing was) had written something of his political or life’s philosophy, of which many of my friends in the past have believed something similar. Anyway, I wrote a response to what he had written because I felt compelled to. Maybe it will benefit someone else to read it, so I’m posting it here.

In response to http://an-archos.com/about:

“And ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free.” -John 8:32

Nice WP plugin. Interesting but (and forgive me) naive social philosophy. I don’t know if I have it in me to start a debate right now… not sure if I should — well — I suppose I could say that there is no such thing as true freedom in a material sense of the word. We can only approximate it, and even then it’s deceptive because it’s like a double-edged sword. On one side it plays into a libertine ideal with human creation and accomplishment as its seeming end, the other side leads to complete depravity and a loss of the will to the lusts of the senses and flesh. Ultimately the flesh wins out, because “freedom’s” ultimate goal is truly nothing more than to satisfy the desires of the flesh — which can never be accomplished. It simply enslaves the human spirit and soul into a never-ending battle with material and sensual need, which is something you are currently witnessing as your philosophy plays itself out as the political mantra of today’s culture and society.

Freedom has come to represent the human “right” to carry on selfishly and without any regard to morality or decency. Oddly enough, the worldly pursuit of it ends as a negation of the human will, the assertion of which was actually the goal it had initially set out for itself. At its best it will leave you living like a backwoods transcendentalist, which is a selfish and Godless pursuit if ever there was one. Humans are invariably a fallen and devolving creature, and without the intervention of God Himself, will ultimately lead themselves to doom — with, or “without” the influence of decent political leaders. True freedom — or the lack thereof — is a spiritual matter at its core. Liberty and “happiness” can and will only be found in having a personal relationship with God through Jesus Christ, the messiah, The Saviour — however offensive that may seem to one’s intellectual sense.

Regardless, may God bless you in your search and I truly hope and pray that you eventually come to know what it is you are looking for. Thanks again for the cool plug-in.

Humbly and earnestly,

Brian

p.s. You truly cannot serve two masters at once, and to believe you are serving none at all is to be serving the devil, whether you believe it or not. Only God knows what is best for humanity and unless you know (and obey) His will, then you are simply shooting in the dark, no matter how good you believe your intentions and understanding to be.

p.p.s. Not that it matters, but I considered myself to be a libertarian and an anarchist in the past. I did study a fair amount of political philosophy and I remember it was disputed as to whether or not true anarchy, like true democracy, was even possible. It appears as if no matter how much society attempts to beset itself of leadership, leaders (or tyrants) just keep popping up out of the woodwork… like flowers or weeds I suppose…

p.p.p.s. “In terms of libertarian anarchism that would require every individual taking full responsibility for their own well being whilst always recognising a mutual benefit in the well being of others.” – Interesting statement, but communism shows us that humans in their natural state will often fail to recognize the mutual benefit in the well being of others when the self is seemingly put at risk. I say seemingly because perceived risk is a subjective thing, whereas most humans consistently see themselves as being “at risk”, we have this (although well-intentioned) objective rarely being realized in actuality. On the other hand, acting in an effort to realize some mutual benefit to oneself seems rather loveless to me. I understand the logic behind collective action, but it requires certain environmental conditions to be constantly met. In the absence of coercion, and in terms of game theory, the cheating individual always wins in a game where the winning strategy benefits the whole to some extent, yet the cheater to a slightly greater extent. Honestly, I’ll give you the fact that people appear to be “selfless” in this way when most, if not all of their basic needs are being met, but strip them of those comforts (or the possibility that they may never be realized in this lifetime) and the system breaks down entirely, and becomes one in which individuals are coerced into acting accordingly. …anyway, I’d rather not take any of these up as talking points… unfortunately, your ideals are based on a significant misrepresentation of whom and what we are as human beings, unless you assert that some of us are in fact “demigods” and are somehow exceptions to the rule… in which case I will tell you that you need to re-read what I wrote above (in my first postscript) a few times at least…. anyway, that’s a lot of p.s., and I feel like I’ve said a lot here. If you’ve made it this far, I appreciate you taking the time to read it. God bless you and forgive me if I’ve misspoken in some way.

6,380 comments.