BS: UFO's and the Bible

Subject: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Rustic Rebel
Date: 31 Jan 03 - 01:43 PM

This is my theory on the subject of God=Aliens.

I have believed this for a long time that the 'gods' in the bible were actually aliens.
A good place to start to explain would be the book of Eziechiel- which is the most know for his descriptions of the 'Lord's' ship or cherubin as he describes. Get your bibles out now!
Eziechiel-
1:1-28; This is where he describes the vessel.
2:1-3; he was spoken to.
3:12-14; he was taken up into the ship- something like in a whirlwind of clouds.
8:1-4 He was taken again.
10:1-22; The vessel was above his head and again he describes it, then taken into it again.
11:22-25; the ship lifted up it's wings with wheels.
40:1-4 Alien shows him future visions through mind telepathy.

There is a NASA engineer named Joseph Blumrich that was so inspired by these descriptions that he came up with a patent for a flying vehicle. The Saturn-V rocket.

Exodus-
3:1-8 The angel of the lord appeared in a flame of fire. The bush was burning but not consumed.

There are many chapters in Exodus that talk about the 'aliens' appearing in flames which I percieve to mean lights, and clouds which I percieve to mean as smoke from the vessels.
13:20-22 The 'ship' went before them by day in a pillar of cloud and by night a pillar of fire. Imagine that.
24:9-18; The cloud settled on the mountain (which they seemed to do quite a bit) for six days and on the seventh day took Moses for fourty days and nights.
Kings 1&2-
1; 19:5-13; An alien is hiding out in a cave because the people were turning against them.
2; 2:2-11; The cheriots of fire came to the mnt. and took Elijah up in a whirlwind into heaven.

That almost sounds like abduction stories, where people claim to be taken in the beam of light and they feel like it is a liquid change.
Daniel says they put him into a deep sleep and felt no strength.
Numbers;
More clouds in chapters 9 and 12. In chapter 14 it almost sounds like they are pissed off because the people in Egypt were following other 'Gods' or aliens.

More to follow on the high technology in the bible, and the theory I have on 'the immaculate conception'!

Anyone care to discuss?
Peace. Rustic

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Clinton Hammond
Date: 31 Jan 03 - 01:53 PM

Call Eric Von Danikin...

That crack-pot has been saying the same thing for years and years...

;-)

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Kim C
Date: 31 Jan 03 - 01:56 PM

I heard a guy on the Art Bell show talking about Blue Apples and some such. He lives right here in Nashville. Hold me back.

I don't disagree, though, that there are many mystical things in the Bible that defy explanation. Some of what this guy was saying last night, though, was WAY too freaky for me.

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: greg stephens
Date: 31 Jan 03 - 01:58 PM

The bible tells you not to eat oysters too. I wouldn't trust that book one bit.

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: BuckMulligan
Date: 31 Jan 03 - 02:00 PM

the devil can quote scripture for his (or her, to be fair) own purposes

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Rustic Rebel
Date: 31 Jan 03 - 02:09 PM

The high Technology in the Bible could almost be looked at like a science fiction novel.
Take a look at Ezekiel's description.
The four 'straight legs' of 'burnished brass' with' round feet'.
Like the lunar lander- straight legs with round footpads.
A wheel within a wheel. The UFO transformed into a land rover maybe? And they could turn in any direction.
He says there were torches inside that moved to and fro. Circulating lights?
And the living creatures darted to and fro. He must have seen them running around in the ship.
When he talks about the 'rover' he says the humans were inside and it went where they went.(1:15-20)
when it moved it sounded like water. Like thunder and when it was still they let their wings down.
There was a brightness round about it like a rainbow. Colored lights?

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: catspaw49
Date: 31 Jan 03 - 02:10 PM

What is this? Wacky ideas day? Considering the number of translations of language and modernization to text over the years,some by ecumenical decree, how can any of this be taken seriously?

Lots of good stories in the Bible, but I'm with Mark Twain......"It's not the parts of the Bible that I don't understand that bothers me.....It's the parts I do understand."

Spaw

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Keith A of Hertford
Date: 31 Jan 03 - 02:20 PM

Give Rustic a break. Is the alien theory more whacky than a supernatural one?
I'm not convinced Rustic, but my son has made quite a study. I'll try and find a link to some of his stuff.
Keith.

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Rustic Rebel
Date: 31 Jan 03 - 02:27 PM

The book was written by men and deciphered by men, but a lot of people believe it. Why believe some of it and turn away from some of the obvious?
I do not consider myself a crack-pot thank you very much Spaw. I consider it naive to believe we are the only ones here in universe after universe.

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Rustic Rebel
Date: 31 Jan 03 - 02:31 PM

Spaw- I mean wacky (not crack-pot)
Thanks Keith.

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Rustic Rebel
Date: 31 Jan 03 - 02:35 PM

Then you can think about the story of Noah. The idea that he rounded up animals to go into the ark is a little bizarre. When they actually might have had the intellegence to take DNA samples of each animal instead.

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: catspaw49
Date: 31 Jan 03 - 02:38 PM

"I consider it naive to believe we are the only ones here in universe after universe."......RR

Now on that point I can agree wholeheartedly.

Spaw

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Amos
Date: 31 Jan 03 - 02:40 PM

Rustic --

I think the key is in the "universe after universe" part.

Problem is that minds are infinitely plastic and can come with anything imaginable, presenting it as "real". While this is all well and good in the centers of self and the imagination of the soul, it has been pretty well stamped out as unworkable in the halls of commerce and material agreement called for by life in the material time-space continuum.

So anytime you bleed reality from one of these universes into the other, you're gonna hit flak, but don't let it bother ya.

I haven't seen material traces of UFOs, current or ancient, but I would sure love to. Barring that I will just have to visit other planes or other spheres to find them! P:>)


A

Spaw is making me an aluminum-foil headpiece. How embarassing is that!!??


A

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: BuckMulligan
Date: 31 Jan 03 - 02:41 PM

Clarifying - I hardly think RR is a crackpot; he didn't make these things up, and they're not, as Keith points out, any harder to swallow than the "standard brand" literalist interpretation of scripture. They're fascinating to speculate on, but in the end "could have meant" is a long trot from "proves." And the whole "ancient aliens" theme has a load of von Daniken baggage to overcome - he was a crackpot.

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: leprechaun
Date: 31 Jan 03 - 02:51 PM

Gee Greg, maybe there was more Demoic-whatever Poisoning in those days, you know, red tides and stuff, so it might have been good advice not to eat oysters. You should open your mind to the possibility that pollution from spent rocket fuel could have contaminated the waters of the Mediterranean Sea and caused a danger of paralytic shellfish poisoning.

There are many explanations as to why they might not have wanted to eat oysters. In my state, all the oysters are private property, so the only place you can get them is the store. So maybe them bible-writing folks were just trying to protect the shellfish industry.

Who's to know, really? All that stuff got translated into English from some other durn language, and who knows how reliable the interpreters were? So some those of chapters and verses could well have been infomercials.

I for one, am glad we can eat oysters now, and I trust I won't get struck by lightening.

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Clinton Hammond
Date: 31 Jan 03 - 02:54 PM

1) The term universe means everything... there is only one universe, and whatever we discover is part of it...

2) "I consider it naive to believe we are the only ones here in universe after universe."

Ummmmm just fer a laugh go to Exn.ca
and click on the "Rare Earth" segment...

It's just one of the better arguments for the "unlikely-hood" (Is that even a word???) of ETs...

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Kim C
Date: 31 Jan 03 - 03:08 PM

Mister's Uncle Paul has some theories about the food restrictions in the Bible. Most of them have to do with diseases that animals carry. Also I think many of the rules placed on Moses and the children of Israel were for solidarity, to set them apart from everyone else.

Anyway, I don't know what Ezekiel's wheel was. I wasn't there. It could have been any number of things. The fact that it was something in the sky, and we don't know for sure what it was, makes it an Unidentified Flying Object.

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Rustic Rebel
Date: 31 Jan 03 - 03:09 PM

Even our government (although they are un-believable also) has a set of 'plans' on how to act when we get 'invaded'. The first thing is all nations are notified through the UN. So we don't go off bombing each other.
back to the bible...

Enoch was Methuselah's father and Noah's grandfather. His Book should have been in the Old testament but was edited out of thr Bible by the Ecumenical Council because of it's controversies. As the Book of Ezekiel's was almost thrown out.
Enoch took many space flights also. There are numerous references of him 'spirited' away in a whirlwind and taken from the earth.
He says the 'angels' showed him many secret things in heaven.
32:2; they went over the summits of the earth and passed above the Erythraean sea, and went far from it. and passed over the angel Zotiel. Another spaceship?
He describes portals or windows in the ship. He saw the stars of heaven come forth.
Pages of this book contain things about the sun, moon, yearly cycles and revolving in circular chariots.

I've got more coming!
Peace, Rustic

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: BuckMulligan
Date: 31 Jan 03 - 03:14 PM

we do, of course, have to entertain the possibility that some (many?) parts of the bible are in fact myth, and not "history." Why not apply the same lines of tihnking to Phaeton/Apollo? Daedalus & Icarus?

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Rustic Rebel
Date: 31 Jan 03 - 03:32 PM

ok Buck- why don't we?

Imagine if you will, the idea of a more intellectual spiecies of race, coming to the earth with knowledge of the atom bomb or nuclear weapons.
Then look at the story of Sodom and Gomorrah.
Two human angels went into town and warned the people of the coming destruction. They were told to escape for their lives to the mountains, lest thou be consumed.
Genesis;
19:24; Then the Lord rained upon Sodom and Gomorrah brimstone and fire. Lot's wife looked back and became a pillar of salt. Phoosh-burned up?
The smoke of the country went up like the smoke of a furnace. Mushroom cloud?
Maybe this would explain the walls of Jerico coming down also.
These aliens had the power and to make the people conform they showed their power.
Another theory which I hadn't considered was then they created the great flood to wash the world clean and start over with the 'primatives'.
Peace.Rustic

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Ed.
Date: 31 Jan 03 - 03:33 PM

The four 'straight legs' of 'burnished brass' with' round feet'.
Like the lunar lander- straight legs with round footpads

Sounds like a 1970's Coffee Table to me...

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Raedwulf
Date: 31 Jan 03 - 03:53 PM

"Spaw is making me an aluminum-foil headpiece. How embarassing is that!!?? "

It could be worse. It could be an aluminum-foil codpiece!!!! ;)

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Amos
Date: 31 Jan 03 - 04:02 PM

Clinton,

That's a pretty Newtonian "space is a box" worldview, pal...I don't think Hawkings woudl buy it. Even in physics the notion of multiple "universes" is used as a means of explaining some anomalies. And even you will probably allow, for example, that the unbounded and sovereign realm of your own imagination follows some pretty whacky laws if youhold it to the standards of the physical universe.

As for definitions, let me defer to the American Heritage:

1. All matter and energy, including the earth, the galaxies, and the contents of intergalactic space, regarded as a whole. 2a. The earth together with all its inhabitants and created things. b. The human race. 3. The sphere or realm in which something exists or takes place.

Note that definition one is the usual definition of ther materiaal universe. Definition 2b is interesting because it implies a universe of agreement. And definiton 3 would apply to the world of, say, dreams, the future, imagination, or a parallel universe in the physics sense of the term.

A

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Rustic Rebel
Date: 31 Jan 03 - 04:06 PM

yeah- what Amos said!
Even a coffee table would be an extreme in those days!
Another theory I have is on the 'Immaculate Conception'
The alien Gabriel must have artificially inseminated Mary. How else do you explain a virgin that is pregnant?
The wise men following the star. Since when do the stars move, maybe they followed the space vessel in the sky, to where the half alien (maybe whole) child was to be born.
Jesus did have an awful lot of knowledge for his time and many 'special' powers now didn't he? And where was he during those 'lost' childhood years?
And the ressurection. Well that's a good one. I suppose his people came and picked him up.
Peace.Rustic
P.S. I am only stating my beliefs, I'm not trying to convert anyone here.

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: TIA
Date: 31 Jan 03 - 04:09 PM

A criminal cannot walk through a room without leaving abundant evidence of his (or her) presence in DNA, fibers, characteristic dirt grains (remember OJ?), insect eggs, etc. Aliens could not have done anything more than a fly-by without leaving an abundance of physical evidence. Everything found so far has a rather prosaic explanation. Doesn't mean they're not "out there" (statistically speaking in an infinite universe there's a 100% chance that they are, but I suspect they are too far away to visit)

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: GUEST,Bill D witn no cookies, else I would toss th
Date: 31 Jan 03 - 04:21 PM

*biting tongue....biting tongue HARD* I will NOT comment on this...I will NOT comment on this.....I will NOT comment on this

mmmmfffffffffff......

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Kim C
Date: 31 Jan 03 - 04:23 PM

Wasn't Enoch the one who "walked with God" instead of dying?

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Sorcha
Date: 31 Jan 03 - 04:24 PM

RR, I think it is at least possible. Get the book, "Link" and read it.....fascinating stuff.

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Ed.
Date: 31 Jan 03 - 04:29 PM

LOL, Bill D!

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Rustic Rebel
Date: 31 Jan 03 - 04:39 PM

I suppose I could say they left the pyramids or the statues on Easter Island, or the runways known as the Nazca Lines(believed to form a giant astonomical calender) but your right I have no proof.

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Sorcha
Date: 31 Jan 03 - 04:46 PM

Short review of Link, by Walt Becker. Based on fact and cultural anomalies.

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Ed.
Date: 31 Jan 03 - 04:46 PM

You could say anything at all...

What is is that you are actually saying?

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Rustic Rebel
Date: 31 Jan 03 - 04:47 PM

Sorcha-Are you talking about the Bible or the book of Enoch?

Come on now Bill- Don't bite your tounge to hard. Might hurt yourself.

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Sorcha
Date: 31 Jan 03 - 04:50 PM

Neither, it's a novel......by Walt Becker.

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Ed.
Date: 31 Jan 03 - 04:50 PM

Sorcha,

"Based on fact"?

I think I should take Bill D's advice and bite my tongue...

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Rustic Rebel
Date: 31 Jan 03 - 04:53 PM

Ed- what I am saying is I believe we have been visited, religiously sculpted, and maybe even played with by spieces of other planets. that is pretty simply stating it.
Just caught the link now Sorcha, I will check it out. There are a lot of us out there that believe in this theory.
Peace. Rustic

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Sorcha
Date: 31 Jan 03 - 04:54 PM

Yes, god dammit! The ruins do exist!! The numbers do match up. The Aymaran language is an algorithm. Might not have been aliens, but the book is based on Cultural Facts.

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Sorcha
Date: 31 Jan 03 - 04:56 PM

Please notice I did NOT say "facts about aliens" or "based on alien fact".

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Ed.
Date: 31 Jan 03 - 04:56 PM

Oh dear...

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: leprechaun
Date: 31 Jan 03 - 05:05 PM

So what? What the hell does all this have to do with oysters?

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Sorcha
Date: 31 Jan 03 - 05:05 PM

Read the book, Ed, you might find it interesting.

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Ebbie
Date: 31 Jan 03 - 05:06 PM

Lighten up, guys. At worst, discussing this stuff does no harm, at best it gives us something to think about. Inbetween, it certainly is better to dwell on than the stuff going on in the world today. And tomorrow...

One thing about 'skeptics' that always bemuses me is that they seem quick to say, Nah, how dumb. At the same time, they are at a loss or uninterested in speculating as to what else could be the explanation.

Like evolution. I accept it as a starting point (although I do not accept that left to itself, matter builds. My observation says that it rots.) When science says that creation by a specific entity is impossible, i.e., not supported by evidence, it goes on to say that life developed from matter. So, I ask, where did the matter come from? Science says it was always there. Ha. That's no easier to believe than that something was created.

And round and round we go.

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Kim C
Date: 31 Jan 03 - 05:09 PM

I guess my question has always been, if we little bitty human beans were supposed to know where life came from, don't you reckon we'd have found out by now?

Personally I think the answer is probably much greater than any of our minds can fully comprehend.

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Cluin
Date: 31 Jan 03 - 05:21 PM

And everybody knows now that when you crucify an Andromedan, you have to put Kryptonite in his mouth to keep him from regenerating in 3 days.

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Little Hawk
Date: 31 Jan 03 - 05:42 PM

Yeah, talk about your sceptics, eh? I've met any number of traveling space aliens who absolutely REFUSE...I mean refuse pointblank...to even consider the existence of something as unlikely (in their opinion) as the Bible. They laugh, they give you pitying looks, they dismiss the idea entirely.

I actually presented one of them with a real physical Bible, just to see what he would do. Well, he picked it up, looked at it scornfully, and riffled through the pages a bit. He then put it down contemptuously and said:

"These things can easily be faked, you know. A kid could come up with one as good as this, I bet. I've seen better fake bibles in that pathetic rag 'News of the Universe', and they printed an article the other day about Osama Bin Laden having a secret base on one of Jupiter's moons! Bible indeed! What a crock! I just don't get how an apparently rational being like yourself can countenance such absolute rubbish. Only a total Earth Cadet could come up with something this stupid!"

I told him to go screw himself with felicitous abandon.

- LH

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Kim C
Date: 31 Jan 03 - 05:54 PM

Felicitous abandon!

I like it. :-)

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: greg stephens
Date: 31 Jan 03 - 05:55 PM

Not only did they leave the pyramids and those lines in the desert, they also left some music behind, of which "Bohemian Rhapsody" and "Tutti Frutti" are arguably the best known examples

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Little Hawk
Date: 31 Jan 03 - 05:57 PM

I think he assumed I was referring to some exotic dancer...

- LH

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Amos
Date: 31 Jan 03 - 06:02 PM

, if we little bitty human beans were supposed to know where life came from, don't you reckon we'd have found out by now?


The director of the US Patent Office wanted to close up shop somewhere in the early 1900s. He stated on record that everything that would be invented already had been.

So, Kim, I must regretfully reply in the negative, I don't suppose we would have. Our destiny, collectively is in our hands. We're just not very deft with it yet! :>)

A

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Bill D
Date: 31 Jan 03 - 06:08 PM

"Occam's Razo.....mmmpppppppppppffffff

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Greg F.
Date: 31 Jan 03 - 06:19 PM

I think the book y'all need to read is The Demon-Haunted World by Carl Sagan. Its NOT a novel.

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: GUEST,nice guest
Date: 31 Jan 03 - 06:30 PM

Leper: well, you did get me looking up the Oregon harvesting rules, which are NO harvesting of wild oysters, and cultured are private property. Good rule. Because the oysters are the aliens which rule the Second Quadrant of the Galactic Empire, Helios Division, Earth sector. It keeps the peace.

Dan

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: GUEST,Glypton
Date: 31 Jan 03 - 06:50 PM

Look people, get serious. There ARE no bibles. None. There never have been and there never will be. There is no such thing as a bible, except in the fevered imaginations of religious nuts and candidates for the psych ward. All you have to do is follow the scientific method, use a little logic, and avoid falling into emotionally-based wish-fulfillment about books that will answer all the "big" questions. I'm really sorry to have to tell you this, but there are no Sopranos either. It's a fictional show. Grow up, okay? Do you really think we're going to institute full trade and diplomatic contacts with Earth while you primitive people continue clinging to unreal stuff like this?

Glypton

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: leprechaun
Date: 31 Jan 03 - 06:58 PM

Well there might have been other reasons for the prohibition against eating oysters. I'm afraid it wouldn't be gentlemanly to go into it too much in depth, but suffice to say, it could relate in some way to the whole forbidden fruit idea, allegorically speaking.

Oh for shame!

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Ed.
Date: 31 Jan 03 - 06:59 PM

Greg F,

Ignoring 'Glypton' I'd agree that Carl Sagan's Demon Haunted World is a fine book. It is however worth remembering that Sagan was human too and made mistakes.

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: NicoleC
Date: 31 Jan 03 - 07:08 PM

Actually, the rule is that all fish for consumption must have fins and scales that are detachable from the skin. Shellfish does not qualify, nor do lobsters, crabs and other crustaceans.

From a dietary standpoint, the prohibition against eating shellfish is a wise one in sanitarily handicapped environment and pre-refridgeration society. Even with our modern conveniences, lots of people have severe and sometimes fatal allergic reactions to shellfish.

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Bobert
Date: 31 Jan 03 - 07:33 PM

Well, Danged! What's UFO's *God* to do with the Bible? Well, heck. I don't see no conflict at all.

Like who's to says that God has only *one* experiment going?

"In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth" I don't think can be taken lierally to mean that there are no other earth's.

Okay, I gotta spill the beans here: I saw a UFO! For real! It was a dark night back in 1972 and I was with this woman in a park about 10 miles west of Langley, Va. where the CIA headquraters are. This area is real close to the Potomac River and we were, ahhh, just talking at that moment and were both looking toward the river and there it was. We both saw it clearly for at least 15 second. Maybe more. Neither of us could say anything until its flight took it behind a tree line when we both just looked at each other and said, "Wow!"

Now, I'm not going as far as to say that this isn't some earth-build airship but it was definately what folks describe as a flying saucer!

So go ahead and say that I must have been either on my medications of off them but I know what I saw. And so did Lisa Hadley.

That's my UFO story and I'z stickin' to it and will agree to take any poligraph anyone wants me to take...

Bobert

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: GUEST,Glypton
Date: 31 Jan 03 - 07:47 PM

See? That's just what I mean. Start believing in something totally irrational like the "Bible", and you can fall for anything. It doesn't matter what kind of fish you eat or don't eat. Have you ever seen anyone fall down and die from eating an oyster? No? Didn't think so. Get your head out of that hole in the ground, stop imitating ostriches, and wake up to reality.

There are NO actual bibles.

Oh sure, there are books that people claim are bibles, and they'll show you photos of them and go on and on about it, and then with an air of "wait till you see this" they'll stride in with one of those books under their arm, all pleased as punch. Well, you know what? It's just another book. It's another one of those dumb paper books they manufacture by the millions and millions on Planet Earth (who knows why?), thus ruining their forests and clouding their minds. You see one book, you've seen them all. Not one of them will answer all your questions about life or give you a handy little moral map by which to plan your destiny. No sir. You've gotta figure out that stuff out yourself using your brain, dumbo! No book will do it for you.

My planet is 15 times older societally speaking than yours and we don't go to "Bibles" or any other spurious books to know that. We go to science and pure thought. Science, math, and clear-headed logic can answer all your questions, brother.

So what should us "UFO" guys care whether or not we are written up in some ancient tome somewhere that purports to be prophetic? Does it really matter? Will it secure you a membership in the Galactic Federation any sooner? No, it won't. Now, do away with that pointless "money" stuff you are all so worried about, get properly organized and unified as one people, end war and poverty once and for all on your planet, and THEN we may be in a position to talk usefully.

As it is now, you guys are a "write-off", if I may use one of your common expressions.

Glypton

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Clinton Hammond
Date: 31 Jan 03 - 07:48 PM

"I could say they left the pyramids or the statues on Easter Island, or the runways known as the Nazca Lines"

Yes... you could and 1) you'd be WRONG and 2) you'd be belittling the ancient cultures that toiled to create those structures...

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: BuckMulligan
Date: 31 Jan 03 - 07:49 PM

Just what we needed!!! A real alien. He said so. Must be true. So, what's ET really like, and why has Alf lowered himself to doing phone commercials? And what was Michael Redgrave REALLY saying?

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Cluin
Date: 31 Jan 03 - 07:51 PM

Since your planet is so much older, societally speaking, I guess that explains why you've mastered the art of wasting time by repeating yourselves. We're just entering that stage ourselves.

Let us know how it works out for you.

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: GUEST,Glypton
Date: 31 Jan 03 - 08:39 PM

Cluin...

Forgive me for saying this but...you're just not "clued in"! Hee! Hee! Hee! We have mastered arts you yobbos haven't even dreamt of yet. For instance, we mould three dimensional objects in an energy matrix, instead of a solid mould. This results in a far superior moulding with no parting lines, and it takes less than a second. I am now moulding one of you, based on my speculation regarding your appearance. My goodness, you are a sorry sight! I suggest regular exercise, more sun, and a meat-free diet. It's not hopeless!

BuckMulligan...

Where do I start? First of all, Buck, I don't think that's your reall name. I think you are funning with me. Fine. I don't mind. ET was a fictional character, Buck. Sorry to have to tell you this.

Now sit down. Are you sitting down? Alf is a puppet, Buck. Yes. He's a puppet. A lousy one too, I might add.

Michael Redgrave? You've lost me there, Buck. Michael doesn't rate too high on my World, but I'll see if I can track down whatever obscure Earth stuff he was connected with. He's an actor, right?

It beats me where you people get your Earth cadet notions about reality.

Bobert...

Ah, my friend, you have seen one of the Federation vessels I would expect, but I couldn't say which one. We've got a lot of members. We've been observing this planet for signs of moderately intelligent life for some time now, lately dodging the missiles that your idiot military people are fond of, and hanging in hoping for, like I said, sings of moderately intelligent life.

We were quite intrigued by your president Nixxon back in 1972, so it might have had to do with observing him. He had the most extraordinary nasal structure. Every time you looked at his nose it seemed to get a little longer. Fascinating. It's a pity you retired him early, so we didn't get to see the process complete itself. It might have made nasal history in the entire quadrant.

Clinton was very entertaining too, needless to say. The present fellow you've got seems barely sentient, however.

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Clinton Hammond
Date: 31 Jan 03 - 09:09 PM

Cluin?

What does it (used to??) say on yer web site...

When they made this guy, they broke the mould, but they made him anyway...

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: GUEST,wdyat24
Date: 31 Jan 03 - 09:31 PM

This would make a great XFile!

wdyat24

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: GUEST,wdyat24
Date: 31 Jan 03 - 10:29 PM

The laoding has begun! YESSS!!! I finally put this post on the right thread!

wdyat24

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Ebbie
Date: 31 Jan 03 - 10:39 PM

hey liddle, hi liddle liddle liddle layoding, hi lee liddle lee oh leh hee hee, hi liddle liddle layoding...:)

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Greg F.
Date: 31 Jan 03 - 11:17 PM

Which part of the scientific method or of rational thought do you consider "a mistake" there Ed?

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Little Hawk
Date: 01 Feb 03 - 12:56 AM

Greg - It might be the part that disregards evidence not recognizable to the observer due to his rigid ways of observing and interpreting reality.

Example: A guy was trying to test the hearing of spiders. He would make a loud noise and see if the spider jumped. It did. He cut one of its legs off and made another loud noise. Again it jumped. He continued removing legs and making noises with similar results. At last the spider had no legs. No matter how loud a noise he made, it would not jump. Conclusion...spiders hear with their legs.

Impeccable logic, hindered by lack of perception. Now, I'm sure you've heard this trite little story before, but it's not intended to be taken literally. Rather, it demonstrates a point about the way people think when their awareness is limited to certain narrow paths of interpretation.

And whose awareness is not so limited?

Thus the most certain conclusions of one generation of scientists are frequently shown to be faulty by a succeeding generation...and people usually see exactly what they want to see...what their cultural norms have prepared them to see. If they don't believe in something, they usually don't see it either (or even realize they aren't seeing it).

Erik Von Daniken sees alien visitors behind every statue. Another guy sees ancient fertility cults. Another guy sees Atlantean colonies. And on, and on, and on....

- LH

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Rustic Rebel
Date: 01 Feb 03 - 02:49 AM

Alright Clinton-perhaps you are right. Perhaps I am. I mean who is to say that the people didn't have a little help building those things. I don't want to argue the point I want to discuss the point. If you can tell me where those rocks came from on Easter Island (rocks un-native to the area) I would love to hear your theory on that. If you can say how those runways were so aligned to the stars when they had no concept of 'flying vessels'- I would like to hear what you think. I don't want to hear that I am wrong, I want you to tell me that you have a theory also, and what it is.

Hey Bobert- I'm glad you came in. I wasn't going to let this thread die without something from you! And I am so glad you spoke on seeing a craft. I think a lot of people would if they got out to watch the skies more. I have seen lights doing strange patterns and hovering over a building in Dallas once, and I see lights in a field close by my home occasionally that should not be there. They are only there once or twice a year but it is a desolate area and I see them in the same place when I see them. I've always wanted to check them out, when I see them, but I don't have the guts.
Hey Ed- I would also like to hear your take on some of this biblical scriptures I've pointed out. How do you decipher them?
Peace. Rustic

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Terry K
Date: 01 Feb 03 - 03:56 AM

Hah, Glypton, you must be a fake!

Cos if you're so clever, you wouldn't waste time looking for signs of moderately intelligent life in West Virginia, so there!!

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: leprechaun
Date: 01 Feb 03 - 05:55 AM

Hey Glypton! Klatu, Barato, Nictu! On the half-shell, baby!

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Greg F.
Date: 01 Feb 03 - 11:46 AM

Ah, C'mon, LH- your example is absurd. What you're describing is not scientific methodology at all. Its NOT logic, impeccible or otherwise, but entirely fallacious and a violation of every tenet of proper scientific inquiry. All it demonstrates is a bogus thesis.

Of course succeding generations of scientists revise update and annotate earlier work- that's how knowledge accmulates. That doesn't make the METHOD suspect.

Then if people usually see exactly what they want to see...what their cultural norms have prepared them to see. If they don't believe in something, they usually don't see it either...

If you think about this for a moment, you'll see this negates your whole argument. If people want to see UFO's, they'll see 'em even if there is a much more mundane and practical ecplanation for them.

No?

Best, Greg

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Clinton Hammond
Date: 01 Feb 03 - 02:16 PM

"If you can tell me where those rocks came from on Easter Island (rocks un-native to the area) I would love to hear your theory on that"

You ah, better check yer sources mate... The quarries on Easter Island are as easy to find as the Rappa-Nui (sp?) are themselves...

"If you can say how those runways were so aligned to the stars when they had no concept of 'flying vessels'- I would like to hear what you think"

What Runways? The Nazka (again, sp?) Lines? They weren't runways... They were most likely ceremonial paths to be followed during certain celebrations... The belief that they couldn't have been build or appreciated without flight is erroneous... And well, any fool can see the stars from the ground, why is stellar alignment such a bizarre concept?

"I mean who is to say that the people didn't have a little help building those things"

The did have help.. the had the generations of builders who came before them... Take a look at Egyptology... Look around the Valley Of The Kings and you see lots of incomplete, or improperly constructed pyramids... It's not like the Great Pyramid sprung up in a vacuum... Or The Rappanui of Easter Island... Again, one can look at the learning curve these people experienced while making them...

The same goes for the South American pyramids... There's LOTS of evidence of a learning curve.. They didn't come from Atlantis (The is NO lost continent! plain and simple) And as to why they look like Egypt's pyramids? Well, what did you expect a pyramid to look like???   All the pyramids in the world are pyramid shaped...   They have to be or they fall down...

Look... Sure... I'd like to think that we're not alone... that the universe is teaming with sentient life zipping all over in their faster-than-light vehicles, tinkering with sub-species, and anal-probing red-necks but the more and more good science I read, the less and less that situation seems even remotely possible... Check into information on the carbon cycle of our planet and it's effect on plant life, and you'll see exactly what a small window of complex life our planet has... (as a matter of fact, there's a good link above in a post dated 31 Jan 03 - 02:54 PM... check it out)

And well, as I mentioned before... the belief that our ancestors couldn't have achieved such great things on their own is insulting...

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Little Hawk
Date: 01 Feb 03 - 03:50 PM

Well, yes, Greg...I follow you. Trouble is, I wasn't wanting in the least to see UFO's when I first did see them, in the late 60's. I was scientifically minded, and did not believe in such things, you see. And yet I saw them! Which goes to show that sometimes you can wake up out of a confirmed prejudice about reality if you're willing to, and it doesn't devastate your pride too much. I've been interested in them ever since, but have not seen any more since 1968. I have read a lot of interesting material about it, though, and have met some (in my opinion) very trustworthy individuals with their own stories to tell.

I'll not bore you be recounting any of them. I know it wouldn't help a bit.

I don't waste my time explaining origami to aardvarks, evolution to Jehovah's witnesses, or the Bible to guys like Glypton. Not any
more, anyway.

Clinton - What makes you think that everything isn't alive? It just depends how carefully you observe things, and at what level. What does "life" require for you to say it's "life"? Movement? Nope. Consciousness? Maybe. Blood? Nope. A heart? Nope. Procreation? Nope. A body? Maybe not. You ought to consider larger possibilities, Clinton, or you may end up like your namesake, poor old President Bill...a lousy saxophone player with a declining but still famous libido.

Our planet has a small window for OUR familiar types of life. There may well be others, based on what you would term a completely different biology.

Fire is alive, Clinton. Stone is alive. Clouds are alive. Air is alive. Planets are alive. Don't believe me? Tough.

- LH

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Clinton Hammond
Date: 01 Feb 03 - 04:00 PM

Contact with life similar to ours is the only contact that's important... What's the point of finding life you cannot communicate with???

The universe is likely teaming with life...

Unfortunately, maybe 98% of anything we might even recognize is most likely single cell life... Big whoop...

Fire isn't alive, it's a simple chemical reaction... Stone, clouds, air... nor them... And all the new age hippy longing in the universe ain't gonna make it so...

:-)

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: *daylia*
Date: 01 Feb 03 - 04:09 PM

Gotta have heart to hear the stones sing Clinton!   :-)

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Clinton Hammond
Date: 01 Feb 03 - 04:15 PM

Ya also gotta be on glue, Daylia!

LOL

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Little Hawk
Date: 01 Feb 03 - 04:21 PM

Well, I agree, Clinton, that stones are a less fragile form of life in some respects than you are, as you will find out if one falls on your head. :-) They're very patient too. I am less so.

Chemical reactions are a form of life too. And a fascinating one, for sure.

Here's another question for you. Does life necessitate having free will? What do you think? I think not. Only higher forms of life have free will.

Where does your definition of what is alive end? And where does it begin? Don't just toss off a glib response. Think about it some, and see what you come up with.

"What's the point of finding life you cannot communicate with???"

Yeah! Oooo, I like that! That may be precisely why the UFO guys have been less than enthusiastic about dealing openly and directly with the narrow-minded and paranoid fools down here on this planet.

- LH

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Clinton Hammond
Date: 01 Feb 03 - 04:32 PM

LH...

"stones are a less fragile form of life"
"Chemical reactions are a form of life too"

No... they are not...

I'll say now, I'm done with ya... and I'll quote you for my reasons why...

"I don't waste my time explaining origami to aardvarks, evolution to Jehovah's witnesses, or the Bible to guys like Glypton."

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Little Hawk
Date: 01 Feb 03 - 04:39 PM

And there we rest comfortably in mutual contempt for each other's arrant conceit and stupidity. Hell, I've seen marriages that endured for a lifetime on that basis. The best is yet to come, Clinton.

And now....BACK to "UFO's and the Bible"!!! Yadda, yadda, yadda.

- LH

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Ed.
Date: 01 Feb 03 - 04:42 PM

How to make an Origami Aardvark

Sorry, I was going to write a reply to you, Little Hawk. If, however, you really believe that stones are alive, I don't see much point.

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Little Hawk
Date: 01 Feb 03 - 05:01 PM

And if you're too mentally lazy to bother wondering what I mean when I use the word "alive" or to give me your own definition of what you think "alive" means, you'd be dead right about that, Ed. There would be no point.

I've seen origami aardvarks before somewhere...

- LH

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: *daylia*
Date: 01 Feb 03 - 05:08 PM

Thoughts on 'hearing the stones sing' ... from "Hanta Yo - An American Saga" (Hill)

"Live and appreciate yourself, the grandfathers say. Recognize that your ears grant songs to the trees and to the stream. Soar on the wings of these songs; they belong to you. Use your body for giving growth to the spirit - your spirit. You, who shall become the Great Spirit."

Ahhhh ... put that in your pipe and smoke it, Clinton!

;-)   daylia

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Clinton Hammond
Date: 01 Feb 03 - 05:16 PM

You can talk new age all ya want, it's old age gonna get ya in the end

If you need a definition of "alive" maybe you should pick up a little book I like to call a dictionary...

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Bobert
Date: 01 Feb 03 - 05:26 PM

Yo, LH, how 'bout "door nails"... Hmmmmmm?

Nanu Nanu...

Bobert

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: leprechaun
Date: 01 Feb 03 - 05:29 PM

I just bought the Stone's Forty Licks CD! I think it would only hurt a little bit if it fell on my head. But I still keep it securely in the cabinet, just in case.

Meanwhile, Clinton and I are going to smoke some Amanita Muscaria, brew up some peyote tea, and become enlightened.

And I'm starting to think Little Hawk doesn't use drugs like Bill Clinton didn't have sex with that woman.

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Little Hawk
Date: 01 Feb 03 - 05:51 PM

My last post vanished into cyberspace. Too bad. It was a good one.

Lep - the only drugs I use are as follows:

1. 1 or 2 aspirin when I get a bad headache. That happens occasionally, maybe once in a month...usually when I stay up too late on the computer.

2. Tea with a slice of lemon.

3. I had a glass of wine too...oh...a couple of weeks ago. I manage to consume maybe a bottle or two of wine over the course of a year, when I think of it, which is not too often. Usually it's when I'm visiting somewhere, and I become suddenly aware that alcohol is a daily ritual for a lot of people.

That's it, brother. If everyone was like me the drug dealers would all be out of a job, the breweries would go bust, the tobacco companies would die, and Bush would have had one less reason to invade Afghanistan, cos there'd be no one to sell the opium crop to.

Fools take drugs to gain enlightenment. That's my opinion. Bigger fools take drugs just to get high or feel "cool" amongst their peers.

I ask you again, Clinton: Where does your definition of what is "alive" end? And where does it begin?

- LH

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Little Hawk
Date: 01 Feb 03 - 06:04 PM

Bobert - Yeah, doornails are alive too, but their awareness is extremely limited. They don't believe Clinton Hammond is alive.   It's no use talking to them about it...just like talking to a brick wall. If you try to explain it to them, they tell you to look the word "alive" up in the dictionary. I did, and it says: living, lively, brisk, swarming. Wow. How illuminating! I could've done better to ask George Bush or the village idiot.   :-)

- LH

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Little Hawk
Date: 01 Feb 03 - 06:06 PM

I need some food. Talk amongst yourselves. If Clinton shows any discernable signs of life, PM me at once.

- LH

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Rustic Rebel
Date: 01 Feb 03 - 06:22 PM

I know what you say about stones being alive. Of coarse they are alive. I have always been under the impression that everything is 'energy' Rocks being a dense form of energy.
How do you suppose Jesus walked on water? He manipulated the energy to a denser form.
Peace. Rustic

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Bobert
Date: 01 Feb 03 - 06:49 PM

Well danged, LH, there goes the "Dead as a doornail" thing. Man, is nothing sacred??? Er what? But I'm glad that you cleared that up fir my Little Hawk, 'cause I'z like to bring lots of things in the house and have 'em as buddies. I git hundreds of rocks in my house. Iz just messin' in the garden and find one and we kinda get a little rock-bobert thing going and next thing it's on my nightstand. Now, I probably would have door nails to, except Iz not too sure what a door nail is? But I have 6 rail road spikes who are my friends. Does that count? Got 'em up on the mantle over the fireplace and I like to arrange them differently but I'm sure they get lonely so I keep a cat's skull with 'em so they'llm have something to grove with... Hey, I'm not messin' here. I really do have lots and lots of friends/pets that I've adopted. Drives the poor P-Vine nuts when I bring home my friends but so far she ain't left me over it....

And just 'cause a rock may not make a good conversationalist don't mean ya' can't talk to them. And they are not at all agressive. Yeah, I know someone is going to point out rock slides but, hey, that ain't their fault, dang it....

Now this is one heck of a thread. I've confesssed to seein' a UFO and to talking to rocks. Danged. Who delt this mess, anyway...

Bobert

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: leprechaun
Date: 01 Feb 03 - 06:50 PM

Well I have this theory about skateboards...

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Rustic Rebel
Date: 01 Feb 03 - 07:03 PM

Clinton- your right about the stone coming from the quarries there on Easter Island. I haven't done any reading on that in years but I thought I had remembered that was the controversy at the time. It still is a controversial subject with how they moved the statues-And true I admit our ancestors were a brilliant people, and I'm going to ruffle your feathers again, but just maybe they aquired some of that brilliancy from a wiser spiecies of people not from this world.
Also you are right -lines not runways. That came from some old stuff off the top of my head too, that they were called runways.
I still would be intrested to hear some input on deciphering the meaning of some of these biblical scriptures that no-one seems to want to get into. Is it fear of thinking I could be right?
I did do a search on the Islands and found this site and within it everything I mentioned-the Island, pyrimids and the Lines and even Eric Von Danikin who you had mentioned earlier Clinton, someone I have never heard about but I am going to check out what he has to say one of these days.
Easter Island mention-on unmuseum
Peace. Rustic

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Little Hawk
Date: 01 Feb 03 - 07:11 PM

Nice going there, Bobert. Rocks and stones are pretty independent and self-sufficient types, but it's no secret that some of them are looking for a good home...a place where they are both loved and respected. I feel deep shame when I think of all the rocks I busted on other rocks and threw into deep water when I was a kid. I mean, uncountable thousands of 'em! Probably hundreds of thousands. Maybe millions, even. Just like Dubya tossing little Iraquis around, I was...

God, the sins of my feckless youth! Well, I am nicer to rocks now. I think any rock that moves in with you is in for a nice experience, because you gotta be a nice guy to like railroad spikes. I picked up a few of those glass insulator things from telephone poles too...they are really neat! Found 'em beside the train line out by the woods.

Y'know, I really miss hearing the trains go by at night. There are very few of them now, and most of the rural branch lines have been shut down. What a shame. If I was in charge, I would've kept steam engines running just about forever, but I would've put smoke filters on 'em to keep the dirt under control.

I'm having my favourite drug now...Earl Grey tea...but have no lemons around, so I put honey in it. Not bad. They say Stonewall Jackson used to chew on lemons all the time, while pondering military strategy. I can relate to that. They clear the mind and sharpen perception.

Hmmmmm...enlightenment through lemons? Sounds like a whole new discipline. Maybe I should write a book about it.

- LH

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Clinton Hammond
Date: 01 Feb 03 - 07:21 PM

"maybe they aquired some of that brilliancy from a wiser spiecies of people not from this world"

Given all the good arguments against such a scenario, it's more likely they just figured 'em out on their own....


"Eric Von Danikin" is an unscientific flake, a crack-pot, and an idiot who gives speculation into things not easily explained a very bad name...

I'm out for a gig...

See ya's!

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Little Hawk
Date: 01 Feb 03 - 07:58 PM

Take a deep breath, Clinton. (when you get back from the gig) Sit down.

I agree that Eric Von Daniken is a flake. He's like a saxophone player who only knows one note, but man can he play that one note LOUD!!! He is an embarrassment to any serious UFO-ophile, in my opinion.

- LH

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Bobert
Date: 01 Feb 03 - 08:19 PM

Man. LH, I gotta agree with you about the trains. I used to live on Fulton Hill in Richmond, Va. and down in Fulton Bottom were the train yards. Well, a lot of folks don't appreciate train yards or even understand what goes on in 'em. But in a big city, that's where all the cars are sorted out for the next day. Some are empty that need to be pushed around the city to be filled and others are filled and need to be pushed around the city to where they will be emptied. Well, this work occurs at night. Yep, thetre is an entire nocternal population that does this every night. The use *yard engines* and push and pull cars and get 'em lined up so that during the day these same yard engines do their thing and get 'em all where they need to be.

Well, now there's something about the sound of these yard engines straining to push and pull tons and tons. And there's something about the sound of a car coupling. It is very exciting as tons meet tons and sometimnes when the train is going too fast, like 3 mph instead of 2.5 mph, there is a violent collison and it rocks the entire area. Like real cool.

One would think that this would be a terrible thying to get used to but it's very soothing. I lived up there for 8 years of my life with them trains crashing and banging all night long and never slept better. When I moved, I couldn't sleep well for weeks...

Something about trains. Yeah...

Bobert

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Little Hawk
Date: 01 Feb 03 - 08:25 PM

Righto. Those are "Yard Goats" or "Yard Bulls", those engines. There's a great HO set of a Yard Bull out now in the Zehr's grocery stores in Canada...only about $75 for a set that's worth easily $150 or more. The parts are all made by IHC, which makes excellent trains.

- LH

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: NicoleC
Date: 01 Feb 03 - 09:48 PM

RR, avoid the Von Daniken like the plague. First, he's a loonie. Second, using the phrase "von Daniken says" in any discussion automatically reduces your credibility to his... i.e. none to speak of.

To chime in with an opinion here, let me preface by saying I think the large body of circumstantial evidence and the liklihood of multiple sorts of intelligent species among the various universes at least makes it reasonably possible that aliens visited this planet and may even be doing so now. A key question is, "what do they want to get out of us?" What do we possibily have to offer in return? One non-scary hypothesis is that they are much like us, and are just curious.

But let us set aside for a moment space-going alien anthropologists.

Humans beings several thousand years ago are not physically different than human beings today, and this means that they were as intelligent as us. They had their own visionaries and geniuses, and understood their own technology and available resources FAR better than we do today.

People tend to gravitate to the alien theory because we like to assume that our ancestors were poor, stupid, inept primitives. (We also like to assume that there MUST be something more powerful than us out there, but that's another thesis.) And yet, we don't understand a fraction of their world and knowledge. If we don't understand their language and way of life, how can we presume to make definitive statements about their achievements?

But we'll go, "how did those stupid primitives do THIS" and point to something like the pyramids. The Egyptians could communicate quite well, I think they would tell us if an alien told them how to build a pyramid. In reality, any two year old making a pile of rocks grasps the engineering potential of a pyramid. Rocket science, it ain't.

Even presuming the lines of Nazca relate to flying and are not simply artwork -- how do we KNOW that they didn't have any concept of flying machines? They have bird, there, they must understand motion through the air. The ancient Greeks could conceive of flying, but those primitive native Americans could not? How do we even know they didn't succeed at flying? Truth is, we don't. I doubt that they did, personally, but modern aerospace engineers aren't sure how the Wright Brothers got in the air, and that was only a century ago.

When faced with a choice between hypothetical invisible aliens, and the resourcefulness of people who are as intelligent and thoughtful as we are today, I know which one seems more likely to me. As for pictures and drawings and fanciful stories -- that kind of creativity is what propels up to new inventions, and it certainly wasn't lacking in our ancestors and more than we lack it today. I went through a phase where I considered all the alien theories -- but finally, they simply don't seem anywhere near as likely as the fact that our ancestors were pretty bright people that were as adept at problem solving as we are today.

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Bobert
Date: 01 Feb 03 - 10:04 PM

Well, danged, LH. (Sniff) I feel like we've been trivialized with our sentimental feelings about trains as Nicole just shot right on over us as we were stopping by that spot on a snowy evening. Well, so what? Trains is cool and I like that set of m odels that they are offering up in your neighborhood. I got lots of models myself, but more trucks than trains.

Excuse me, gotta go. Was having a nice talk with a burled piece of tree that I've drug in the house and don't want to hurt its feeelings....

Bobert

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Little Hawk
Date: 01 Feb 03 - 10:05 PM

Good points, Nicole. The ancient people may very well have mastered some form of flight. They could easily have created hot air balloons of a large sort, for example, and observed the plains of Nazca from some considerable altitude, while tethered to the ground by lines. Why not? Anyone who figures out that hot air rises and who can sew a large silk bag and a simple gondola can do it. All it takes is the idea.

My own feeling is that we have BOTH been visited by space visitors from time to time AND have invented and created marvelous things entirely on our own at many other times.

Why should the one exclude the possibility of the other?

In other words, I have a high opinion of the capabilities of both humans and extraterrestrials when it comes right down to it.

It's annoying when someone like Von Daniken becomes a fanatic on his own pet theory, and tries to make everything that ever happened fit it and only it, but that's what people are often like when they become enamoured of an idea.

- LH

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: *daylia*
Date: 02 Feb 03 - 09:16 AM

But what if human beings ARE extra-terrestrials unwittingly disguised as earthlings? Hmmmmmmm???

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Rustic Rebel
Date: 02 Feb 03 - 12:02 PM

Well Nicole I didn't take your advice and I checked out the man. Von Daniken. And I have to take it back that I never heard of him. He wrote 'Chariots of the Gods' Yes, I have not only heard of him I saw his show on PBS a few years ago. I have to say this, my theory on gods=aliens is also his, so I do not find that to be crack-pot theory. I do suppose how-ever that the Bible could have been written by a bunch of science fiction writers!
Not only the Bible but the Siva Purana, Uranchia, and the tribe-Dogon (another controversy the Dogon tribe, that knew about star systems 700 years ago) all relate to the God=Alien theory.
Now way up on this thread I had also mentioned our Government having a plan for alien invasion. I (of coarse) could not find that on the internet, top-secret shit they keep from the public ya know, but I did find a page that I talked about that FEMA had put out to fire-fighter's. The book is called Fire Officer's guide to Disaster Control, and if you scroll down this page a bit, the chapter on what to do if there was an alien invasion, is posted.
Click here
The reason the government had to come up with some kind of plan was brought about by the radio program by Orson Wells- War of the Worlds. The way people freaked out when they heard this on the radio, the gov. thought they needed something.
Peace. Rustic

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Clinton Hammond
Date: 02 Feb 03 - 12:32 PM

" so I do not find that to be crack-pot theory"

Even Charls Manson managed to find people to agree with him... Anybody I've ever met with half an ounce of brain see's through EvD's work in about 2 minutes flat...

I mean you go right ahead and believe what theories you wanna, but don't be surprised when only other 'fringe' types even listen to ya...

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: leprechaun
Date: 02 Feb 03 - 12:49 PM

Well I think if you had a lot of people available, you could launch them into the sky, one at a time, with a primitive machine like a catapult. While they are at the top of their arc, they could observe what they see, and they would have a second or two to shout back down to the people on the ground, who could record those observations, and use them to build the Nazca. Sure, it would take a long time, and you'd have to have a lot of well trained volunteers, each of whom could only be used for one trip in the catapult. But what the heck, it was thousands of years ago, and all they had was time on their hands. So eventually the dang thing would get built.

Who's to say ancient people weren't skilled problem solvers?

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: *daylia*
Date: 02 Feb 03 - 01:13 PM

Well they had to be I guess - poor things didn't even have electricity or computers. Or TV!!! *GASP* How the heck did the species ever survive? ;-)

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Ebbie
Date: 02 Feb 03 - 02:08 PM

Rustic Rebel, your link leads straight to Charles Bahme's theories. His views have not been made official in any sense of the word.

Stop and think. If his Chapter 13 were official, do you really think it would be necessary to go into the history of UFO manifestations and sensationalist sightings? Why not just say that in the event of an unexplained incident with its concurrent potential for panic, the fire fighters are to do such and so?

I remember my parents talking about the brief panic that swept certain communities in the War of the Worlds radio broadcast, (A neighbor of theirs left her home and ran through the streets screaming)so obviously the potential for harm is there. I should think that any 'manual' would address that in a more direct fashion than is given in Bahme's book.

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Rustic Rebel
Date: 02 Feb 03 - 03:07 PM

Ebbie- I heard a reference to the Fire-man's guide on a progam I watched on the history channel. In doing a quick search I came up with that one. It may not be the official FEMA book then.
Clinton-Do you really think I care if people believe my theory or not? Like I said earlier, "I am not trying to convert anyone" If I cared, I probably wouldn't have even started this thread! "To each his/her own"
I just think the idea is plausible. And I am not saying our ancestors were of caveman intellect(except the cavemen themselves),I just say maybe SOME ideas come from other places un-known-to this-world!
Damn I'm feeling ganged up on here when I only wanted to discuss biblical scripture. I do respect all of you and your views though, and I am never to old to learn something new from them!(except maybe that train thing that was going on-reminded me of a song-'my old man is so insane-he thinks he's a freight train!)
peace.Rustic

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Penny S.
Date: 02 Feb 03 - 03:36 PM

1. Gaining aerial views. Two weeks ago my class was sketching chairs. The children sat or lay on the floor. The chairs stood on the floor, and I made sure that they were usually not straight on to the chair. One boy produced an accurate plan view straight onof his chair. (Which, when I asked him to draw again, what he could see, he rubbed out!) There's a wood in Kent called Harp Wood, because it is harp shaped. No nearby high spot for a view from above. Humans can do the aerial view trick without going up there at all. Men tend to be better than women, apparently, but we can all do it with practice.
2. Discussion of recorded gods being aliens ignores continuing religious experiences in the absence of any aliens. This is something else available to humans who pray or meditate, or engage in group acts of worship. I'm not sure how general it is, as churches etc leave a lot of people cold. So cold that they don't get it in any sort of religion. But where it occurs, it doesn't need aliens. Bibles, etc, attempt to make sense of these experiences, and make them available to others.
3. Archaeology now reads very small bits of evidence - today I have seen microscopic iron beads used to show that Tudor armourers used welding techniques. Aliens working with our ancestors on major projects would have left something behind - paint spalls off their craft, lubricating oil, minor bones from alien food items, or odd seeds or pollen in waste matter. They would have had to be fantastically careful not to leave anything. Attempts to remove traces would have left their own remains. No-one's reported anything that could be interpreted that way. And someone would have done just that, if there were anything to be reported.

Penny

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Penny S.
Date: 02 Feb 03 - 03:50 PM

Oh yes, and if it is not scary that aliens may be like us... just curious... that's what we are like, is it? We aren't just curious. We like lots of other behaviours, as well. Imperialism, colonialism, terrorism, exploitation, slavery, torture, - need I go on?
And we've already told them we're here...

Penny

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: GUEST,alinact
Date: 02 Feb 03 - 04:13 PM

Rustic

I admire you for having the courage of your convictions and laying them out here.

I believe the bible is a book that should be used when studying the history of "the middle east" during the period 500BCE and (for want of a figure) 50-100CE. There is no doubt the bible contains factual material of the people, places and events of those times; there probably was a bloke named Jesus wandering around who had the ability to convince people that his "agenda" was the way to go (dare I say it - Adolph Hitler had similar abilities). But, as others have said above, the book itself has been translated and interpreted so many times, the "mystical" side needs to be taken with not just a grain of salt, but more with a "pillar" of salt.

Now, if you want to "theorise" about what actually happened, have a read of the books by Immanuel Velikovsky (Earth in Upheaval, Worlds in Collision, etc.). These books were written back in the 1950's and 99% of the worlds scientists dismissed his theories as preposterous and that he was just another crackpot. The difference with IV is that, thanks to the space programme, some, and I repeat SOME, of his outlandish predictions have now been proven correct.

Allan.

Just a note to Glypton - yes, unfortunately there are many recorded instances of people dying from eating oysters that are "off".

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Donuel
Date: 02 Feb 03 - 05:54 PM

What are UFO's?
http://www.angelfire.com/md2/customviolins/abduction1.html

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: GUEST
Date: 02 Feb 03 - 06:08 PM

Little Hawk.

Please explain how stones are alve.

Thank you.

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Rustic Rebel
Date: 02 Feb 03 - 08:08 PM

Donual-that is pretty ggod.
Penny-interesting technique you have with showing ariel perception.
I used to study the Bible not for what it taught religiously, but more for the history. I was even out to de-bunk it in a way, because of all the contradictions you can find in it. And through doing this I read over and over about 'God' coming in a cloud or leaving in fire etc.. and truthfully it all seemed to connect to some type of alien craft and alien intervention.
As for finding clues all I can say is there is a new discovery every day. We just had the new discovery, the dinosaur with wings, which will take us to a whole new level of the evolution theory. Human remains that are thousands of years older than any biblical reference and we keep digging up more all the time.
So who knows? There may come a day!
I keep wracking my brain trying to remember where it was that they found petroglyphs that resembled space men. They were in some sort of suit and helmet carved into a cave wall. Does anyone remember this?
Right on Allan-thanks and I will check into that book, it sounds interesting.
Peace. Rustic

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: MMario
Date: 02 Feb 03 - 09:05 PM

I've seen representations of the glyphs - what they remind me of mostly is the figures kids draw when they are first beginning to try to go from pure stick figures to more lifelike representations

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Little Hawk
Date: 02 Feb 03 - 09:51 PM

Well, for God's sake...I just typed out a lengthy reply to GUEST, and sent it...and it vanished.

(Groan)

This happens often enough that it's getting VERY annoying.

Well, here is a part of it that I can paste in...

It is accurate to say that there is a life force in all things, and that it is an intelligent, purposeful force. Therefore in that sense all things are alive, down to the molecular and the atomic level. This doesn't mean that all things are conscious of having an individual identity or a measure of free will, but that they are invested with a life force that defines and forms them in the first place, that is all.

Inert things like rocks, water, and air basically are unconscious, have no form of individual awareness, and cannot act according to free will. Plants and some simple "animals" are conscious, but cannot act freely. They can only grow...and react in a passive manner to an exterior factor. Some are on the cusp, and have a very limited form of action, like a fly-trapping plant or a "sensitive" plant that moves its leaves away when you touch it. More complex things can both act and react with great facility, and have a good deal of free will. They think and act on those thoughts. Animals are of that type, as are insects, etc. The simpler ones have less individual freedom of will, and tend to act more as a collective or in an instinctive manner. Truly sentient beings can act, react, and think independently...and they can even think ABOUT the process of thinking itself! They can theorize alternative realities and intuit new concepts that have not yet been actualized, but may be at some point. They are not just doers, but CREATORS.

That describes the more highly evolved human being.

The less evolved human being is closer to an animal. He acts on basic vital drives and believes either in a very primitive religion or in nothing spiritual whatsoever. The primitive believer and the primitive non-believer (materialist) are natural opponents, because they bear the same distinguishing mark, that of the beast...driven by desire, passion, hunger, fear, attachment, and ego. They each see their own ignorance reflected in the other, and they despise it.

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: GUEST,Cluin (at girlfriend's)
Date: 02 Feb 03 - 10:03 PM

Well, the only one I'm really empirically sure is alive is me. The rest of the universe exists within in my perception.

And once again, that Shakespeare guy who exists within my perception was right... It's all a dream, man!

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Clinton Hammond
Date: 02 Feb 03 - 10:07 PM

*in my best Merlin voice"

A dream to some...

A NIGHTMARE TO OTHERS!!!!!!!!!!!

LOL

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Little Hawk
Date: 02 Feb 03 - 10:31 PM

Cluin - That's an interesting philosophical view expressed in a number of religious traditions...that this existence is a dream. It's one way of looking at it. The North American Indians and the East Indian traditions both tend to take that viewpoint.

As dreams go, though, it's very tactile, and it's very slow to change and hard to wake up out of, isn't it? :-)

I had a dream the other day of waking up from a dream, and then some other stuff occurred, and then I really did wake up! I think....

Dreams within dreams within dreams...

(play that spooky music...)

- LH

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Rustic Rebel
Date: 03 Feb 03 - 03:08 PM

Any one heard of the JANAP reports? This is a report to be filed to the Gov. in a ufo siting. JANAP report
Also another report to be filled out is- called a SEPRA report-SEPRA
And another interesting page is the Brookings Report dealing with NASA ans SETI on ufo's.
Little Hawk- you should like this one from the enterprise mission!

LH- I've had dreams like that also- a dream in a dream. Strange feeling they leave me and they are usually very vivid when I have dreams like that.

One more thing I would like to bring up is why our Governments think they have to keep all of the -UFO- information away from people.Do they think we are complete idiots or what? They think we are going to freak out if they told us the truth and showed us all the photo's and information they have? I for one think we could handle it.
I saw a film from NASA once where they shot a missle out at a UFO from space, and it showed the ufo coming in, the missle going off and the ufo just turning around and flying out of site. Now why are they trying to do this is another question. Now NASA cuts all ufo's out of there films.
I personally think this is an outrage. Was the Star Wars (Reagan's) program actually set up fot just this purpose?
Peace. Rustic

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Clinton Hammond
Date: 03 Feb 03 - 03:17 PM

NASA doesn't have missles!

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Rustic Rebel
Date: 03 Feb 03 - 03:29 PM

Damn Clinton, I'm glad your here to keep me in line!
a NASA film our governments missles. StarWars
Peace. Rustic

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Clinton Hammond
Date: 03 Feb 03 - 03:34 PM

Oh... star wars... the orbital missle platforms THAT WERE NEVER BUILT?!?!?!?!

You'd have better luck and be more credible if you were talking about the movie...

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Little Hawk
Date: 03 Feb 03 - 05:41 PM

Rustic - For some interesting and quite serious material on that matter, look up "Disclosure Project".

disclosureproject.org

For those who prefer having their heads in the sand, don't bother. You wouldn't be inclined to even half consider such info, unless it came from the State Department, I suppose (your version of big "mummy" and big "daddy", who can always be trusted to tell the truth).

- LH

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Clinton Hammond
Date: 03 Feb 03 - 09:21 PM

The Disclosure Project???

You may as well get your "Facts" from The Weekly World News...

Got any credible sources???

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: *daylia*
Date: 03 Feb 03 - 09:46 PM

Does such a thing as a 'credible source' exist for a subject like UFO's?
Expecially for the incredulous? Just wondering ...

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Clinton Hammond
Date: 03 Feb 03 - 10:50 PM

Travis Walton MIGHT be a good guy to ask...

Might...

,-)

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Rustic Rebel
Date: 03 Feb 03 - 11:11 PM

I'll tell you what Clinton- I didn't just make it up that I saw this film. Our Government has something out there that shot a missle at the UFO. It will take me some research and memory as to where I saw this but it was a real film and very convincing if it was a fake. One thing I have noticed about you Clinton- your still coming into this thread for some reason. Come on Clinton what is it that you believe about UFO's that keeps bringing you here?

Now here's a theory just for you Clinton-
Redheads have been branded on every planet in the system. They have been mutated by solar radiation acting upon the excessive sugars and sex hormones in their bodies.(Ha!)
In Central America, South America and Mexico, there are prevailing myths about a race of redheaded caucasians who appeared thousands of years ago and conquered tribe after tribe with benevolent magic.
The Incas, Aztecs and Mayas attribute the development of their highly advanced civilization to the 'Red Beards'
The pyramids and other massive New World masonaries were built by these demi-gods.
The Red-beards legend extends into Oceania as well. The great stone heads of Easter Island were said to be portraits of those same carrot-tops.
The Red-Beards had extraordinary abilities. They were masters of pyramid power,an incredibly effective harnessing of natural energies, so complex modern science hasn't begun to understand it.
Could it be these RedBeards were extraterrestrials?
Peace Rustic
P.S. These excerpts on RedBeards were provided by the beloved Tom Robbins, from his book 'Still Life With Woodpecker', to which he delves into the problem with redheads!

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Rustic Rebel
Date: 03 Feb 03 - 11:16 PM

I cannot resist adding this here also- Ode To Redheads
By Tom Robbins

How are we to explain the power these daughters of ancient Henna have over us bemused sons of Eros?

Red hair is a woman's game.

The harsh truth is, most red-haired men look like blonds who've spoiled from lack of refrigeration. They look like brown-haired men who've been composted. Yet that same pigmentation that on a man can resemble leaf mold or junk yard rust, a woman wears like a tiara of rubies.

Not only are female redheads frequently lovely but theirs is a loveliness that suggests both lust and danger, pleasure and violence, and is, therefore, to the male of the species virtually irresistible. Red O red were the tresses of the original femme fatale.
Of course, much of the "fatale" associated with redheads is illusory, a stereotypical projection on the part of sexually neurotic men. Plenty of redheads are as demure as rosebuds and as sweet as strawberry pie. However, the mere fact that they are perceived to be stormy, if not malicious, grants them a certain license and a certain power. It's as if bitchiness is their birthright. By virtue of their coloration, they possess an innate permit to be terrible and lascivious, which, even if never exercised, sets them apart from the remainder of womankind, who have traditionally been expected to be mild and pure.

Now that women are demolishing those old misogynistic expectations, will redheads lose their special magic, will Pippi Longstocking come to be regarded as just one of the girls? Hardly. To believe that blondes and brunettes are simply redheads in repressive drag is to believe that UFOs are kiddie balloons. All redheads, you see, are mutants.

Whether they spring from genes disarranged by earthly forces or are "planted" here by overlords from outer space is a matter for scholarly debate. It's enough for us to recognize that redheads are abnormal beings, bioelectrically connected to realms of strange power, rage, risk and ecstasy.

What is your mission among us, you daughters of ancient Henna, you agents of the harvest moon? Are those star maps that your freckles replicate? How do you explain the fact that you live longer than the average human? Where did you get such sensitive skin? And why are your curls the same shade as heartbreak?

Alas, inquiry is futile: Either they don't know or they won't say -- and who has the nerve to pressure a redhead? We may never learn their origin or meaning, but it probably doesn't matter. We will go on leaping out of our frying pans into their fire, grateful for the opportunity to be titillated by their vengeful fury, real or imagined, and to occasionally test our erotic mettle in the legendary inferno of their passion.

Redheaded women! Those blood oranges! Those cherry bombs! Those celestial shrews and queens of copper! May they never cease to stain our white-bread lives with super-natural catsup

Peace. Rustic
P.S. Tom Robbins is coming out with a new novel in April!! Villa Incognito. I can't wait!

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Keith A of Hertford
Date: 04 Feb 03 - 06:04 AM

Rustic, I think I know the film you are remembering. It is footage taken in orbit, and in the background are some intrigueing moving points of light. One of them is seen to shoot something fast towards another one. The 'missile' flies dead straight and is clearly unguided. The other ufo moves out of it's path.
Hard to explain as space junk, but also not what you would expect from advanced aliens. Just another unexplained observation.
Keith.

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: TIA
Date: 04 Feb 03 - 09:23 AM

1) When considering the possibilty of extraterrestrial visitors to earth, it is always helpful to remember the (to humans) unimaginable distances between astronomical features. The nearest star (Proxima Centauri) is 0.4 light years away -- the light that we observe from that star left the star over five months ago (and remember light travels darn fast in a vacuum and there are serious physical problems with any living thing accelerating and deccelerating to and from light speed...think Challenger and multiply by a gazillion). The nearest galaxy to our own is 2,199,506 light years away. If humans were to attempt this journey (even at light speed - see above) we would actually evolve on the way (our ancestors were probably upright but quite ape-like 2 million years ago).

2) Hate to repeat myself in a thread, but Penny S. nailed it above -- archaeologist routinely recover and analyze evidence as inconsequential as individual fibers, pollen grains, etc... The chances of alien spacecraft and aliens visiting our ancestors, and interacting with them sufficiently to teach them to build the ancient wonders without leaving a single shred (speck, mote, particle...) of physical evidence is far-far-fetched.

3) Remember that skeptic is not a synonym of cynic.

4) On the nature of science...of course former scientifc "knowledge" has been disproven - that's the whole point. I forget whom I'm quoting, but scientifc theories are born scorned, some gain acceptance, but die disproven. That's the way it works. The whole idea is that ALL knowledge is open to testing and disproof. Yes, Carl Sagan was human, with human frailties, but as a scientist, he tried very hard to recognize those frailties and avoid letting them affect his conclusions. He almost certainly was not 100% effective at this, but he recognized the problem. The most anti-scientific attitude is absolute certainty. Doubt must be maintained. Skepticism is required to do science.

5) Extraterrestrial life is almost certainly out there somewhere. I hope to live long enough to see the evidence of it detected. It will be the most amazing scientific discovery ever. But if life does exist, but resides millions of light years away, I will probably not make it.

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Keith A of Hertford
Date: 04 Feb 03 - 09:51 AM

Worse than that.   4.0 not 0.4 light years to Proxima Centauri.

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: TIA
Date: 04 Feb 03 - 10:04 AM

Oops, my bad, thank you.

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Clinton Hammond
Date: 04 Feb 03 - 01:18 PM

"Could it be these RedBeards were extraterrestrials?"

Anything's possible... but the lack of ANY evidence supporting the ET theory makes it HIGHLY unlikely... (Ask a cop... there's NOTHING more unreliable than "eyewitness testimony")

What do I believe about UFO's? Well, kinda like Mulder's poster says I Want To Believe... or maybe "I'd LIKE To Believe" says it better...

There are a couple of odd things that I've read about... experiences that make me go "Hummmmm?", like Travis Walton's case for example...

But on the whole, I think the UFO Phenomenon is fuelled by delusion, misunderstanding, and hoax... There are simply too many rational explanations AGAINST UFO's to make belief in them reliable... (See TIA's post fopr just a basic few...) Seems like an awful long way to go, to cram a chrome dildo up Cleatuse's backside...

Am I prepared to change my opinion in the light of new evidence?? Abso-frigg'n-lootly!

Remember that universe I mentioned a few million threads ago, with the FTL travel and such.. I'd REALLY love to live in that place... (o.k... minus the anal probing I suppose...) But no matter how much I wish, it ain't gonna make it so...

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Cluin
Date: 04 Feb 03 - 02:23 PM

Not unless you were Billy Mumy from that old Twilight Zone episode... But then he did end up travelling in space with his modular family, a neurotic cyborg and an old fag. If he'd done it a couple of years later, they would have formed a pop group.

You see where this kind of stuff can lead if you're not careful?

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Clinton Hammond
Date: 04 Feb 03 - 02:24 PM

"his modular family, a neurotic cyborg and an old fag"

LOL!!

Hey... didn't you and I used to be IN that band????

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Little Hawk
Date: 04 Feb 03 - 02:35 PM

Clinton - You use the term "credible sources". Those could be:

For a loyal Nazi in 1944 - Hitler, Goebbels, and the official government line.

For a loyal Republican in 1956 - Joe McCarthy

For a loyal Japanese in 1944 - the Emperor and his commanding officer.

For a loyal British soldier in 1776 - The British Crown.

For a loyal Al-Queda soldier - Osama Bin Laden

For the little old lady across the street who plays Bingo daily and knows practically nothing about anything - The Weekly World News

For Clinton Hammond - anyone in an official position in government or science or the press or whatever who already doesn't believe in extraterrestrial visitors to this planet.

For someone who has actually seen those visitors or their craft - anyone who does believe in them and has some kind of personal anecdotal or reasonably well documented information to support that belief, and who appears to be normal and trustworthy.

Follow me?

Your use of the term "credible" is arbitrary.

Your beliefs are based on prejudice, not experience. Mine are based on an actual experience, which you don't know anything about and are in no position to cast judgement upon. None whatsoever. I know that like most people you are fond of your own version of reality, and will defend it...but belief in the non-existence of something that someone else has actually seen and you have not strikes the someone who has actually seen it as very stupid...to say the least.

It's a form of wishful thinking on your part, because you like reality to remain the way you already think it is, and no exceptions to that. It's the willful maintenance of conventional ignorance as a function of habit.

You say you are prepared to change your opinion in the light of new evidence. I don't think that's really true, unless that evidence were to come from certain specific sources...the official ones at the top. If it is already the case that those official sources, for their own vital reasons, are deliberately suppressing and debunking all such evidence, then that is not going to happen. That's convenient for you, Clinton, because it means you will never have to shift off dead center till hell freezes over or the system as we know it collapses around us. You're a good, loyal soldier, Clinton, who can be depended upon to echo the party line. That's my opinion.

The party is generally in the business of lying to the people while it pursues its own private agendas. Those agendas are at the expense of humanity and in suppression of the truth about a great many things, not just UFO's.

- LH

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Clinton Hammond
Date: 04 Feb 03 - 02:43 PM

"Mine are based on an actual experience"

What you've 'eperienced' on your glue trips is of very little consequence to me... Anybody dumb enough to say that stones are alive and mean it, needs to have their head examined...

Accurate to say there's a life force in all things??

No... no it's not... It's new age spiritual codswallop

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: BuckMulligan
Date: 04 Feb 03 - 02:56 PM

skepticism and empiricism have fallen victim to "cultural relativism" and the 60s-generated egalitarian movement that made the mistake of assuming "equality" means that "my reality is as valid as your reality" ("reality is perception.") Which is great for everyone's self-esteem, but isn't going to come up with a model of the way the world works that will allow us to really understand it and make progress towards making anything better.

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Wolfgang
Date: 04 Feb 03 - 02:58 PM

Your beliefs are based on prejudice, not experience. Mine are based on an actual experience, which you don't know anything about and are in no position to cast judgement upon. None whatsoever.

As if it had never happened yet that reported experiences have been found to be wrong. Lucid dreams, hallucinations, wrong memories, outright lies, wrong interpretation of a valid percept, failure of reality monitoring,... Of course, someone who has not had a particular experience can be in a position to cast judgement upon it. Or at least an educated guess.

Wolfgang

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Clinton Hammond
Date: 04 Feb 03 - 03:01 PM

As I mentioned elsewhere... ask ANY cop/detective... he'll tell you there's NOTHING more unreliable than "Eye-witness testimony"

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: TIA
Date: 04 Feb 03 - 03:18 PM

Personal revelation and experience and anecdote can be valid, instructive, inspiring, and a grand basis for spiritual beliefs or faith... but they hold zero scientific water. Scientifc evidence must be reproducable, and entirely independent of the observer. So far, as a matter largely of faith, but partially of statistics (life exists at one known place in the universe, the laws of physics seem to hold true throughout the universe, the universe is immense, therefore it is likely it exists elsewhere) I believe in extraterrestrial life. But there is not yet any reproduceable, physical (i.e. independant of observer) evidence that they have made it here.

Also, remember Occam's Razor...There are myriad natural and technological sources for lights or unusual objects in the sky, odd mental images, and even physical sensations - all well known and all far less likely to violate current knowledge of physical laws than alien visitation. The simplest explanation is most likely to be correct. The explanation with the fewest requirements for unknown forces is most likely to be correct.
As a skeptic who admires the wonder and surprise of this poorly understood universe, I always eagerly await the next scientific evidence that will completely upset current theories.

Science is damn good fun.

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Cluin
Date: 04 Feb 03 - 03:45 PM

It's not Little Hawk's assertion that rocks are alive that troubles me. I'm an unapologetic animist myself.

But I am worried by his many proclamations that William Shatner is a genius.

Come back to the light, Little Hawk!

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Rustic Rebel
Date: 04 Feb 03 - 04:18 PM

Like I posted somewhere-I believe rocks are alive also. They are made up of energy- everything is energy, rocks being a dense form of those atoms that are energy. I'm going to go a step further and say-Yes I believe rocks have a consciousness. I believe everything does. Everything you see, is God to me. All that is, is God. So if I say rocks don't have a conciousness I am saying God doesn't either. That is my opinion on that.

Thank-you Keith. I am glad I'm not the only one that saw that film. It was pretty convincing to me.

Another theory to ponder-What if these space ships actually come from here? Like us from the future into the past. Now that is a trippy thought. Sounds like I'm getting into Spaw's time cube thing!

Clinton- I'm going to go check out Travis Walton right now. Never heard of him either.

One more opinion- I think Clinton and Little Hawk should kiss and make up! We all have our part in this huge play of life and diversity is what makes us all so interesting.
Peace. Rustic

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Little Hawk
Date: 04 Feb 03 - 04:47 PM

"Educated guess"?

Yes. I'll go along with that, Wolfgang. That's exactly what Clinton's opinion is, it's an educated guess, as is mine. That's what most people's opinions are.

Is it so hard to imagine that atomic structures are in some way alive, and that therefore there is a life force in all things? Does "life" have to mean biological life? Or can there be other forms of life?

It all depends on words, people. There is no practical difference whatsoever in how Clinton and I see or deal with a rock. None. There is just a difference in what we mentally conceive of when we use the words "alive" or "life" as to exactly how we define that concept.

I never said, Clinton, that a rock has consciousness, awareness, free will, muscles, blood, or that it is born, grows, or dies. Did I?

If your definition of life does not extend to looking beyond such very obvious outward phenomena that even a child can easily observe then of course a rock is not "alive"...in your terms. Nor is a spirit. Nor is a thought. Nor is a concept. Hence you can easily dismiss all possibility of spiritual life, as well as a life force existing in atomic structures, I suppose.

We are arguing about words, period, and are both of us are equally inclined to be rational, and there is no one around here sniffing glue.

And there is something far more unreliable than eyewitness testimony...no witness at all. That's the position you are in at the moment regarding certain things you choose to believe are impossible or nonexistant...because you don't know about them yet, haven't encountered them, and are merely repeating something you've heard someone else say...which is exactly what most of humanity does most of the time.

- LH

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: wilco
Date: 04 Feb 03 - 05:00 PM

This discussion depends upon some pretty radical assumptions. The first is that humans are something other than another animal. The second is trying to give historical credibility to the Hebrew oral history, which had it's own socio-political agenda. It's like trying to reconcile the possibility of ghosts with the Eygyptian Book of the Dead.

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Little Hawk
Date: 04 Feb 03 - 05:15 PM

The Hebrew oral history? Please elaborate on that, wilco.

Here are possibilities to suggest that humans are something other than another animal:

Humans build and create a vast number of artificial things, many of which they do not actually need, but simply enjoy or find interesting or make a profit from. Some animals create a single thing...like a nest...which they do need. I see a key difference right there.

Humans worry constantly about possible future events that they make up in their minds (the majority of which never happen). I don't believe animals do that...they live much more in the moment.

Humans can think about the thinking process itself, and may discuss it at great length. I don't think animals do that at all.

I may be wrong. So may you. So, what is so radical about suggesting that humans are not just another animal, unless all you can see when you look at a human is bones, soft tissue, and a biological structure. Yes, we have animal bodies, but we do other behavioural and mental things that are strikingly unlike the behaviour of animals.

- LH

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: TIA
Date: 04 Feb 03 - 05:19 PM

Little Hawk is correct about the lack of eyewitnesses case.

The absence of evidence is not the evidence of absence.

(this is the old "can't prove the negative")

I propose that a skeptic is generally a person who does not believe in un-eyewitnessed phenomena until evidence is offered.

Believers may be inclined to believe even without evidence.

Neither is "right" or "correct" while the jury is still out (i.e. when there is no evidence).

Hopefully, when evidence appears, both the skeptic and the believer will evaluate it critically and honestly and adapt their beliefs acdcordingly. One who does not do this is a bigot. One who does will occasionally eat crow, but emerge far wiser and with greater credibility.

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Little Hawk
Date: 04 Feb 03 - 05:32 PM

Very well said, TIA. You have covered both bases accurately.

All I would really ask of anyone is to consider the possibility that there is a life force in atoms, and the possibility that there have been visitations by UFO's seen by some people. If they are willing to consider it, then they are not bigots.

I would think that a "new" (to someone) idea would arouse some curiosity or interest in people, not hostility and contempt...but I am often disappointed in that expectation.

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Rustic Rebel
Date: 04 Feb 03 - 05:46 PM

Clinton I'm trying to figure you out. Your reference to Travis Walton has me confused. Travis Walton claims to be an abductee. Missing 5 days in a Ufo. So I ask, were you being cynical or do you believe his story?
Little Hawk- You have brought us to another interesting site. I am going to post a link here on military nuclear specialists that have come forward with what they have seen UFO's do. What intrested me on this was one of them describes the film I was talking about earlier about shooting the missle at a UFO.click here
This will also bring you to the disclosure project.
If you check out the disclosure project there is an interesting thing going on. Check out the George Noony show, transcripts with Dr. Steven Greer. Founder and director of the disclosure project and founder and international director of CSETI-center for the study of extraterrestrial intelligence.
The last excerpt from this discussion went like this-Remember UFO's run on energy and propulsion systems that would replace the need for oil and gas. So the security has been mostly out of greed, not out of security.
Peace. Rustic

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Little Hawk
Date: 04 Feb 03 - 08:31 PM

Not just oil and gas, Rustic. No need for nuclear either. No need for energy companies, no need for hydro plants, no need for a whole bunch of major players who stand to lose their preeminent postion in the financial hierarchy. And no need for wars on this planet or a huge military budget. And no need for poverty.

There never was any need for poverty, actually, but certain people found it convenient to maintain it through gross inequality, and have done so with great resolve.

UFO's are no threat to humanity, in my opinion, but they are a massive threat to the social sytems which oppress humanity. They're a threat to the status quo.

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: GUEST
Date: 04 Feb 03 - 08:51 PM

For what it's worth...I read a while back that the 'alien abduction personality' is one of the personalities programmed into all MKUltra victims. The U.S. brainwashing program. The CIA is responsible for the tens of thousands of missing kids each year in the U.S. (and no telling how many around the world), and the kids are traumatized in order to create fragmented personalities. The personalities are then assigned different trigger phrases the kid's handler can employ at any time to activate the various personalities trained in prostitution, assassination, drug muling, etc. And a personality compartment is always reserved for the 'alien abduction' scenario...in case the subject needs to be discredited. If the subject is about to reveal sensitive information, just trigger the 'abduction' story, and no one will believe anything to come out of his or her mouth after that.

MKUltra is interesting. The U.S. govt imported the Nazi death camp scientists in 1947 and allowed them to continue their torture experiments, since they were aimed at an end result which would be beneficial to the country which controlled it...mind control.

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: SINSULL
Date: 04 Feb 03 - 09:02 PM

"Another theory I have is on the 'Immaculate Conception'
The alien Gabriel must have artificially inseminated Mary. How else do you explain a virgin that is pregnant?"

First, Immaculate Conception refers to the belief that Mary was born without Original Sin.
Second, given a choice between virgin impregnation and stoning, why would a young girl not claim that she was a pregnent virgin and the mother of the Messiah?

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Little Hawk
Date: 04 Feb 03 - 09:03 PM

Nice seein' you drop in on this thread, GUEST. The West and the Soviets really had to scramble to each get their fair share of all that Nazi expertise in 1945, didn't they?

Have you checked out that other site Carol posted yet? Lots of interesting info there. Disclosureproject.org is pretty neat too.

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: GUEST
Date: 05 Feb 03 - 01:49 AM

Yeah, there was quite a dispute over the Nazi brain-trust after WW2. The Americans got most of the doctors in exchange for giving the Russians most of the territory. And the Russians continued to use THEIR Nazi personnel as bureaucrats in East Germany after the war. That's why the Germans hate Americans. Especially East Germans. We left them under the rule of the Nazis after the war. And the Stasi grew out of that...the East German secret police. Like-minded kinfolk of the 'scientists' brought to this country. America got the death-camp 'doctors' and allowed them to continue their experiments.

The experiments centered around personality fragmentation...how much can a human take before 'breaking', and what exactly IS breaking. Turns out the doctors discovered a process for creating new personalities. Works especially well with kids...the younger the better. Adults know life usually goes on after a rape, but what does a three-year old think? With no concept of life beyond the horror of the moment, the kid's mind creates a new identity compartment in which to store the horrific event. And when that new identity is created, the torturer can train it to assassinate, to spy, to seduce, to carry drugs in it's bodily cavities, etc, and then call it back at will. And that's what grew out of the CIA bringing the death camp doctors to the U.S. in 1947. The project was called MKUltra for a while, but they keep changing the names of the really ugly stuff. Sirhan Sirhan, Hinkley...probably MKUltra, or Monarch.

And as for the ones left in Germany...do you people realize how INTENSELY the Germans hate America for leaving the Nazis in their positions of power in East Germany? The Stasi...they are what we are soon going to be seeing in the U.S. It is now legal to torture in the U.S., if the President or any of his designees authorizes it. Or so they claim. And I recall one description of a Stasi 'session'. Don't read any further if you're squeamish. The man was strapped to a chair, his eyelids were cut off, then the top of his skull was carefully removed. He was then placed in front of a mirror so he had to watch as his 'questioners' prodded his brain with needles, and as his brain short-circuited, he had to watch himself babble in baby talk and recite old school lessons, and so on. The East Germans were subjected to that for so long they quit breeding. They preferred national suicide to that kind of existence. Their birth rate dropped to zero, and continuing mortality put them into negative growth. And they blamed the U.S.

And now we have our own Stasi because of the new Homeland Security Act. WE NOW HAVE A NATIONAL POLICE WITH A LICENSE TO KILL...ACCOUNTABLE TO NO ONE! I fear you people don't know how bad the situation is. We're stumbling around in our little garden here and there are MASSIVE lions crouched in the weeds. Their eyes are fixed on us and every time we stumble closer their muscles harden a bit more. And they're nearly ready to pounce. One more 'terrorist attack' and that's it. The concentration camps are built and the U.N. troops will start popping up to 'assist' our new Gestapo during our 'crisis'. And the ex-Stasi troops will be among the kinder ones. To them it's just business...but it won't be to the ones who REALLY hate us...the third-worlders we've scoffed at for decades. If you are LUCKY you'll get off with a little brain poking. So you'd better get ready. If they don't speak English at that checkpoint (ski masks are everywhere now so racial features will be masked in the upcoming overthrow), so ask some questions at that checkpoint, and if they don't speak English, start shooting. If you have no gun, use your car to run them down. And when they come at you with hollow-point needles, answer them with hollow-point bullets. Sure you'll die, but YOU'RE GOING TO DIE ANYWAY. All of us are already on lists...either 'good', 'bad' or 'unknown'...so very few will make it past the checkpoints. And even if you survive the checkpoint today, what about tomorrow? Did your neighbor TURN YOU IN for something? What a way to live. This is it, folks. GWBush just announced a whole new 'regimen' of vaccines we'll be expected to take, and they are all poison. All of them. There are 300 weaponized strains of anthrax, and our anthrax 'vaccine' protects against 7. It's a joke. The Air Force pilots know it and half of them are quitting rather than take the crap. 40,000+ military have died from those shots since the Gulf War 12 years ago. And ask the Brits about the MMR shots. The hordes are about to come kicking through our doors, with needles and guns and a desire to plunder and kill, so you'd better leave none of them standing. Just THINK about what your leaders have done to you and all those you care about BY DESIGN, and let your rage pour out. It's either that or death in a concentration camp. And if enough people refuse to go along with the program, or strike back...who knows? CAN the 200 people who run the global crime syndicate subjugate America just because they've bought off the politicians? I don't think so. I think we have enough fortitude to do what's right once we see the choice openly.

And I guess some will think this diatribe is right in place on a UFO thread. No disrespect intended, Rustic...it isn't that I DISBELIEVE in UFOs, but it's just hard to contemplate what I CAN'T see when what I CAN see is so horrible.

End of sermon.

(Someone christened me 'The Sermonator' on another forum once. Maybe I should use it here)

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: TIA
Date: 05 Feb 03 - 12:16 PM

Before I click through all those links, is any of the evidence physical (e.g. artifacts of non-terrestrial material, artifacts that have been found in-situ but are "out-of-place" technologically, etc..)?

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Rustic Rebel
Date: 05 Feb 03 - 03:39 PM

This stuff is not my entire life, but I sure have been inundated with it the last few days!

Sinsull-Thank you!! I get it more clearly now. It was Mary's mother that was implanted with the seed! Mary was the alien seed making her free from original sin. Then when she was implanted with another 'pure' seed, well then you have Jesus.
Or looking at it from another perspective- Mary was the 'pure-race' seed and just because of the supposed purity in her, it just made her a virgin of 'no sin'.
Sinsull you have made a believer out of me! see what I said earlier I am not to old to learn! And now I understand the connection with Mary and the church better. I will add this for you to read, and see if you get out of it what I did....


it is evident and notorious notorious that she was pure from eternity, exempt from every defect (Typicon S. Sabae);
she was formed without any stain (St. Proclus, "Laudatio in S. Dei Gen. ort.", I, 3);
she was created in a condition more sublime and glorious than all other natures (Theodorus of Jerusalem in Mansi, XII, 1140);
when the Virgin Mother of God was to be born of Anne, nature did not dare to anticipate the germ of grace, but remained devoid of fruit (John Damascene, "Hom. i in B. V. Nativ.", ii).
The Syrian Fathers never tire of extolling the sinlessness of Mary. St. Ephraem considers no terms of eulogy too high to describe the excellence of Mary's grace and sanctity: "Most holy Lady, Mother of God, alone most pure in soul and body, alone exceeding all perfection of purity ...., alone made in thy entirety the home of all the graces of the Most Holy Spirit, and hence exceeding beyond all compare even the angelic virtues in purity and sanctity of soul and body . . . . my Lady most holy, all-pure, all-immaculate, all-stainless, all-undefiled, all-incorrupt, all-inviolate spotless robe of Him Who clothes Himself with light as with a garment . ... flower unfading, purple woven by God, alone most immaculate" ("Precationes ad Deiparam" in Opp. Graec. Lat., III, 524-37).
To St. Ephraem she was as innocent as Eve before her fall, a virgin most estranged from every stain of sin, more holy than the Seraphim, the sealed fountain of the Holy Ghost, the pure seed of God, ever in body and in mind intact and immaculate ("Carmina Nisibena").
Jacob of Sarug says that "the very fact that God has elected her proves that none was ever holier than Mary; if any stain had disfigured her soul, if any other virgin had been purer and holier, God would have selected her and rejected Mary". It seems, however, that Jacob of Sarug, if he had any clear idea of the doctrine of sin, held that Mary was perfectly pure from original sin ("the sentence against Adam and Eve") at the Annunciation.
St. John Damascene (Or. i Nativ. Deip., n. 2) esteems the supernatural influence of God at the generation of Mary to be so comprehensive that he extends it also to her parents. He says of them that, during the generation, they were filled and purified by the Holy Ghost, and freed from sexual concupiscence. Consequently according to the Damascene, even the human element of her origin, the material of which she was formed, was pure and holy. This opinion of an immaculate active generation and the sanctity of the "conceptio carnis" was taken up by some Western authors; it was put forward by Petrus Comestor in his treatise against St. Bernard and by others. Some writers even taught that Mary was born of a virgin and that she was conceived in a miraculous manner when Joachim and Anne met at the golden gate of the temple (Trombelli, "Mari SS. Vita", Sect. V, ii, 8; Summa aurea, II, 948. Cf. also the "Revelations" of Catherine Emmerich which contain the entire apocryphal legend of the miraculous conception of Mary.

Pretty heavy shit there. The seed of God, Made in the home of all the graces of the most holy spirit. Ok then. Working out a new philosophy!

Peace. Rustic

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: NicoleC
Date: 05 Feb 03 - 06:05 PM

Interesting quotes, but they must be taken into historical perspective, including the atitudes of the authors.

At the time when most of those religious texts were written, women were considered evil, unclean beings. Virginity is a higher state of purity, but it is still an impure condition by virtue of one's femaleness. Mary HAS to be elevated above other women to hold with their belief that Jesus is holy.

Secondly, the general attitude throughout most of Europe was that a child came from a man's seed, while a woman was merely the vessel in which it was planted. (Very pagan in origin, really -- "mother earth" and all that.) Mary's position in theology is not as a provider of genetic material, but as a vessel which grew and gave birth to God's seed. Hence, Mary's pureness is only relevant in light of her as a "clean" vessel to hold the son of God, not as being clean enough to be part of the creation process.

So if we take into account that women are inherently evil but Mary is somehow not, the idea that Mary must somehow be of cleaner birth than other women is tempting to a theologian trying to reconcile the two -- creating a mystical lineage is one way to do that, although it really only moves the problem, not solves it -- i.e. God chose to create a pure vessel instead of Mary being that naturally or God choosing to purify Mary of her "natural" state of impurity in preparation for implantation.

In reality, though, Mary was a 13 year old Jewish girl that could be killed for the crime of being raped. I personally think she either fabricated an excuse OR the trauma of the situation was easier to remember as being a holy event; she may have genuinely believed it happened that way.

Faith in Jesus as the son of God is exactly that -- an article of FAITH for which there isn't a shred of proof. It doesn't stop millions from believing it. The same can be said for any alien origins of Jesus -- belief it may be, but proof? None. (Not unless the hypothetical aliens decide to let us in on the secret, and even then they might be lying to establish credibility...)

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: *daylia*
Date: 05 Feb 03 - 06:23 PM

Nicole I'm curious about where you found such specific information about Mary ie) her age when pregnant with Jesus?

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Keith A of Hertford
Date: 05 Feb 03 - 06:41 PM

Hi Rustic,
The Insider is my lad.
Best wishes,
Keith.

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: NicoleC
Date: 05 Feb 03 - 06:45 PM

That's the approximate age that is generally believed to be true; I've seen it it numerous scholarly sources, although I'm not sure if there is a "biblical" source per se.

12ish was the normal age of betrothal for jewish girls at the time. Betrothals usually lasted 1 year. Unlike modern engagements, betrothals were very serious business -- part of the marriage process, not just a promise to wed.

If Mary was betrothed but not yet wed, that puts her age at or about 13 years old (i.e. 12-14), unless she was profoundly different from Jewish marriage customs at the time.

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: *daylia*
Date: 05 Feb 03 - 07:18 PM

Thanks Nicole - that's the usual hypothesis given concerning Mary's age. I just wondered if some new records or evidence had been found that I hadn't heard about.

Rustic, I've been thinking about this since I started reading this thread a couple days ago, and hesitated to post it because I do not want to look like I'm trying to discredit or debunk any of your theories above. And I'm not! But now I'll risk asking you -

Assuming for a moment that an omnipresent, omnipotent and eternal Creator God DOES exist (cuz I don't want to rehash that tired old debate), and that He wished to impregnate a human female, why would He require an ET (or anyone else) to do it for Him? Surely such a God would be perfectly capable of generating new life within a woman's body without any 'help'!

Just a thought ...

daylia

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: GUEST
Date: 05 Feb 03 - 07:25 PM

Geez. And look at all the trouble Jerry Lee Lewis got into for marrying a 13-year old.

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: NicoleC
Date: 05 Feb 03 - 07:44 PM

Yes, but there's message and then the messenger. Would Mary and/or medieval theologians conceived (ha ha) of the idea that Mary could have been impregnated without some sort of inseminator? It's not that far-fetched in a world of ultrasound and MRI's and x-rays, but then?

If Mary were impregnanted by said omnipotent God, then an intermediary may have been necessary to make it real and comprehensible for HER, and not necessarily God's limitation. Even is Mary is physically untouched, the angel acts as an intermediary.

Finally -- and you'll have to forgive me because I don't remember the scientific biological specifics -- it IS theoretically possible that a woman can impregnate herself, although it would be very, very rare. Such an event, with or without divine intervention, would be a miracle and would NOT require a male parent. As I said, I don't recall all the particulars, but I remember it requiring an impressive number of unlikely events to converge.

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Little Hawk
Date: 05 Feb 03 - 07:51 PM

Hmmmm...number one, I will make this comment. All conception is immaculate. Not that I am suggesting it doesn't involve sex, I am suggesting that sex itself is an "immaculate" process...or can be...when accompanied by an immaculate (a genuinely loving) consciousness.

I regard the medieval view of women and the Old Testament view of women as deranged, corrupt, and insane....as I would regard any viewpoint that defines women (or men) as essentially sinful, evil or impure. Ditto for any viewpoint that defines sexual activity in such negative terms.

As for Jesus being the Son of God, that doesn't worry me much, because I regard every male as God's own Son-in-the-making and every female as God's own Daughter-in-the-making, God embodying both the male and female principle in full balance, and I believe if you study Jesus' teachings closely you might perhaps find that he saw it that way too.

Some sons and daughters are further along than others in their awareness, that's all. He was very far along, which is why he affected people so profoundly at the time. Buddha was another who was very far along, and there have been many such individuals, some famous and some quite obscure.

- LH

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: *daylia*
Date: 05 Feb 03 - 08:31 PM

OK I'm feelin a little moronic now - of course that's so Nicole. A physical experience of some kind would have been necessary for Mary's own understanding and emotional health. And I'm sure that whatever form that intermediary took - angelic being/energy, ET's or whatever - it would have been just as Little Hawk said - 'an "immaculate" process ... accompanied by an immaculate (a genuinely loving) consciousness".

Surely the Lord of Love was conceived in love!

Y'know, it felt uplifting to write that!

(((((((((((((((( :-) ))))))))))))))))                                    

daylia

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: NicoleC
Date: 05 Feb 03 - 08:45 PM

Can you imagine waking up one morning and finding out you were pregnant when you hadn't had sex in ages? It'd be pretty darn incomprehensible to me, too! It'd be nice if someone showed up to explain it to me... a little blaze of light and unearthly power would be welcome, too :)

I'm sorry, LH, but "immaculate" sex sounds soooo boring.

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: *daylia*
Date: 05 Feb 03 - 09:36 PM

well it probably beats 'emasculate' sex he he he! Where ARE those angels when you need 'em?!?

:-)   daylia

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Rustic Rebel
Date: 05 Feb 03 - 10:05 PM

Keith- I did go into your site and stayed only a short while. I plan to check into it more. You gave so many links I just breezed through them. Thanks! Lots of interesting reading.

Daylia, When I started this thread the first thing I said was God=Aliens. Meaning, I think that the God or Gods in the Bible were the aliens. They came in all their glory in clouds of fire. They were powerful and had an advanced technology so the people called them Gods. They could part the sea with whatever instruments of energy they may have had, or whatever mind power they have. Maybe just so advanced that they know how to manipulate energy, just like Jesus did (and I have already used this here) when he walked on water.Maybe so advanced they manipulated people. Used them like people claim they are still using them today.
Do you see where I'm going with this Daylia?
The eternal creator that you are talking about I call- "All that is", and that I believe is in all of us. Equally so, so did Jesus when he tried to teach us that we could be like him. But too many people were looking for a savior instead of saving themselves.
In my most humble opinion.
Peace. Rustic

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: bigdarve
Date: 05 Feb 03 - 10:06 PM

yeah,rustic- there's one born every minute. you can make anything up you want from even the yellow pages.the trick is making money out of the suckers who buy the books.
eric van wotsisname must be laughing his cock off all the way to the bank and fair play to him,he's richer than i'll ever be but i'm not so big a fibber.
watch out for all that forbidden shellfish mullarkey!

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Little Hawk
Date: 05 Feb 03 - 10:16 PM

Well, Nicole, it's all a matter of interpretation of words, I guess...

What's boring about totally passionate love? I have never experienced sex as anything but immaculate in feeling, despite having had one girlfriend who could not accept the notion that anyone could possibly love her...but was willing to settle for casual lust whenever she could arrange it on her own terms. She longed to be thought of as a "slut". It turned her on. That was, I can tell you, a twisted experience and not one I would wish to repeat. I was with her for nearly 3 years, and it was like living in hell. She was one of the most untrustworthy individuals I have ever known in this life. She could also be charming when she decided to be. She had come from a family background where there simply was no love (but lots of fear, rape, drunkeness, violence, and what-have-you), and the standard way of coping for her was to lie, manipulate, and use your obvious assets (in her case, her body, so she thought) to get what you wanted. Exactly what she did want, God only knows. She never got it...not from me...not from several other guys who all have one thing in common after the fact...they avoid her any way they possibly can.

Why do you think I like Elves so much? They express the highest love accompanied by the greatest sense of self-worth. All things, in their highest form, are immaculate, and I'm not talking about lemony pledge/cleanliness when I say that. Nor am I eliminating sweat and passion. How can anything so beautiful not be immaculate, if there is no fear involved?

- LH

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Little Hawk
Date: 05 Feb 03 - 10:36 PM

yeah, bigdarve- there's one born every minute. you can make anything up you want from even the yellow pages...like the notion that life is all about accumulating money and material possessions and being "he who dies with the most toys". The people who do that most "successfully" are no doubt laughing their asses off all the way to MalWart (deliberate mispelling). I do not envy them. I pity them.

My impression is that Von Daniken believed his theory. I think he went off the deep end. That doesn't have much bearing one way or another on the UFO question for me. If I want to study Christian spirituality I don't go to Billy Graham or Jerry Falwell for it.

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: GUEST,Magpie
Date: 06 Feb 03 - 12:05 AM

Oh dear...

Clinton brought this thread to my attention, and although i never intended to have a word to say about it .. but ...

1) Medieval theologians were very clear about how Mary was impregnated. It was a divine miracle. Moreover, she was not surprised by the event, having been forewarned by an angelic visitor. It is of course tempting to find "explanations" for all of the divine events that happen in the Bible... but i think that says more about our present mindset than it does about the content of the scriptures.

2) As was noted in a previous post, absence of evidence is not evidence of absence. However, when one is suggesting a radical hypothesis such as ancient alien visitation, i think it is clear that the burden of proof lies with those in favor of the theory, especially since more mundane explanations exist. To date, i am unaware of a single shred of credible evidence of alien visitation to ancient cultures that has not been adequately dealt with by scholars in the field (e.g., not Erich von Daniken)

3) i am with Clinton on the Travis Walton thing... there are a few (very few!) UFO sighting reports which are... interesting. The Exeter Incident is another. Isolated reports, however, do not equal a massive government conspiracy/coverup, for which (again) there is not a shred of credible evidence - even according to most ufologists.

and off i go, muttering into the darkness...

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Little Hawk
Date: 06 Feb 03 - 12:23 AM

Sighting reports? Oh well, it's a matter of opinion whether they are interesting or not. But sightings? They are very interesting! Trust me.

As for medieval theologians...yes, I am aware of their opinion about Mary, I just don't give it much credence, that's all. The concept of a virgin birth was one that had already been popularized much earlier in one or two pre-Christian religions, but the Christians are under the impression that they thought of it first. They didn't. Just like they didn't think of the Christmas (midwinter) celebration first, or the "Son of God" concept first. These things have been thought of many times before Jesus was ever born.

And agreed, our logical explanations say MUCH about our present mindset.

The virgin birth is symbolic of something. I leave it to you to figure out what.

In the same sense, Adam and Eve are symbolic of something, as are most religious archetypes.

Taking either case literally may entirely miss the point.

Do you really believe, for instance that Caine & Abel and Adam & Eve were the only four physical people on Earth when Caine slew Abel, and that Caine then went "east of Eden" to find himself a wife? Who was she, a wandering ape?

Anyone who takes religious tales literally has got to come up with logic that rivals Houdini's ability to get out of handcuffs and locked containers.

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Cluin
Date: 06 Feb 03 - 02:26 AM

Stop, children! What's that sound?

Oh... it's just Joseph Campbell spinning around in his grave.

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: GUEST,Penny S. (elsewhere)
Date: 06 Feb 03 - 07:48 AM

If it were possible for a woman to impregnate herself, she would have to produce sperm as well as an egg. She would not be a woman, she would be a hermaphrodite. If a woman did somehow enable the development of an egg without sperm, it would not have a Y chromosome. The child would be a female, not a male. If the child did have a Y chromosome, the mother would not be a woman. She might look like a woman, since XY foetuses can develop into the default female if the Y does not become active at the right time, but she would not be a woman. That being so, she would probably not have a womb, or the ability to make eggs. There would be no child. If Jesus did not have a father, then he was the result of some miracle.

If girls were married at 13 in first century Palestine, it would be unlikely for them to fall pregnant at once. The onset of menarche has been falling recently - and the average age would have been higher than 13 where food was less abundant, and less rich in oestrogen mimicking compounds than it is is modern western societies. There is a greater chance of miscarriage and of maternal death with young mothers, whose pelvis is undeveloped. The mother is less capable of caring for the child. Would God be involved in using an unfit and risky vessel, however pure, to the possible detriment of his offspring or the baby's mother? (Would an alien, who had presumably been watching the way humans develop?) I think not.

Penny

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: catspaw49
Date: 06 Feb 03 - 08:46 AM

Yeah, I see that Penny........Seems as though the god dude would have been a lot better off to use some experienced birthing vessel. Then instead of Jesus, we might have had the 9th child as the "Saviour," a kid named Morty.

Gawddamn but this thread cracks me up!!! Let's think about the Alien perspective a bit........Obviously they would have to be very advanced and perhaps conquered the speed of light. So they show up here and find.........us. Eons and eons of travel and we're the best they can find. Wouldn't that be a bitch? So instead of setting up shop with their own technology and taking over the planet or just blowing the place to hell and be gone, what do they do? They start dickin' around arranging rocks. Yeah, right.........Gimmee peace.............

But is there life out there? Odds are in favor of it certainly. Also consider this.......Life here started with a combination of 4 amino acids. It is possible for life to have started somewhere else with a different 4.... or 6 or 8......As it developed there would be no reason to believe it would follow the same path as life as we know it here. So it's quite possible that life forms exist that, should we encounter them, we will not recognize as life....nor they us.

Anyway, y'all are crackin' me up!!!

Spaw

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: BuckMulligan
Date: 06 Feb 03 - 09:22 AM

Even more interesting is the school of thought that holds that they didn't find us at all, but left some wee ETs behind to become us.

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: catspaw49
Date: 06 Feb 03 - 09:35 AM

So Buck....We're the best they could come up with???? Ya' know, if I arrived here and found this planet damn near covered in water, I'd have left some water creature.....So maybe they left a few dolphins............Nah, not my idea of a good theory at all.........

Spaw

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: *daylia*
Date: 06 Feb 03 - 10:37 AM

Rustic - your train of thought is a lot clearer to me now - thanks. And it's quite intriguing too.

Yes, given the existence of an omnipresent God, everything in the universe must be an expression/manifestation of that creative divine power, including ET's. But here's a thought re "Maybe so advanced they manipulated people. Used them like people claim they are still using them today."

In my understanding, the most highly evolved 'spiritual' beings (ie. angels, archangels) are NEVER invasive or manipulative. They are highly respectful, never interfering with the life of another being or breaching their 'sacred space' without permission, without specific invitation. That is the essence of 'free will' - and it is one of the most important spiritual 'laws' of Creation.

If this is true, then any 'alien' who manipulated or used a human being without permission is certainly no highly evolved spiritual being. Although obviously more technologically and psychically developed than humans (hence the manipulative abilities), such a being would be no more spiritually advanced than the average human being. So wise discrimination - and prudence - is always necessary when dealing with these or any other 'subtle', unusual energy form or being.

To date, those are some of the conclusions my own studies and experiences have led me to. Just some thoughts for pondering ...

You go, girl! (I'm betting you're a 'girl' - if not, so sorry!)

:-) daylia

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: BuckMulligan
Date: 06 Feb 03 - 10:37 AM

what makes us think "we're the best?" Maybe those whale "songs" are really just laughin' and laughin' and laughin'.......

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: *daylia*
Date: 06 Feb 03 - 10:59 AM

Buck that's just a WHALE of a good thought! He he he

:-)    daylia

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: wysiwyg
Date: 06 Feb 03 - 11:03 AM

I'm hoping there are other civilizations out ther, as much as anyone else. But as my very smart husband pointed out to me recently, if there are highly-advanced folks out there, wouldn't they have discovered out beautiful and lush-with-resources planet long ago, before we even had humnan beings walking around, and wouldn't they have claimed this place as a cushy vacation resort planet?

~Susan

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Bill D
Date: 06 Feb 03 - 11:14 AM

agreeing with catspaw that this thread gets stranger & stranger......I love a good debate, but you will note that I gave up WAY back trying to inject reason into it.

I wonder sometimes if some people subconciously avoid simple answers and sceptical reasoning because it is just too dull & boring.
....immaculate conception and aliens and Pantheism are just much more fun to speculate about..

ah, well...carry on...I'll jes' set here and shake my weary ol' head.

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: catspaw49
Date: 06 Feb 03 - 11:37 AM

Hey Bill...Thanks for reminding me about the "immaculate conception" part.......Didn't you always figure that Joseph was just really pissed over the whole thing?

JOSEPH: You're what?
MARY: I am with child Joseph.
JOSEPH: How the hell is that possible? We've been married ten years and I ain't even seen you nekkid, let alone anything else!
MARY: But Joseph, I am still virginal. The baby was given to me by God.
JOSEPH: God my ass....Some guy got you tanked up on wine and told you he was God!!! So now what?
MARY: Joseph, it will be your great honor and duty to rear the son of God.
JOSEPH: Lemmee get this right....I've still got the world's worst case of Blue Balls, but you're knocked up and the SOB who did it claims to be God....and then splits, sticking me with bills??? Dammit Mary, construction is way down and we are barely making it the way it is. I tell you Mary, this kid better know how to stretch food and turn water into wine!
MARY: He will Joseph. He is the son of God.
JOSEPH: Geeziz Keericed!!! That's ridiculous!!
MARY: No Joseph, that will be name.


Spaw

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: BuckMulligan
Date: 06 Feb 03 - 11:38 AM

Injecting sceptical reasoning into a thread like this is like herding cats while pushing a chain uphill.

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Bill D
Date: 06 Feb 03 - 12:00 PM

'spaw...you know, there's a song with the basic dialogue you give... "The Cherry Tree Carol"

"When Joseph was and old man, and old man was he,
He courted Virgin Mary, the maid of Galilee....etc

Joseph gets very angry!...but the unborn baby Jesus causes the trees to bend so that Mary can pick cherries easily.....now there's a metaphysical debate for you!

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: catspaw49
Date: 06 Feb 03 - 12:11 PM

Yeah Bill...and it cracks Karen up!!! She really hadn't thought too literally about the words til a few years ago, but then she had this mental image of a pregnant Mary with a voice coming out of her womb telling the trees to bend....and she can't help but laugh at the "image." This kind of literal thought process she blames on me and now says I have ruined another perfectly good song for her.

Spaw

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: NicoleC
Date: 06 Feb 03 - 01:11 PM

Okay, so I was trying to determine the biological basis for my earlier remembrances and did a little research. Without getting into XOs and XXYs too much (this is complicated stuff), random notes on self-impregnation:

Parthenogenesis; non-sexual reproduction i.e. development of the ovum into an individual without fertilization by a spermatozoon. Common in the insect and fish world plus a few other higher animals, but usually considered not possible among humans. Although eggs develop by themselves fairly often, they do not develope very far. However, several studies in the 19th century discovered pregnant women who carried to term who had some sort of vaginal blockage and could not have been (as far as they knew at the time) inseminated by men. Also, in 1955, Lancet reported a "virgin birth" where researchers could not rule out parthenogenesis.

In parthenogenic offspring, the female's 23 chromosomes double to make up for the missing male chromosomes. So parthenogenic offspring are a clone of the mother.

(Parthenogenisis among some frog species' was the basis of the dinosaurs' reproduction in Jurassic Park, except that the movie also combined it up with another phenomena, namely spontaneous sex change, which can happen among some species as well.)

Hermaphroditism; a sex anomaly in which gonads for both sexes are present; the external genitalia show traits of both sexes and chromosomes show male female mosaicism (xx/xy). Hermaphrodites can impregnante themselves (even without resorting to physical measures.

Quote, "In a study in the Netherlands in 1990 called Combined Hermaphroditism and Auto-fertilization in a Domestic Rabbit. In this study a true hermaphrodite rabbit served several females and sired more than 250 young of both sexes. In the next breeding season, the rabbit which was housed in isolation, became pregnant and delivered seven healthy young of both sexes. It was kept in isolation and when autopsied was again pregnant and demonstrated two functional ovaries and two infertile testes. A chromosome preparation revealed a diploid number of autosomes and two sex chromosomes of uncertain configuration.

A study was carried out on a human hermaphrodite at the Department of Obstetrics and Gynaecology, Chicago, Lying-in Hospital, Illinois. The objective of this research was to determine the conceptional events resulting in a 46xx, 46xy true hermaphrodite and to report the first pregnancy in a 46xx, 46xy true hermaphrodite with an ovotestis.

The design of this study involved chromosome studies performed on patient's lymphocytes and fibroblasts, red cell antigens, human leucocytes antigens and the presence of y- chromosome deoxyribonucleic acid were analyzed. Findings were compared with parental and sibling blood group data.

The result of these studies demonstrated that our patient is a chimera; an organism in which there are at-least two kinds of tissue differing in their genetic constitution, thus with dual maternal and paternal contributions. In addition, despite the presence of an ovotestis, she conceived and delivered a child."

Chimera - A chimera is an animal compirsed of cell lines from a variety of sources. They can be found by fusing two or more early embryos or by adding extra cells. Reproducable in labs on mice. At least one such human subject is a alive and has been the subject of many scientific studies. His skin is male XY, but his blood is female YY. This particular subject has a face which has one appearance on one side, and a significantly different appearance on the other, but it otherwise is a perfectly normal appearing boy. It is not 100% how he came into being. The possibility exists that he had a female fraternal twin in the womb which died, and some of that twin's genetic material passed into his body. OR -- they merged in the womb. Another theory is that his mother parthogenically reproduced, then part of the egg was fertilizied by the father before the embryo died.

Finally, many children are born without being 100% of one sex or the other and are also not true xx/xy hermaphrodites -- sometimes with drastic appearance anomolies, but often very minor ones that may go unnoticed. In the case of children who are of fuzzier distinction, a sex is generally chosen and the child raised that way. Sometimes operations are performed to "correct" physical anomalies, but actual chromosonal makeup is rarely checked, and the determination is made by appearance alone. An XY child can appear totally female, or vice versa, but XY females cannot generally conceive normally.

So -- if Mary were a true hermaphrodite or a chimera (or even just a bit mixedup), the process of parthenogensis could have created a male child and not just a clone. As I said, pretty rare.

To a believer, the upshot of all this can mean that Jesus' birth was a divine miracle, yet of natural origin. To a skeptic, this can mean that God wasn't required, necessarily.

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: BuckMulligan
Date: 06 Feb 03 - 01:26 PM

But a "believer" doesn't NEED all the Xs and Os. A believer only needs "the word" and his or her faith. No explanation consonant with natural law is necessary - "God did it." To a non-believer, the explanations are similarly unnecessary, since the non-believer is quite likely to recognize a mythic theme that crosses many culture and mythic systems (virgin birth), and the christian implementation of it is simply evidence of the fact that christianity & its scriptural artifacts are indeed part of "the big picture."

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: TIA
Date: 06 Feb 03 - 02:06 PM

For bizarro images of the holy family, the Xmas carol "The Holy Well" cannot be beat. Mary doesn't seem so immaculate in that one.

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: NicoleC
Date: 06 Feb 03 - 02:29 PM

True Buck -- but a "believer" will look at that kind of scientific possibility and call it proof of their belief; and skeptic will look at the SAME possibility and say it means there is no proof one way or the other.

13 year olds are, as pointed out, remarkably bad vessels for giving birth. Any ideas about the age of onset of puberty aren't very accurate, since we really don't know what was normal back then.

However, just because the plumbing is in doesn't mean the house is ready to be occupied. But we also get into theological ideas about the relative purity of children vs. adults; the idea that children are more pure and innocent (which we still ascribe to today) is a very old one. So someone on the cusp of childhood/adulthood, would be more theologically "pure," and therefore an appropriate *spiritual* vessel. An omnipotent God, of course, could get around the physical issues of a 13 year old mother.

Some of this reminds me of arguing long ago with other kids about the existence of Santa Claus.
"How could Santa deliver todays to everyone in one night?"
"Because he's Santa and he can stop time."
"How can he get down a chimney if he's so fat?"
"Because he's Santa, and Santa can do that."
"How does he know who to bring toys to?"
"Because he's Santa, and Santa has special powers!"
"Then how could ELVES make all those toys in just one year?"
"Because elves work for Santa, and he gives them special powers."

:D

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Little Hawk
Date: 06 Feb 03 - 03:42 PM

Boy, what a bunch of literal thinkers. Spaw's right, this thread is hilarious.

I note that none of you have even reacted to my suggestion that virgin birth was a pre-Christian religious idea (which the Christians borrowed later), nor to my further suggestion that it is a symbolic tale, not a literal one.

Of course, you're not spiritual adepts are you? Nor are you even attempting to be, in most cases.

The ordinary human being doesn't look any farther than grossly literal interpretations of religious materials, generally speaking. That's why religions feed highly symbolic and fanciful tales to the general congregation...as a parent tells fairy tales and "Santa Claus" stories to a little child...while few students people in the mystery schools or monasteries live quietly, studying the symbols in those tales, looking beneath the surface, and coming to a deeper understanding of what they actually mean.

You people are seriously in need of help from an enlightened being, unless of course you wish to simply remain blissfully ignorant. And my suspicion is, you do. You think your ignorance is wisdom and common sense.

So go ahead and talk yourselves blue in the face about the pros and cons and physical requirements of "virgin birth", and whether or not it is possible.

As if it mattered... LOL! By the time they crucified Jesus, I suspect he was getting fed up with the whole thing anyway...he was trying to teach higher spiritual truths to violent, sadistic apes.

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: NicoleC
Date: 06 Feb 03 - 04:00 PM

Well, LH, one can go through life assuming everything is a spiritual mystery, or one can have fun exploring possibilities. Nor do all spiritual events need to be based on fantasy, and symbols are invariably rooted in real events and occurances -- otherwise we wouldn't comprehend them as symbols.

One need not be assumed "blissfully ignorant" because one considers and mentally plays with alternate views. Just as one need not be assumed arrogant and self-righteous for the presumption they are enlightened and everyone who doesn't agree with their perception is not.

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: BuckMulligan
Date: 06 Feb 03 - 04:00 PM

Golly Little Hawk. How enlightened of you.

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: BuckMulligan
Date: 06 Feb 03 - 04:04 PM

But Nicole: if one's faith is verified by facts, then it ain't faith anymore, is it? Thus losing one of its primary values ("belief in what you know ain't so" as Mark Twain put it.) If there's value or power to having "faith" then that value & power are diluted the instant it's no longer "faith".

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Little Hawk
Date: 06 Feb 03 - 04:11 PM

I agree entirely with what you just said, Nicole.

Buck - When faith is verified by facts it becomes knowledge. Knowledge is, in my view, superior to faith. I imagine you would agree with that too.

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: BuckMulligan
Date: 06 Feb 03 - 04:16 PM

You'd be wrong. I don't think you can compare faith & knowlege. They do different things. If I'm an engineer designing a bridge, I want knowledge. If I'm seeking "spiritual growth" or "enlightenment" then faith works just fine. OTOH, if I'm looking to make sure my ticket to heaven is still good...

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Little Hawk
Date: 06 Feb 03 - 04:22 PM

I should probably add that I wasn't suggesting that I am an enlightened being. I'm not. I'm a mere student who started out this life as a logical, scientifically grounded, rational atheist...that was the view of life I received from my family, and I went with it till I was in my early 20's, more or less.

If you ever meet an enlightened being and are ready to deal with it, you'll recognize the person as such. If you're not ready to deal with it, you won't, you'll just think "My, what a nice person that was!" and most likely go merrily on your way. And that's as it should be.

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: NicoleC
Date: 06 Feb 03 - 04:31 PM

LOL, Buck, we gotta sit down and play word proofing games one of these days!

"if one's faith is verified by facts, then it ain't faith anymore, is it?"
Yes, except when used as a noun to refer to a religion.

Let me revise that statement:

... a "believer" will look at that kind of scientific possibility and call it supporting evidence that reinforces their belief; and skeptic will look at the SAME possibility and say it means it could have happened without God.

(To which a believer will say, "but everything happens by the will of God...")

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: catspaw49
Date: 06 Feb 03 - 04:37 PM

......geeziz............get the hip boots...........I bet Bill already has his on..........Wait a minute.....Maybe some of those chest high waders instead.............

Spaw

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Little Hawk
Date: 06 Feb 03 - 04:38 PM

I see what you mean, Buck, but I was thinking of a different kind of knowledge than what allows an engineer to build a bridge. To do that he has to have knowledge of math, physics, tensile strength of various materials, and a whole lot of other facts like that at his command.

I was speaking of the kind of knowledge that comes from direct experience of something, and it could be something that has no obvious physical or quantitative permeters, so to speak.

I'm saying that a person can have faith in God, for example, or they can know God. This is similar to saying that they can have faith in the idea of romantic love (as do billions of people) or they can actually experience it directly! Whole different ball of wax. The direct experience imparts knowledge, which is more powerful than faith.

The direct experience is something you can't pass on vicariously to another person (which you can often do with faith), nor can you convince them of it in any way whatsoever if they are disinclined to consider it credible. In just that way, if someone were totally skeptical and disbelieving about the reality of romantic love...or patriotism...or any other powerful concept like that...there wouldn't be a damn thing you could do about it to change their mind, would there?

And their view would be based not on knowledge, but on faith. Their faith in what they believe is real. And for them, it would be real...as a matter of faith. With no faith in love or patriotism they would be patently unlikely to gain knowledge of either. You have to believe the mountain is there first, before you are going to try and climb it. Climbing it may still prove too difficult, even after you believe it's there, but believing is just the beginning. To know the top of the mountain you must actually climb there. Pictures of it, and stories about it from other people are not the real experience itself.

- LH

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Little Hawk
Date: 06 Feb 03 - 04:46 PM

Put it another way: Faith simply alerts you to the existence of possibilities. Knowledge is what you attain by realizing those possibilities.

This is true with everything in life, not just with spiritual matters or mountain climbing.

Accordingly, he who has no faith has no possibilities. That's why faith is valuable, but it's not the final step by any means.

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: *daylia*
Date: 06 Feb 03 - 04:50 PM

OH NO! BillD was here, so he must've caught me at the 'circular reasoning' thing again. And now I'll lose all those points I'd earned toward winning a complimentary copy of his up-coming "Dissertations on Pure Balderdash!" Oh no, say it isn't so ...

Nicole that's quite the amazing article re "self-insemination"! Sheesh, it would fit nicely with the 'male lactation' phenomena. Now, if both became the evolutionary norm for this species, betcha the marriage/divorce/abortion rates would plummet. True 'gender equality' might become more than just a dream!

Hmmmm, wonder if it would be more like a nightmare ...

But on a more serious note appropriate to the spirit of this discussion, here's what Joseph Campbell has to say about the symbology of the Virgin Birth in "The Power of Myth":

"The virgin birth represents the birth of compassion in the heart, the birth of the spiritual man out of the animal man. This is a spiritual birth - the Virgin conceived of the word through the ear.
And the Buddha, with the same meaning, is said to have been born from his mother's side, from the level of the heart ... He wasn't born physically from his mother's side, but symbolically.

What is symbolically referred to is not Jesus' physical birth but his spiritual significance. That's what the virgin birth represents. Heroes and demi-gods are born that way as beings motivated by compassion and not mastery, sexuality or self-preservation.

This is the sense of the second birth, when you begin to live out of the heart center. The lower three centers..." [ie. mastery, sexuality and self-preservation] "...are not to be refuted but transcended, when they become subject to and servant to the heart."

Ahh, I luvya Joseph! And now you can get back to resting in peace...

Thanks Cluin for reminding me to look him up.

daylia

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Little Hawk
Date: 06 Feb 03 - 04:57 PM

Excellently put, daylia. Those are some perceptive analyses of concepts such as "virgin birth", but not the ones that would normally occur to people who are busy counting (or stealing) hubcaps.

There were figures in Greek mythology who were presumably conceived in a mortal woman through the action of a god, and those were also symbolic tales of a similar sort to what Campbell alludes to. They were allegories.

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: NicoleC
Date: 06 Feb 03 - 04:59 PM

"I'm saying that a person can have faith in God, for example, or they can know God."

Or one can have faith in God, and that faith distorts their perception of an experience.

For example: I have seen several UFOs. Yes, yes I have. I've looked up in the sky and seen things I couldn't identified. My reaction was "Hey cool, it's a UFO! I wonder what it is? Aircraft? Aliens? Weather ballon?"

If I had faith or belief that aliens were visiting this planet on a regular basis, I might have interpretted that experience very differently, and assumed that I had indeed seen the craft those small gray aliens fly around in.

I don't think experience = knowledge. Experience may contribute to knowledge, but experience can be subjective. As "truth" it can only be interpreted on a personal level.

One might get a warm sensation while praying and call it an experience with God. Another might call it heartburn :)

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Little Hawk
Date: 06 Feb 03 - 05:12 PM

Absolutely, Nicole. That is why no one else can decide for you or for me what is real. We each must decide for ourselves in each and every case.

Some experiences contribute a little to knowledge, some a lot. Some experiences (given individual interpretation) may even obfuscate knowledge. As far as that goes, we again must each decide for ourselves.

But you will agree, I hope, that actually having sex (for example) gives one more knowledge of it than being told the facts of life by your mom or dad when you're 14 years old or reading a book about it?

That's just one possible example of acquiring knowledge through experience. I find direct experience beats any amount of faith or theorizing.

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: *daylia*
Date: 06 Feb 03 - 05:17 PM

Believe me Nicole, you'd know the difference between a true "experience with God" and heartburn. There is no comparison. You're a real smart cookie, open-minded and thoughtful and compassionate, if I may presume those things from reading your posts, not knowing you personally. I'm sure you'd have NO PROBLEM knowing the difference.

It's not like a UFO at all. Not an outer experience, but an inner one - which then manifests in the outer only if and when you recognize it and then choose to act upon it. And if that happens, your life changes permanently, in highly beneficial ways both for yourself and for everyone you touch.

That's my 2 cents worth, anyway.

daylia

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: *daylia*
Date: 06 Feb 03 - 05:28 PM

Sorry, what I said above wasn't quite right Nicole - it is a 'inner experience' - a subjective one like you said. But like the story of Mary's visit with the angel, such experiences ARE accompanied by outer 'confirmations' which are meaningful to you personally, so that you can understand them and know that they are real. THEN you choose an interpretation, and to act upon it or not.

Guess that makes it 3 cents worth now.

daylia

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Wolfgang
Date: 06 Feb 03 - 05:35 PM

I find direct experience beats any amount of faith or theorizing. (Little Hawk)

Sometimes I regret you are not a French Canadian. In French, there is only one word for experience and experiment: une experience. And in that sense I can agree with that sentence:

A good experiment can beat any amount of faith or theorising (and, I add: of subjective experience as well).

Wolfgang

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: NicoleC
Date: 06 Feb 03 - 05:42 PM

Daylia, you are assuming first:

That there is such a thing as a "true experience with God."

And second, that every perception of an experience with God would necessarily be "true."

Neither condition is something that one person can judge for another. If one genuinely believes that their heartburn is God talking to them, they are as unlikely to accept your dismissal as you are to accept their divine revelation.

"But you will agree, I hope, that actually having sex (for example) gives one more knowledge of it than being told the facts of life by your mom or dad when you're 14 years old or reading a book about it?"

I would say it merely gives you an experience; maybe bad, maybe good, maybe mediocre. In and of itself, it is not knowledge since every experience can be different and even the same experience can be viewed differently within one's own mental framework. If one says, "sex is boring,' does that mean they KNOW sex is boring, or does that mean their EXPERIENCE of sex is boring? Because you or I or someone else may have an entirely different viewpoint based on our own interpretation.

I would define knowledge as the collection of reproducable experiences of the self and others. When you add the individual viewpoints together, you can start to form a framework that can be accepted as knowledge.

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: *daylia*
Date: 06 Feb 03 - 05:48 PM

Une experience c'est une experience, n'est-ce pas Wolfgang? :-)

French is such a DIVINE language ... and I 'defile' it regularly I must confess! (Had to check with my mom for the spelling!)

daylia

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Bill D
Date: 06 Feb 03 - 05:52 PM

why, *daylia*, I didn't say nozzing, your points are safe...so far...*grin*...if you want, I'll reserve you a copy of "Critique of Pure Balderdash"...

(it's hard to do, as there is SO much balderdash that needs to be critiqued...Kant had it easy with "Critique of Pure Reason")

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Little Hawk
Date: 06 Feb 03 - 05:53 PM

Interesting point, Wolfgang. I agree. A good experiment beats any amount of faith. However, one may first need some faith in a certain direction...and some expertise...to be both willing and able to make the experiment. The pioneering scientists were people who had faith that their way of seeking knowledge would yield valuable results, and they were often opposed bitterly by the clergy who had faith in different propositions entirely.

I would love to be in a better position to actually test out the more interesting theories that intrigue me the most.

Every language has its own fascinating ways of expressing things. I don't know much French, but it strikes me as very expressive in its own way. I have always liked the Spanish word "simpatico", because it says a lot in one word. Do you have any German phrases or expressions that can't easily be matched in another language? How about "weltschmertz"? (I hope I spelled it correctly).

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Little Hawk
Date: 06 Feb 03 - 06:03 PM

Hey, Nicole, you have such a lively mind...I bet you could talk yourself into your own execution by the guillotine if it appealed to your sense of winning the argument. :-)

Here's another example. From what do you gain more knowledge of what is an apple?

1. From hearing about apples, seeing pictures of them, hearing other people's opinions about them, reading books about them, OR..

2. From picking them, smelling them, tasting them, eating them, and growing apple trees through the whole four seasons?

Hmmmm...?

That's what I'm talking about, Nicole. Direct experience imparts knowledge. Indirect, secondhand experience imparts information, and I don't consider information to be knowledge, because information can so easily be incorrect, incomplete, or even totally false.

And if you think one doesn't gain knowledge about sex from having sex, then you are seriously at sea.

I think you're just fond of "winning" verbal debates, that's what I think...by any subterfuge possible. Doing so does not impart knowledge, but it feels absolutely great, eh?

- LH

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Amos
Date: 06 Feb 03 - 06:04 PM

LH:

Faith is sure a higher order of knowing (in its best form) than having a mind full of certain data structures. But it is often used to describe nothing more than a blind insistence on certain data structures. So as with most aspects of this wild-ass topic, you can easily get pronged by semantic ambiguities the size of Godzilla.

But you have no call to act superior and condescending, Big Boy. It gives the lie to the very enlightenment to which you usually aspire and occasionally pretend...

A

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Little Hawk
Date: 06 Feb 03 - 06:09 PM

You're absolutely right, Amos. When I get angry, as occasionally happens, I can get negative too. As I said, I'm not enlightened. I repeat, I'm not enlightened. I'm angry, Amos, and disgusted.

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: catspaw49
Date: 06 Feb 03 - 06:09 PM

As I recall, they do have a nice word for "fire insurance company"....what is that one Wolfgang?

And Bill, Kant had it easy but chose to take a different route as he found it impossible to say clearly in ten words what could best be completely obscured in a thousand!

Spaw

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Little Hawk
Date: 06 Feb 03 - 06:11 PM

Could you elaborate on that a little, Spaw?

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Amos
Date: 06 Feb 03 - 06:12 PM

From Terry Bisson's timeless article on the day they discovered earth (the whole thing can be found at Terry Bisson's web site):

..."They made the machines. That's what I'm trying to tell you. Meat made the machines."

"That's ridiculous. How can meat make a machine? You're asking me to believe in sentient meat."

"I'm not asking you, I'm telling you. These creatures are the only sentient race in that sector and they're made out of meat."

"Maybe they're like the orfolei. You know, a carbon-based intelligence that goes through a meat stage."

"Nope. They're born meat and they die meat. We studied them for several of their life spans, which didn't take long. Do you have any idea what's the life span of meat?"

"Spare me. Okay, maybe they're only part meat. You know, like the weddilei. A meat head with an electron plasma brain inside."

"Nope. We thought of that, since they do have meat heads, like the weddilei. But I told you, we probed them. They're meat all the way through."

"No brain?"

"Oh, there's a brain all right. It's just that the brain is made out of meat! That's what I've been trying to tell you."

"So ... what does the thinking?"

"You're not understanding, are you? You're refusing to deal with what I'm telling you. The brain does the thinking. The meat."

"Thinking meat! You're asking me to believe in thinking meat!"

"Yes, thinking meat! Conscious meat! Loving meat. Dreaming meat. The meat is the whole deal! Are you beginning to get the picture or do I have to start all over?"

"Omigod. You're serious then. They're made out of meat."

"Thank you. Finally. Yes. They are indeed made out of meat. And they've been trying to get in touch with us for almost a hundred of their years."

"Omigod. So what does this meat have in mind?"

"First it wants to talk to us. Then I imagine it wants to explore the Universe, contact other sentiences, swap ideas and information. The usual."

"We're supposed to talk to meat."

"That's the idea. That's the message they're sending out by radio. 'Hello. Anyone out there. Anybody home.' That sort of thing."

"They actually do talk, then. They use words, ideas, concepts?"
"Oh, yes. Except they do it with meat."

"I thought you just told me they used radio."

"They do, but what do you think is on the radio? Meat sounds. You know how when you slap or flap meat, it makes a noise? They talk by flapping their meat at each other. They can even sing by squirting air through their meat."

"Omigod. Singing meat. This is altogether too much. So what do you advise?"....

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Little Hawk
Date: 06 Feb 03 - 06:28 PM

LOL! I love it. Yes, I remember that one, Amos. Thanks for contributing it to the spiritual firing line discussion. I am going to go out now and commit suicide by stuffing grafefruits in my ears whilst humming the theme to Gilligan's island. I can't take this meatbound existence any longer...

If I fail, expect me back sometime after my headache goes away.

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: *daylia*
Date: 06 Feb 03 - 06:32 PM

"Neither condition is something that one person can judge for another. If one genuinely believes that their heartburn is God talking to them, they are as unlikely to accept your dismissal as you are to accept their divine revelation."

Right. The recognition and interpretation of any event is entirely up to the one who experiences it. So if one person experienced a 'warmth' and a kindly inner voice while praying for example, and interpreted it as heartburn accompanied by perhaps an overactive imagination, that person would be unlikely to make significant changes in their lives because of it (other than perhaps taking some Tums). Nothing 'spiritual' happening there, according to the person's choice.

If the next person interpreted the same experience as a 'divine revelation', and then stopped yelling at their kids or stealing from their neighbours because of it, that would be a beneficial change based on what is, to them, a direct spiritual experience with God. Through action, the 'spiritual experience' becomes physical reality.

And if the next person, with the same experience, also decided that it was a direct experience with God and that they were now 'enlightened' and should therefore get up on a soapbox and start preaching their divinity far and wide to 'save the world', they'd probably end up very lonely or very looney. Or both.

What's really important is not the experience, but the choices made based on the interpretation of that experience. The ability to discern physical/emotional/mental/social experiences from spiritual ones developes with time and effort, for anyone who chooses to spend their time and energy in this fashion. The ability to make wise choices about what to do with experiences interpreted as 'spiritual' also developes, through trial and error.

BTW I didn't mean to offend, Nicole, if you took any offense to my presumptions about you.

Happy ponderings, daylia

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: *daylia*
Date: 06 Feb 03 - 06:53 PM

Y'know, I still don't like how that came out! There's holes in it somewhere dammit ... Hmmmmm. There's much wisdom in silence...

Oh, Bill's back! Maybe he can figure it out! Do you see anything that qualifies as 'balderdash' in my last post Bill? Some material for your Critique perhaps? Hey, maybe I could copyright my balderdash and sell it to you! Whaddayathink? :-)

daylia

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: NicoleC
Date: 06 Feb 03 - 07:02 PM

"Subterfuge?" Well, at least I'm not resorting to insults again. I do enjoy debating because I enjoy debating. As I have said a couple of times here today, there are no answers or "winning" when you are talking about personal beliefs and truths. I'm simply telling it like I see it.

Throw however many examples at me which get broader and broader in terms that you may, I do not think a single person's experience equals knowledge. I think a single person's experience is one person's experience. Period. One does not "know" all about sex merely by having had it. All sorts of animals have sex without having the vaguest comprehension of what it's for. Some do fine without sex at all. Experience is merely an aspect of knowledge.

You latest example:

1. From hearing about apples, seeing pictures of them, hearing other people's opinions about them, reading books about them, OR..

2. From picking them, smelling them, tasting them, eating them, and growing apple trees through the whole four seasons?

Is that supposed to only be two choices? I can count hundreds of experiences within those examples. Each one of those contributes ultimately to knowledge. If one grows apples within one's own orchard, one may gain much knowledge about growing apples within one's own orchard, i.e. within only your own experience. That is hardly the tip of the iceberg when it comes to knowing about apples. However, reading books about growing apples will also impart the experiences of others -- fighting diseases and pests you may not have seem, growing in other climates, growing other species of apple trees, understanding the life cycle of the trees even if you haven't experienced one yet, etc.

Neither is superior -- each experience contributes to knowledge in different ways. One's own experience is not necessarily superior to the experiences of others, save in your own mind.

Which brings us back to my original point about "experience" being subjective and biased. If someone has never seen an apple and I give them a crabapple and say it's an apple, does their experience of eating an "apple" equal knowing about apples? If instead I give them a Granny Smith, do they "know" apples are all tart and small and green? What if they go out and pick an "apple," but mistake a pear for an apple? Or get one that is underripe or wormy? Do they then "know" what apples taste like?

Or does knowledge come when one compares one's experiences with others?

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: NicoleC
Date: 06 Feb 03 - 07:06 PM

Nope, I gotcha Daylia, and definately not offended in anyway from you sayin' those nice things. Your last post makes perfect sense to me. Or at least I think so... we're agreeing, right? :)

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Rustic Rebel
Date: 06 Feb 03 - 07:36 PM

Ah, Terry Bisson the Master of science fiction and fantasy quill. Funny Amos!

Nicole- I also thought your explaination of self insemination was very interesting. I suppose that could have been something that happened. Worth the consideration.

Daylia- I believe life on earth started way before the people of the Bible started writing their stories. We do have scientific proof of that. I also think we were visited long before the people of the bible.
They weren't Gods, only percieved as Gods. When I said messing with people, well what's this all about-burning meat so they can smell the aroma (the sacrifices),killing a man (I can't remember who that was right now) because he spilled his semen on the ground, hanging out in the mountains and giving Moses the commandments that people are to follow, saving some people and letting many die, being a jealous God and who were they jealous of? Anyway the list goes on with my interpretation of this book.

We have talked about another religion that deals with this on another thread. It is called Urantia and they don't hesitate to explain about aliens in this religion. As a matter of fact aliens are the basis of this religion. It is actually an interesting read. In it - there are claims that earth is an experimental planet.
One can judge for themselves-Urantia, the book

Spaw I get a good laugh every time I come here!

Peace. Rustic
P.S. Yes Daylia, I am a woman.

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: *daylia*
Date: 06 Feb 03 - 08:25 PM

Yup Nicole we're agreeing! :-)

Bill on second thought you can have all of my balderdash for free, as long as I get my much anticipated and complimentary copy of the Critique. And hey, just because Kant had it easy doesn't mean you Kant too! ReKant! ReKant!

Rustic I'll check out Urantia later - thanks for posting the link. Saw something about the Raelian (sp?) clones on the news today too ...

Meanwhile I've just experienced a 'direct divine revelation' in the form of a fuzzy feelin in the noggin and a kindly inner voice intoning "Get Ye Off-line ... Get Ye Offline ... Get Ye Offline ..." I'll interpret it as a loving warning that my eyes are getting square and I might get confused with an alien tomorrow if I don't log off now ... I CHOOSE TO ACT UPON THAT WISDOM! AND SO REAP MOST BENEFICIAL REWARDS!!!

Blessings to all - (aliens too!) - daylia

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Bobert
Date: 06 Feb 03 - 08:45 PM

Nevermind....

Ahhh, sorry, I thought I'd stick my head in to see what's so intersting and unless I want to be up in til reading every post since the last I was here, I don't have a clue.

With that said, can I just throw a few things into the mix.

First of all I confessed to having seen a real live UFO so I ought to get 3 or 4 points for that and second, Iz a Christain which I reckon ougtta give me another 3 or 4 so I'z somewhere between 6 and 8 points and if we're talking a 10 poihnt system here, I'z got between an F and a B.

Well, now, I don't know about heartburn. Well, yes I do, but it ain't got nuthin to do with hearing the Holy Spririt.

Second, take the Old Testament (save the Psalms and a parts Proverbs, Isiah, Jeremiah, Deuteronomy and Job) and throw it in the river. Get you into the New Testament anfd the story begins to make a lot of sense and provides great road map for a spiritual life.
\
Well, that's my contribution for now. Just thought I'd jump this speeding run away train, say hey, and get the heck off so...

Hey.

Bobert

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Little Hawk
Date: 06 Feb 03 - 11:13 PM

Pardon me, Nicole, I was really in a bad mood. What you say is well reasoned. Any direct experience provides only some knowledge, certainly not all knowledge about what is being experienced, and yes, it is subjective.

Still though, I find direct experience to be the most powerful teacher possible...far better than books and other people's opinions. That is all I was saying.

Regarding "knowing" God, you have to talk to someone who actually does...which is not me...I just believe in and know various stuff about God (as I define the word "God", which may not be someone else's definition of it). I do know God is there...but I can't prove it to anyone in their terms. That doesn't mean I know God...that's a whole further experience. If you don't believe there is such a thing as "God" (again, this depends on your definition of what you think the word "God" means, doesn't it?...), then you would not be open to fair consideration of someone else's experience of knowing God, even if they did genuinely know God, would you?

How can I talk to someone usefully about something which they are certain is completely imaginary? It would be like the alien in Amos's post above talking to the other alien about "sentient meat". A futile, and downright laughable exercise.

This is why it gets people not too far, generally, discussing these matters with people whose basic beliefs are radically different.

Basic beliefs shape everyone's reality. As you believe, so it appears...to you.

Daylia's explanation of the practical applications of believing in spiritual things is most apt, and offers up 3 useful examples of what might happen, given a certain experience and how the person interpreted it.

If your spirituality is based on positive notions such as: I am valuable, so are other people, we all have equal rights, I should treat others as kindly and fairly as I would want them to treat me, I will strive to assist others and improve myself, and so on...

Then that could be quite helpful in life, couldn't it?

If, on the other hand, it's based on bigoted notions such as: My religion is the one only true religion, it's the only way, it's the best, anyone who isn't in it is damned, I must convert others to my religion, those who aren't like me are the enemy, and so on...

Then we've seen the disasters that leads to.

I'm inclined to live and let live, and I identify with religions and groups that feel that way as well.

I agree with Bobert. You can throw out most of the Old Testament, at least as a literal guide to human conduct. It's vicious and bigoted in the extreme by modern standards. It gives me the feeling that the 12 tribes of Israel were a very cruel and violent bunch of people on the whole. The New Testament has many good teachings to offer (although I find some of the apostle Paul's stuff quite unpleasant). So do the Hindu, Buddhist, Taoist, Muslim, and Native American religions. There are certain sects in almost every religion that are fanatical, exclusivist, and extremely dangerous (like the Wahabbis in Islam)...but then, you could say that about political factions too, couldn't you?

As for debating...no, I don't really like debating much, because it becomes an ego game. I like discussing. A discussion is a cooperative effort involving mutual exploration of a subject. A debate is a competition in search of verbal victory.

Sometimes the two get mixed up together. That's troublesome. In politics, debating is outright war by means of words. I don't consider that healthy. It brings out the worst in people, and it's one of the reasons why our political system has become so corrupt. Victory is more important than truth or brotherhood in such a system. In fact, victory is all that matters. And that's war.

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Bill D
Date: 07 Feb 03 - 12:22 AM

"ReKant!" bah!, HumeBug! (VERY in joke among philosophers)

Boy, I am so far behind, I dare not try to comment on all the pieces of this...but you asked, daylia....so, regarding "is there any balderdash"? (I have enuf, thanks...ain't buying no mo')...no, no balderdash in your post, but there is a LOT buried in this:

"The recognition and interpretation of any event is entirely up to the one who experiences it."

...including, presumably, the 'event' of reading that sentence. Are you sure you want to claim that all 'events' are entirely subjective? That's what Hume (David) claimed, in contradiction to Kant...(well, at least he claimed you couldn't prove otherwise). Both of them made statements to the effect that "all knowlege begins with experience"...and then proceeded to head in totally different directions ..*grin* Hume went so far as to argue that no one could 'prove' that anything existed outside their own subjective experience.

Now, after making this claim, Hume noted in a footnote that although he was convinced of the tightness of his argument, he sometimes had emotional problems dealing with it...he just couldn't ACT as though it were all subjective.....And I suspect that's at the core of some of the differences between the posters here--they have convinced themselves of things that they can't wrap their minds around.

People use 'words' to talk of Gods, inner conciousness, souls, Nirvana, ghosts, etc., etc......when they often have little idea what they mean themselves. They like thinking they have said something about something, but like an old woman once said of some current "navel gazing" pop songs, "why, he's singin' about air!"

I have often made remarks about 'proof'...and my point is not that I can dis-prove claims people make, but rather that they have not proved them, and **IF** they do not have the kind of proof that one can show others, then their experience IS only subjective, and discussing it is only word games!

No...there's no law agin' word games, or agin' folks getting together and doing it as a group, or in electing a leader of their group, or paying him a salary.....etc.....but I sure hate to see them come out of their meetings and presume to inform ME that the results of their discussions are binding on ME...but, that is basically what is happening a lot, and that a major reason why I enter these discussions.

Rustic Rebel noted "The Urantia Book", which I have mentioned before..(as well as "Oahspe" and others)...what if I managed to get a majority of the Congress to accept the details and teachings of EITHER of those and we started to see laws, wars, taxes, etc....based on the concept "that earth is an experimental planet" placed here by strange aliens?...you see? I cannot prove they are wrong!

ah, well...I keep returning to one point, don't I? *big, silly smile*

I just maintain that we can have love, beauty, art, songs, deep emotion and human creativity...even literature ABOUT mysticism, religion, ESP and aliens, without buying into the idea that any of them are literally true fact.

But, as I have said, I suspect that many would find it boring to see things from my curmudgeonly point of view...*grin*...in any case, I sure don't expect to change many minds. I do, however, hope to make a few work harder...and, who knows?, "...the horse may learn to sing."

(old joke ...details on request)

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: GUEST,Magpie
Date: 07 Feb 03 - 02:34 AM

LH-

I confess i am confused by your response to my post. You seem to be picking and choosing - placing credence in the teachings of Jesus ("spiritual truths") while discounting key elements of the saga - in particular, the Immaculate Conception, which is sort of a vital aspect.

Moreover, how does your handwaving away of the miraculous differ significantly from the dismissal of UFO evidence that you were criticizing earlier?

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: *daylia*
Date: 07 Feb 03 - 09:59 AM

Bill - regarding "the horse may learn to sing", have you seen this little gem that someone (I think Beccy) posted on another thread a while back? HE HE HE ... click on the horses to have some fun! And sure, what's the details of that old joke? Humour is SO divine ...

And regarding " No...there's no law agin' word games, or agin' folks getting together and doing it as a group, or in electing a leader of their group, or paying him a salary.....etc.....but I sure hate to see them come out of their meetings and presume to inform ME that the results of their discussions are binding on ME...but, that is basically what is happening a lot, and that a major reason why I enter these discussions."

I couldn't agree more. Whenever any person or group tries to influence me (unless I've invited them to do so), much less manipulate or control me by insisting that 'This is right and everything else is wrong', something inside me starts quietly chuckling (maybe it's that divine 'inner voice'!). Big warning lights start going off in my mind's eye, and I don't walk but RUN in the opposite direction.

Unfortunately that IS the track record of most religious institutions to date. Which is why I don't have much use for things 'religious'. I much prefer the spiritual, which in my understanding is PERSONAL, not social.

I've read that many ancient esoteric 'mystery schools' hung a sign over their door that read "KNOW THYSELF". That is, imo the only way to find what is truly 'spiritual' in the myriad of traditions/beliefs that claim to be 'spiritual' out there today. Joseph Campbell's work is also an excellent guide, IMO.

And regarding rituals, ceremonies and other institutionalized methods of "knowing God", I really like this old Buddhist saying:

"I chop wood. I carry water. This is the way to enlightenment."

daylia

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Bill D
Date: 07 Feb 03 - 01:34 PM

joke:

a court jester somehow offended the king...The king, an unforgiving sort, sentenced him to death!

The jester, being a quick-witted sort, said,"But Sire, if you execute me, I won't be able to complete my surprise project for you!"

"And what is that supposed to be?", asked the king.

"Well, I am slowly teaching your favorite horse to sing! It will take about 10 years."......
So the king, who REALLY loved his horse, decided to allow the jester to try it.

As the jester was led out, one of the guards whispered to him.."That was fast thinking, but who are you kidding? No one has ever seen a singing horse." (not even Big Bill Broonzy)

"Well, I know what you mean," said the jester, " but in 10 years, a lot can happen; I may die anyway...the king may die...or, who knows, the horse may learn to sing!"

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: *daylia*
Date: 07 Feb 03 - 01:53 PM

Hee-haw! Hee-haw! Hee-haw!

Ooops, is that the right animal?

Neeeiiiiigggghhhhh ......   :-) thanks Bill!

PS you're right about the word "event". THAT'S what was bugging me when I re-read my post. Not all events are subjective (ie. the sunrise). It's the interpretation of them that is personal! "Experience" would have been a better choice, but I'd used it enough times already I thought!

Sorry bout the 'drift', Rustic.

daylia

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: catspaw49
Date: 07 Feb 03 - 01:56 PM

I think the drift is the best thing that could have happened to this sucker............Wanna' talk about carp? We had a nice carp discussion going on some other thread...........

Spaw

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: *daylia*
Date: 07 Feb 03 - 02:13 PM

Sure, lets talk about crap! Ooops, that's crap. I MEAN C-R-A, no C-A-P, no ...

Forget it. Sounds fishy to me!

daylia

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Penny S.
Date: 07 Feb 03 - 02:22 PM

The Immaculate Conception is not essential to the Biblical narrative, since it isn't there - see above, a long way above. It is about Mary's birth, not Jesus, and the Bible gives little information about Mary.

Thank you Nicole, for supplying information which I couldn't recall.

I didn't go into everything I could have said, being short of time, but only implied it. To be explicit, Jesus was either the result of a miracle, which does not need, and should not have, explanations placed on it which depend on physical states of extreme peculiarity (especially in this case, which I'll come back to), or of a normal sexual relationship.

The point of the Incarnation was that God became like us. (This is probably true of those other virgin stories which Little Hawk referred to.) The more odd the process of Jesus birth, the less true is the Incarnation. If it depended on Mary being a chimera or a hermaphrodite, Jesus is not like us. If God says, I will be born as a baby, and makes it so, not abhoring the Virgin's womb, he could be more like us than that. If God says, I will be born in the ordinary way, to a married couple who know each other in love, he would be most like us. I would prefer if it were that way.

When I was prepared for confirmation, the curate asked if anyone had a problem with the virgin birth. I kept quiet. He than explained that it was important because one of Joseph's ancestors had committed some offence to God and his descendants were hence barred from the Davidic throne. I still kept quiet. If that was his best argument, he had a very weak case.

I feel that those who want Jesus to have been the result of a miracle have a serious problem with human love and its expression. That some don't want his birth to have been painful and messy, is more understandable, but if God was going to use the "beam me out" method of emerging from the womb, why bother going in there in the first place. It defeats the object. If they want the birth to have been in the absence of midwives, there is another odd problem in their minds as well, about women. (What does it mean if God is brought into the world by normal women, and then seen out of it by them, as well?)

If it is necessary to postulate that Mary was 13, we need to look very carefully at the men concerned with that belief. Still carrying the purity of the child? Really? Like the children sought out in the belief that sex with a virgin cures AIDS? The way these men see women is profoundly flawed. (And if some who go along with this are women, maybe thay haven't thought it through very carefully.) I wouldn't want one in charge of any young girls in my care. If the Incarnation is about God becoming one with us, and he refuses to involve himself with a woman, as if he could not know that an older woman was still a virgin, if that were necessary, then the Incarnation is not for women. Mary has to be more of an adult than that. Yes, God could ensure that her poorly developed womb and bones could carry him safely, but why should he? If that is part of his message, then I know what sort of man he was, and I want nothing of him.

However, the small knowledge I have of God is not like that. God could be born of a rape victim, and still be God. God could be born of a prostitute, and still be God. Of a woman of any age, of a couple in any circumstances, and still be God. I think he would prefer to be conceived and carried in love, but if he can arrange a safe birth from a thirteen year old, he could probably get over that limitation, if necessary.

If you believe that God became one of us, the physical details shrink into insignificance beside that amazing event. Or should. If the physical details become vital to the belief, you need to look at the core again. God became man. Or he didn't. That's all that matters.

Penny

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Art Thieme
Date: 08 Feb 03 - 03:34 PM

238 posts in this thread,
238 posts,
If one of these posts just keels over dead,
There's 237 posts in this thread...

(continue---------and soon it'll be all gone)

Art Thieme

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Little Hawk
Date: 09 Feb 03 - 10:07 AM

You're probably right, Art, because I simply haven't got time for it right now. Have fun! I intend to.

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Little Hawk
Date: 10 Feb 03 - 12:37 PM

Thank you for the links, Insider. There is a phenomenon I have observed countless times, which is:

People with a preconceived prejudiced idea of "how things are" (and that includes just about everybody) have a strong tendency to discount or ignore any evidence that refutes or alters their established view of how things are. As a result, they seldom even encounter such evidence, except in passing, so to speak, and they do not dwell on it because they don't believe it in the first place. They do dwell on things which they do believe.

There are only 2 likely events which can cause them to change their minds...

1. A direct encounter with such radical new evidence, in a way which is undeniable.

2. A statement in favour of such new evidence by an authority in whom they place great trust. The authority can be said to be a "father" or "mother" figure. Most commonly that authority is the government, the news media, a church, the scientific community, the economic advisors, the medical community.

In cases where these authorities decide, for strong reasons of their own, to mislead the public, to lie, or to conceal information...then it is probable that they will succeed in fooling most of the people most of the time.

This has been demonstrated amply in every powerful dictatorship and every corrupt government since the dawn of civilization.

Unless confronted directly by stark reality most people simply go on believing whatever it is that they already believe, and all the more so if their "leaders" tell them to believe it.

"Don't follow leaders" - Bob Dylan   

Think for yourself.

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Clinton Hammond
Date: 10 Feb 03 - 12:46 PM

"Think for yourself."

"Ya... think about how dumb the average person is... Now what you have to remember is that half the people are dumber than that"

-George Carlin-

Is the human race a good candidate for 'thinking for itself'?

Again, so far the evidence is against it!

:-)

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: *daylia*
Date: 10 Feb 03 - 02:44 PM

Hey Clinton did you think that 'evidence' up yourself?

daylia

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Clinton Hammond
Date: 10 Feb 03 - 02:46 PM

No daylia

God told me...

:-)

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: *daylia*
Date: 10 Feb 03 - 02:54 PM

OK, and the initial premise of this thread is that 'GOD=ALIENS'. Is there something you want to tell us Clinton?!?   :-)    daylia

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Clinton Hammond
Date: 10 Feb 03 - 03:05 PM

Ya... that there are a lot of people in this thread, don't know satrie when they read it...

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Little Hawk
Date: 10 Feb 03 - 03:30 PM

"Satrie"? We don't need no steenkin' satrie, Clinton! :-)

Man, the view is just gorgeous from up here! See ya...

zzzzzzooooommm!

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Cluin
Date: 10 Feb 03 - 03:35 PM

Are we there yet?

How much looooooooooongerrrrrrrr????

Are we there yet?

There better be a pool...

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Rustic Rebel
Date: 10 Feb 03 - 06:30 PM

Twilight Zone theme song playing in backround.

Imagine this if you will...Keith (insider) and Rustic Rebel on the same wavelength.
Before coming here today I went to do some reading about the Raelian Revolution. (Taliesn mentioned them on another thread) I was sidetracked and found this place with historical artwork of UFO's! I thought if this thread was still going I would post the link. An interesting site. Matthew Hurley
That's not all Keith. I also went into some research on the Sumerian and Akkadian texts (inscribed in clay) and read a bit about this.This suggested that ET's were in our solar system 240,000 years ago- when kingship descended from heaven and founded 5 cities in the Mesopotamian plain.
I also read a story about the gods and the great flood (from the tablets) and it was very similar in ways to the Bible's flood.

Clinton your back and as amusing as ever! You too Cluin!
Peace. Rustic

PS. I went to a small blues fest this weekend where Canned Heat played. I met Fito de la Parra, the soul survivor of the band. It was also his birthday. I had e-mailed him earlier that week to bring me his book-Living the Blues-and he did it! I now have an autographed copy from Fito! (Just had to share that!)

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: *daylia*
Date: 11 Feb 03 - 05:44 PM

GUEST the Insider - thanks for the links. The art is beautiful and thought-provoking, and the search for the 10th planet? Hmmmmmm .... fascinating!

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Rustic Rebel
Date: 11 Feb 03 - 07:59 PM

Daylia, I thought this thread was on it's way out but since you 'revived' it again, you should check out that link I gave of Matthew Hurley's site. It has many beautiful painting and pictures of those petroglyphs I spoke about way back on this thread. I agree that they are thought provoking. I haven't checked out the search for the 10th planet. Interesting you say? I will have to go there.
Peace. Rustic

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: *daylia*
Date: 11 Feb 03 - 09:05 PM

Thanks Rustic - just bookmarked Matthew Hurley's site too. Most intriguing! Can only absorb so much at once, but the paintings make the effort a pleasure.

I always wondered whether 'credible' evidence about a subject like UFO's really existed - especially for the habitually 'incredulous'. This collection of artwork, the record of events it reveals ... thought-provoking indeed!

Peace   :-)   daylia

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Bill D
Date: 11 Feb 03 - 09:09 PM

with a little effort, I could make an entire argument that most 'disk' images were drawn from halos and hats and crowns and bowls and rocks and other 'naturally round and/or domed items'...even from the sun and moon...But that would be a much less interesting hypothesis, huh?

We see what we want to see....

I can wonder at those paintings, but statements in the page like this:
"Some people believe they may represent ET beings." really bemuse me. Of course "some people" believe that...some people really believe that fairies are real also. Perhaps they are...I can't 'prove' them wrong.

A WWW search in Google for mandala images will show how pervasive circles (of MANY sorts) are in the history of art.

(By the way...I am a science fiction fan who would LOVE to see a real alien or UFO....and I have no doubt that somewhere in the universe there MUST be life besides our own planet. It would please me a lot to have answers before I die...but I won't hold my breath, as I don't look good in blue...;>)"

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: *daylia*
Date: 11 Feb 03 - 09:52 PM

Thanks Bill! The mandalas are wonderful! I just about lost myself in "Images of Sanity and Compassion in Tibetan Buddhism".

A most welcome - and timely - diversion indeed, especially after spending time with Mark Twains "The War Prayer" and revisions thereof today.   :-(

Good point about the circles, too. Several of the beautiful depictions of the Buddha also show small spherical objects 'hovering' nearby the seated figures. Hmmmmmmmmmmm

daylia

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: catspaw49
Date: 11 Feb 03 - 10:11 PM

Notice how fat Buddha is? Those "circles" are little clouds of methane emanating from his ass.........

Spaw

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: Cluin
Date: 12 Feb 03 - 03:18 PM

Gawd in Betelgeuse!!! Now are we gonna play "Spot the Extraterrestrials in Art"?!!!

We're already up to friggin' near 300 posts.

Subject: RE: BS: UFO's and the Bible
From: TIA
Date: 12 Feb 03 - 03:38 PM

Holy shit!

Starry Night...vapor trails!

Edvard Munch...that's no screamin' human, it's a Gray!