Is Ziegler on the money? Yes and No. (Main Forum)

by Benikira , North Coast NSW, Wednesday, June 20, 2012, 21:42 (338 days ago) @ James

James, I wonder if Klaus Ziegler might be better sticking to mathematics and not dabbling too deeply into logic and ethics let alone theology and prayer of all things.

I wonder was he exposed as a kid to that awful milleu many of us were exposed to in our childhood and really came a cropper as a lad when he prayed for something real big and it didn’t come off.

It is fine to talk about philosophers struggling for millennia to clarify paradoxes, to quote Spinoza and Shakespeare and remind us that the problem of the divine will has worried theologians (like Leibniz?) for centuries and thank god or leave god out of it if you like and just be thankful to Voltaire for identifying the big absurdity - but don’t ask me to take what he writes all too seriously. It is a bit meandering and not so great an example of logic – the very thing he seems to want to rely on.

Those beginning paragraphs are anyway just a bit of an introduction to get him to the point where he can put his point of view about the absurdity of prayer or rather what he seems to think prayer is.

Mind you I imagine I agree whole-heartedly with what seems to be his main idea about the efficacy or its lack when it comes to asking the god in the sky for special favours.

But that isn’t really what prayer is surely? And I confess I’m not too sure myself these days as to just what it is. Still searching!

However what Judith, Debb and PatrickW have written I find much more satisfying, even convincing than Klaus Ziegler’s writing.

Brian’s reference to talking about the “spiritual side of life” being likened to talking about a relationship of human love is also worthy of some thought in the context of prayer. A love relationship can hardly be reduced to one person simply asking the other for favours. Like Indian magic - sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn’t.

Benikira

All the women I know were wise from their youth.
Wisdom is forced upon me as I grow old.

locked

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Complete thread:

The Efficacy of Prayer - James, 2012-06-20, 01:51
- A response... - Brian Coyne, 2012-06-20, 03:50
  - A response... - James, 2012-06-20, 06:43
    - A response... - judith, 2012-06-20, 08:21
      - A response... - Debb, 2012-06-20, 08:58
    - A response... - Debb, 2012-06-20, 09:01
      - Another response... - PatrickW, 2012-06-20, 10:13
        Another response... - PatrickW, 2012-06-20, 10:17
      - A response... - Helen, 2012-06-20, 10:43
    - shame this forum hasn't a 'like' button ...thank you James [nt] - Roy, 2012-06-20, 11:41
    - The "spiritual side of life" likened to our love lives... - Brian Coyne, 2012-06-20, 13:17
- Is Ziegler on the money? Yes and No. - Benikira, 2012-06-20, 21:42
  - Is Ziegler on the money? Yes and No. - James, 2012-06-21, 00:28
    - Spiritual and religious maturation... - Brian Coyne, 2012-06-21, 01:34
      - Spiritual and religious maturation... - Sue, 2012-06-21, 08:29
        Spiritual and religious maturation...PS - Sue, 2012-06-21, 08:43
    - Is Ziegler on the money? Yes and No. - Liz, 2012-06-21, 08:32
      - Is Ziegler on the money? Yes and No. - James, 2012-06-21, 11:07
        Is Ziegler on the money? Yes and No. - Liz, 2012-06-21, 11:57
        Is Ziegler on the money? Yes and No. - gemstones, 2012-06-21, 12:16
        Is Ziegler on the money? Yes and No. - curlie que, 2012-06-24, 17:36
        Is Ziegler on the money? Yes and No. - Jerome, 2012-06-21, 23:40
    - My little rant. - Benikira, 2012-06-21, 22:55
      - My little rant. - James, 2012-06-22, 00:29
- Mind-Blindness and Autism - Oh Yet We Trust, 2012-06-22, 08:50
  - and then there is Oxytocin - Roy, 2012-06-22, 09:52
    - and then there is Oxytocin - Liz, 2012-06-22, 10:30
      - and then there is Oxytocin - Roy, 2012-06-22, 11:39
        and then there is Oxytocin - Liz, 2012-06-22, 21:52
        and then there is Oxytocin - Roy, 2012-06-24, 10:33
        and then there is Oxytocin - Liz, 2012-06-24, 12:26

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