08-02-2013, 06:23 PM | #51 |
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Re: What a "god"?
The problem, of course, is that religious concepts have little to nothing to do with observable reality. That means things like god, spirit, soul, etc. are not truly translatable.
The most we can do is create our own setting specific definitions.
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08-02-2013, 06:45 PM | #52 | |
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Re: What a "god"?
Quote:
I do agree that culture-bound or setting -specific definitions for 'gods' are useful. But why stop with what you call 'religious concepts'? We could have a long debate about the meanings or proper usage of all sorts of words, whether they refer to physical objects, human actions, abstract concepts, and so on. In fact, such arguments have come up pretty often. Remember when you disagreed with people about what 'theft' meant? Last edited by combatmedic; 08-02-2013 at 06:58 PM. |
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08-02-2013, 07:02 PM | #53 | |
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Re: What a "god"?
Quote:
Wizrobes masquerading as gods is also cool. |
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08-02-2013, 07:03 PM | #54 |
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Location: Portland, Oregon
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Re: What a "god"?
Religious concepts have to do with human social interaction which is an observable reality. Even positing materialism, they have at least as much reality as "state", "corporation","money","internet" etc. Or as much reality as "elf", "dwarf", "werebeast", etc. All of whom have their own associations.
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08-02-2013, 07:42 PM | #55 | |
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Re: What a "god"?
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But the fact that no one can definitively prove religious concepts and that no two cultures share them is close enough to them not existing as fully translatable for the context of this thread. God is not as universal a concept as taking something that doesn't belong to you whatever you may call that.
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08-02-2013, 07:48 PM | #56 | |
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Re: What a "god"?
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Legolas, Puck, Santa's helpers, or Keebler? I don't think it's possible to create a definition of Elf or god that most would agree on. I'm not knocking anyone trying to do it. But I think it would be just as much fun to create working definitions for specific settings.
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08-02-2013, 11:16 PM | #57 |
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Re: What a "god"?
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08-03-2013, 10:23 AM | #58 | |
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Location: Portland, Oregon
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Re: What a "god"?
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In a way you are sounding like Cordelia's claim that Vor do not exist. Vor exist because Vor claim themselves to exist, because everyone on Barrayar accepts the claim and even Komarrans accept it enough to rebel against it, and that being the case galactics must accept that vor exist. Likewise if gods don't exist as individuals, they exist because poets chant to them and priests sacrifice to them and they alter the existence of society as I note writing this on Saturn's day instead of Frey's day, Thor's day, or Odin's day.
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08-03-2013, 11:31 AM | #59 | |
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Re: What a "god"?
Quote:
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08-03-2013, 07:29 PM | #60 |
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Re: What a "god"?
Every human culture has mythology, gods of some sort, religion, and so on....whatever you may call that.
:) At the risk of sounding like one of those post-modern hipsters; if you are trying to reduce the concept of 'theft' to a brute fact instead of a cultural construct, I don't think it can be done. |
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clerics, fantasy, gods |
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