I am sorry and don't want to offend anyone but I am just not that into coffee.

Laird Wilcox, who has been described as "an American researcher specializing in the study of political fringe movements" identifies 21 alleged traits of a "political extremist":

A tendency to Character assassination
Name calling and labeling
The making of irresponsible, sweeping generalizations
The failure to give adequate proof of assertions made
Advocacy of double standards
A tendency to view opponents and critics as essentially evil
A Manichean (bipolar) world view
Advocating some degree of censorship and/or repression of their opponents and critics
Identifying themselves by reference to whom their enemies are
A tendency to substitute intimidation for argument
Widely use slogans, buzzwords and "thought-terminating clichés"
Claim some kind of moral or other superiority over others
Doomsday thinking
A tendency to believe that it is justified to do bad things in the service of a supposedly "good" cause
An emphasis on emotional response, as opposed to reasoning and logical analysis
Hypersensitivity and "vigilance"
"May claim" some kind of supernatural, mystical or divinely-inspired rationale for their beliefs and actions
An inability to tolerate ambiguity and uncertainty
"Groupthink"
The personalization of hostility
A tendency to assume that the system is defective if one is defeated

Sounds like... Obama

This one kind of stuck out in my mind. What happens when people believe that God is at war with a Demon? Then they tend to view the world in a bipolar way (i.e. those who are on God's side, and those who are not).

It would seem to me that people who subscribe to the notion that God is at war with an evil Demon really have no choice but to hold this view since this is their underlying view of what they believe to be the true nature of reality.

Once they are in this war-mongering mindset then anything goes because they also believe that "All's fair in love and war"

I even see people lying to proselytize this very mindset. They seem to believe that anything goes as long as they are supporting what they believe to be the 'good God' in this picture of God's at war. They even view lying for God's sake as being ok.

Of course, they refuse to even recognize the evil Demon as a God in its own right. They pretend that it has no real power of its own and that only God has the power. Which kind of blows away their whole notion that God is at war in the first place. Yet they totally ignore this utter inconsistency.

There was something about that in there too wasn't there?

Ah yes,…

Advocacy of double standards
The failure to give adequate proof of assertions made
Identifying themselves by reference to whom their enemies are
A tendency to substitute intimidation for argument
Widely use slogans, buzzwords and "thought-terminating clichés"
Claim some kind of moral or other superiority over others
Doomsday thinking,….
….


Oh wait,… I just realized the whole post was about those people.

Never mind.

Oh, by the way, I'm not offended by the tea at all. I actually prefer it over coffee.

Thanks Roy!

James, I was just checking that out. The bipolar caught my attention, too.

I came across this which seemed interesting to me.

Fanaticism is an emotion of being filled with excessive, uncritical zeal, particularly for an extreme religious or political cause, or with an obsessive enthusiasm for a pastime or hobby.

According to philosopher George Santayana, "Fanaticism consists in redoubling your effort when you have forgotten your aim"[1]; according to Winston Churchill, "A fanatic is one who can't change his mind and won't change the subject". By either description the fanatic displays very strict standards and little tolerance.

The difference between a fan and a fanatic is that while both have an overwhelming liking or interest in a given subject, behaviour of a fanatic will be viewed as violating prevailing social norms, while that of a fan will not violate those norms (although is usually considered unusual).[2]

A fanatic differs from a crank in that the latter term is typically associated with a position or opinion which is so far from the norm as to appear ludicrous and/or provably wrong, while the subject of the fanatic's obsession may well be "normal", with only the scale of involvement being abnormally disproportionate.

I do wish there was a philosophy section on the forums.

That's been requested for several years now, but it appears that the religion forums is meant to be used for this. Actually I think they would have been better off calling this one forum a 'philosophy forum' instead of a 'religious forum'.

Abra

Are you saying that subject would get kicked off of the forum here? I can not see what would be wrong with it. Blessings...Miles

No not at all. I was just agreeing with Roy is all.

~~~
Meaning that it would be nice to have a phiosophy forum where things don't necessarily need to be centered on whether there is or isn't a God.

Well, I screwed that up. I was going to say in one philosophy class I made that same assertion, James and one person told me or gods. So I said oh ok or gods. Whatever, you know. Can we just have a philosophical class since this is Philosophy 101?

Sure i c what you mean no need to mention it. Now my philosphy would be the scriptures because they are part of me. I have people telling me in my normal talk even though i am not talking about the bible they can see it in what I say. So religion is a philosify. I do not know why anyone has to bring up anything about religion yet use it in thier thinking process..Blessings...Miles

Miles, just be lucky you didn't have an athiest father and a holy roller mother like I did. It is part of my upbringing to be an extremist. It was the way I was raised. Extremism has always been difficult for me. Take for instance this text. "I would rather you be hot or cold because if you are lukewarm I will spew you out of my mouth." Or how about this one. "A double-minded man is unstable in all his ways."

BUSH ALERT WARNING WARNING BUSH ALERT

that's all that kept running through my mind as I read Roy's opening post. AHRGGHHHHH BACK AWAY FROM THE VOTING BOOTH WARNIGN BUSH ALERT

oK - WHEW - sweating it out there, won't be over too soon for me.

Actually someone mentioned Obama - I thought McCain. I guess there's no accounting for taste.



Oh sure and then this gets posted and I can think is JSH JSH JSH someone turn off the flashing light - please!.

Interesting though I must say. Tell me something "philisophically speaking" do you think Fanaticism and Fundamentalism can be synonomous?

Yea I know what you mean. Went all the time but thats about all it meant. My mother now she showed her belief by how she was. A true angel. Thats what you heard people say about my mom.But I rebelled against the church when i was 8 and searched untill i was 30. Then I found what i was looking for. I know about extremists. Thier in what i believe also. some making a darn fool out of themselves. But thats just that I guess. But you got to see the extreme both ways so I bet you are pretty rounded and can look back and see things that made u stronger either because you liked something or dispised it..Blessings...Miles

Sure, I understand this perfectly. For a lot of people their religion is their philosophy. No doubt about it.

But for a lot of other people it's not.

Actually the absence of a philosophy forum kind of suggests that only religious philosophies are permissible. Where are the atheists supposed to voice their philosophies? To voice them in politics suggests that they would like to make their philosophies into law, which may not be the case at all.

So in a very real way the absence of a pure philosophy forum is kind of a slap in the face to atheists.

I’m not exactly an atheist, as I do believe in a spiritual aspect to our essence. However, just the same, I can and often do, speak about pantheism from a purely non-religious point of view. Actually the pantheistic view of life can be either religious, or non-religious. It’s a valid philosophy either way.

Clearly the biblical view of an authoritarian Godhead is strictly a religious philosophy and could not even be thought of as a non-religious philosophy because it is entirely based on the idea of specific writings being the word of a God.

There is nothing in pantheism that is dependent upon the input of a sentient God. It can all be understood entirely intuitively, just from the basic premise of what it implies - that all is one. And that can be true for a theist or an atheist.

Actually the religious people would be happier if there were a philosophy forum because I would almost never post in the religious forums anymore.

But I would probably still comment on the falsity of the biblical doctrine in the philosophy forum because even outside of religion that history is a valid part of humanity and is open to pure philosophical discussion. Which is how I always discuss it anyway.

That is why I like philosophy, Miles. In a concept you can have an absolute or perfection. They are like standards that can be judged against. Take the perfect vacuum for instance. It can exist in a concept but I have heard that nature abhors it. I think it is about 29.7 was the last I heard it can get. Or the perfect circle can exist in a concept but pi is like 22/7. Which goes back to tolerance in the way machinists can measure with plus or minus. I like the term no absolutes. It is easy to deal with. Take for instance, temperature. You can have above or below zero but as long as you can measure cold it will always heat to it. I would say that absolute cold would be almost impossible to measure. I am just guessing.

Yea I know what you mean. Something that has intriqued me for years now is at MIT in 2001 they reported that they had stopped light in a vaccuum and could make it also go the speed they wanted it two. @ scientists in 2003 talked about this. They said great progress had come along and thier projections was they would move a object at the speed of light a distance by 2005. They also said that before 2007 that a human would be trasfered at the speed of light just as the chair was. Now we hear nothing about thia as if it was true they could do this then the milatary aplications of it would be numerous. I personally believe they have done it. As being in the AF serving in a secret position we were told star wars would take Russia down. Now star wars was suppose to stopp yet it did not the money was just rerouted.The porpuse of star wars was to be able to shoot anything down with a laser. To do this they needed power. solar power in space would produce this. I told people on the forums when the USA said thier new missille defence was abord a ship when Korea was going to test 7 i think missilles with 1 the last able to reach the US. I spoke of star wars and it had been completed and said the one that would reach the US or any other country would mysteriousy fail. The 1st 6 fell into the ocean. The 7th long range one failed for no reason and broke apart. And we did not fire our new missile system we were told of.I have no doubt that it was shot down by a laser and also the next day Russia test fired a long range missille and it went down and Russia reported they can not find it either. a week later Pres Bush was interviewed by NBC and when asked if this new missille ststem was our defence against long range missilles he replied he could not speak about it.. Why would he say that. The white house propoganda had for weeks before touted this new missille system. Thier can be only one reason for his answer. Star wars works and what we are showing is nothing but for show.Which myself being on Reagans Rapid Deployment force ourt of Clovis NM. Were told alot of things as we played war games alot as our mission was to protect the Straight of Hormuz and we were to within 72 hours be flying sorties out of Saudi Arabia. It was interesting that when Desert storm started to watch and listen to all the lies they were telling the people and the technology that all of suddened appeared that the computer power it would take for these new systems would be about what we have now as the best we are shown. So this vaccuum stopping light and our military power we have with this technology we had no need to be in Iraq or Afganistan when we could not even find 1 man then when sending a missile over pakastan to kill him we 1st contacted Pakistan and let them know what we were going to do and bin laden had a 2 hours to leave as it went straight to him. We did not want to kill him. Then in Iraq I believe this is a ploy to make us look weak. That the USA all along wants that type thought around the world that we are weak. This way when other terrorists attacks happen that other nations and possibly Russia as Mccain does not want diplomatic talks any more with Russia that the hope they will attach our military when we go in a country again. This being so we can take them out and anyone with them with lasers and also take leaders out as these lasers being told what to do by our spy sattallites and GPS system a pin point of any leader who might oppose us we will assinate making it look as if lightning did it.Aries the new space shuttle which is so big it needs to go up in 2 pieces which we get little press abouut says thier intentiomns. As aries was known as the g-d of war.Which i believe all has to happen in this world for the world to fall at our feet.It is the way we have always done business and always will. As NASA always has a reason for the naming of its space age philosify.As the spce station was name the Enterprise and the shuttle that goes back and forth from earth is Columbia. Both being named after star trak. The columbia was the shuttle that would go back and forth from earth. So we have no reason not to believe the naming of Aries has the same significance also. So what do we do.. Probally sit back and enjoy the show... shalom...Miles