An explanation of "stupidity."

[nanana]

That's beautiful, and thanks for adding the context of your journey.  

I embrace your distinction between faith and religion.  It rings true to me, as in my conception of God, God whispers highly different miracles into each of our ears (who am I to say what God DIDN'T say to you), whereas in a religious conception of God, there is frequently (not always) a belief in a single script for God's whispers, often documented long before God's existence is likely to be over.  (There are mystical traditions in most religions that do create space for continuing individual revelation...)

I like putting the state of being comfortable with "not knowing" as another step towards enlightenment.    I  feel very comfortable not knowing things, but I  am often triggered by someone else's certainty.  I  am going to see if I  can let that go right now, having expressed it, and if not able right now, to keep working on it.  

It is great that you found someone who was able to respond to your journey without being too blocked themselves to be at peace with you.  It is amazing how powerful it is to feel heard and to matter.  

My own path to skepticism of science as the only source of truth came from growing up as a great admirer of my dad, who was a Physics professor.  I     loved his brain and the way he could figure out just exactly the level of physics story to tell me to take me on the journey of understanding.  I went to a "loose-hold" mainline Protestant denomination and enjoyed that, but followed my dad into empirical data-worshipping atheism and (you might say) "knowing" skepticism.  

At some point much later, I began to observe that many scientists - my dad included - would refuse to converse with religious people around their different formulations of the origins, e.g., creationism, intelligent design.  It struck me as a huge missed opportunity, and then it made me wonder why he/they wouldn't if their arguments were so slam-dunk.  

That realization, and my conviction that all of God's children matter, made me realize that I  had tuned in EXCLUSIVELY to brain-and-fact data and tuned OUT HEART DATA.  

My dad is still amazing to me, AND his way no longer informs me of the limits I should set on my life's inquiry.  

[TT2025]

Nice one.

During watching the video I remembered conversation in home supplies shop with a guy I knew.. We met in lighting section while I was buying some LEDs. He warned me, that the LED is like small nuclear reactor - really dangerous to have it at home, cause it could break. I replied if he didn't mixed it up with CFLs which are safe until broken (even worse when on due to excited mercury vapours inside it). He said something like "Yea, those with mercury are also bad, but these micro-reactors are even worse.." I backed down after that. 

Those times there was load of stupid bullshit around lights ... Not sude what some poor sods use for lighting these days... Candles?🙂 

And I also remember being stupid myself loads of time, of course 😄 

Edited Saturday at 11:29 PM by TT2025

[viking8x6]

16 hours ago, TT2025 said:

Not sure what some poor sods use for lighting these days... Candles?🙂 

In this context, that suddenly reminds me of my (now deceased) ex-BF, who, back in his glory days, used to have a Christmas party every year with a real tree lit with real candles.

[TT2025]

1 hour ago, viking8x6 said:

In this context, that suddenly reminds me of my (now deceased) ex-BF, who, back in his glory days, used to have a Christmas party every year with a real tree lit with real candles.

Yea, real candles on Christmas tree are nice, but you have to be REALLY careful. Real tree catching fire in living room is Christmas nightmare. I used to beg grandma not to use real candles. Never had incident, thank God. When we had a cat real candles were off limit - tree went to floor at least four times a season (with cat always surviving without a  scratch).

[PozBearWI]

3 hours ago, viking8x6 said:

In this context, that suddenly reminds me of my (now deceased) ex-BF, who, back in his glory days, used to have a Christmas party every year with a real tree lit with real candles.

Fuck you knew Fred too?

[PozBearWI]

1 hour ago, TT2025 said:

Yea, real candles on Christmas tree are nice, but you have to be REALLY careful. Real tree catching fire in living room is Christmas nightmare. I used to beg grandma not to use real candles. Never had incident, thank God. When we had a cat real candles were off limit - tree went to floor at least four times a season (with cat always surviving without a  scratch).

The apartment building I lived in on Christmas Eve 1977 burned down due to the "live" christmas tree catching fire.  

[hntnhole]

4 hours ago, viking8x6 said:

a real tree lit with real candles.

My grandmother used those until her last Christmas. 

She had these little metal candleholders mounted on a little spring, and then a pinch-clip to hold them in place on the tree.  Fun memories .....