1. Donationrwingett
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    03 Apr '07 02:01
    Originally posted by knightmeister
    Imagine a man had a PhD in chocolate and had spent his entire life studying chocolate. He had travelled the world studying chocolate in all its forms and had an entire attic full of books on chocolate. He knew every possible chemical variation and make up of any type of chocolate. If you were looking for a world expert on chocolate , this would be the ...[text shortened]... kit- kat and he begins to weep.

    (For chocolate read sex , cheese , a sunset , or God?)
    What if he made a sculpture of Jesus, made out of chocolate?
  2. Joined
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    03 Apr '07 02:05
    Originally posted by Nemesio
    Do you wanna get down on your knees and start pleasin' Jesus? Do
    you want to feel is salvation all over your face?
    EVSOA
  3. Standard memberXanthosNZ
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    03 Apr '07 08:19
    All the big names come out for the really crappy threads.
  4. Standard memberChronicLeaky
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    03 Apr '07 08:24
    Originally posted by Nemesio
    Do you wanna get down on your knees and start pleasin' Jesus? Do
    you want to feel is salvation all over your face?
    Don't listen to Freaky; you just voiced what we all thought, anyway. CLSOA!
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    03 Apr '07 08:59
    Originally posted by knightmeister
    Imagine a man had a PhD in chocolate and had spent his entire life studying chocolate. He had travelled the world studying chocolate in all its forms and had an entire attic full of books on chocolate. He knew every possible chemical variation and make up of any type of chocolate. If you were looking for a world expert on chocolate , this would be the ...[text shortened]... kit- kat and he begins to weep.

    (For chocolate read sex , cheese , a sunset , or God?)
    So, the woman knows what the brains reaction is to the effect of chocolate on the taste buds (and the other effects of chocolate absorption).
    But, given a bar of possible chocolate, which of the two is more likely to be able to really identify whether it truly is chocolate and not some cheap imitation? Surely a good chemist could fool the womans taste buds easier than he could fool the man with a chocolate PhD?

    Anyway if we apply your analogy to God, you are basically saying that it is better to experience God than to study him theologically. The experience of an ignorant Christian would be better than the experience of a PhD in Theology. I would agree with you - if we assume that God exists.
    However are you trying to say more than that? Are you saying that a PhD holder in Chocolatology could never taste chocolate or possibly that his PhD will negatively affect his tasting experience?
    If so, why are you in this forum discussing philosophy? Surely that will negatively impact your experience of life and God?
    Or are you saying that the woman (taster) is actually in a better position to identify whether chocolate is real?
    Please explain the meaning to your story. Parables can truly be useful in assisting people to understand something but if the meaning is not obvious and no explanation is given then they serve no purpose except to try an obfusticate the truth. The story of Adam and Eve is one such obfustication. Everyone seems to have a different interpretation and I personally have never quite got it. Whenever I try to ask theists about it they often end up showing that they too do not understand it but rather think that they do or simply think that the answer must be there somewhere so leave it at that.
  6. Standard memberknightmeister
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    03 Apr '07 09:29
    Originally posted by scottishinnz
    I just read through your post again and it would equally well apply to a criminologist studying murder scenes.

    So, again, should we all go out and commit murder so that we can know what it feels like?
    There is nothing in the thread that exhorts anyone to taste anything. The thread is about how we know things and the difference between tasting (experience) and knowledge (intellect). If you want to go out and try murder then I suggest you don't because you may get arrested.
  7. Standard memberknightmeister
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    03 Apr '07 09:30
    Originally posted by rwingett
    What if he made a sculpture of Jesus, made out of chocolate?
    Very good LOL
  8. Standard memberknightmeister
    knightmeister
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    03 Apr '07 09:32
    Originally posted by XanthosNZ
    And how is a stupid analogy about chocolate and taste relevent to a discussion of God?

    EDIT: Wait, I've got it, Chocolate is God.
    The fact that you don't get it tells me everything. I would guess that the difference between experiential understanding and intellectual knowledge is not one you would easily appreciate? The chocolate analogy shows how it's quite possible to know a hell of a lot "about" something but still miss the very essence of what's important about it.
  9. Cape Town
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    03 Apr '07 09:40
    Originally posted by knightmeister
    The fact that you don't get it tells me everything. I would guess that the difference between experiential understanding and intellectual knowledge is not one you would easily appreciate? The chocolate analogy shows how it's quite possible to know a hell of a lot "about" something but still miss the very essence of what's important about it.
    I think that everybody knows that experiences are so complex that it is very difficult if not impossible to fully explain an experience to someone else who has not had a similar experience. So why the story, when we all know that already? What are you really trying to say?
  10. Standard memberknightmeister
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    03 Apr '07 09:41
    Originally posted by joneschr
    But was the woman's kit-kat bar really made of chocolate, or simply chocolate substitute? How does she know she's really tasted chocolate? Perhaps the man truly knows chocolate better than the woman. Some might argue that american chocolate isn't really chocolate, in comparison to say, tasty swiss milk chocolate. Perhaps she's lead a life of purchasing fake chocolate.
    Some goods questions here. However , I would argue that at least she would have the opportunity to taste the difference tastes. He doesn't. One could also argue that the sensation is just as important as whether the chocolate is swiss or american. I would also argue that the man will never be able to appreciate what the whole point of chocolate is. If chocolate is never to be tasted what's the point. In this case whether he knows more than the woman or not is neither here nor there because his knowledge is not relevant to him. He would swap it all for one taste.
  11. Standard memberknightmeister
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    03 Apr '07 09:47
    Originally posted by LemonJello
    More crap on gnosis versus episteme. You never addressed my questions in the other thread. For starters, what constitutes the 'real knowledge' you talk about. I want to know what criterial considerations you use to identify it.

    Again, this is nothing more than pragmatic crap: you take experiences that you consider valuable, and you just equate conversance of those experiences with knowledge.
    More crap on gnosis versus epistemeLEMON

    I have no idea why you think this idea to be crap since it is a clearly identified part of psychology and influences education for example. Ever heard of embedding learning through experience , or role plays? Experiential learning versus intellectual learning is a well identified theme . Look at the work of Carl rogers.
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    03 Apr '07 09:53
    If one person says that they tasted chocolate and it was sweet and another tell us that he tasted it and it was sour can we conclude that they are talking about different pieces of chocolate?

    Are the hallucinations induced by drugs as good as your experience of God if it is the experience that counts and not whether or not the experience is 'real'?
    If drugs were shown to be totally harmless, would it be better for us to all just dose ourselves up and enjoy the experience even though it is an illusory experience?

    If a false belief improves your quality of life in some way, it is better to be self deluded?

    What if the false belief merely gives you the illusion that it improves your quality of life?
  13. Cape Town
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    03 Apr '07 09:59
    Originally posted by knightmeister
    He would swap it all for one taste.
    Why? As he has never tasted it, how could he know whether or not it is such a desirable experience? What else would he give up for that experience? If the chocolate was likely to significantly reduce his lifespan or otherwise negatively impact on his quality of life would he still choose to taste it?
    Does the woman think she is superior to the man?
  14. Standard memberknightmeister
    knightmeister
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    03 Apr '07 09:59
    Originally posted by twhitehead
    So, the woman knows what the brains reaction is to the effect of chocolate on the taste buds (and the other effects of chocolate absorption).
    But, given a bar of possible chocolate, which of the two is more likely to be able to really identify whether it truly is chocolate and not some cheap imitation? Surely a good chemist could fool the womans taste bu ...[text shortened]... think that they do or simply think that the answer must be there somewhere so leave it at that.
    Please explain the meaning to your story. Parables can truly be useful in assisting people to understand something but if the meaning is not obviousWHITEY

    Part of the point of a story is you have to think for yourself. I think what I am getting at is that often we live in a world (in the west) where it is taken for granted that the way to know things is through intellectual knowledge. Those with letters after their names are venerated but often they lose touch with something along the way. We get stuck in our heads in a sea of information but intimacy and emotional connection seems lost. When we experience directly there is a vibrancy and realness about how we connect with what we "know" and learn. Our leaders rationalize and intellectualise about Iraq for example , but a week in Baghdad (in a cramped apartment amongst the fighting) would give them a very different learning. They would learn something that can't be taught.
  15. Standard memberknightmeister
    knightmeister
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    03 Apr '07 10:01
    Originally posted by twhitehead
    If one person says that they tasted chocolate and it was sweet and another tell us that he tasted it and it was sour can we conclude that they are talking about different pieces of chocolate?

    Are the hallucinations induced by drugs as good as your experience of God if it is the experience that counts and not whether or not the experience is 'real'?
    If ...[text shortened]...
    What if the false belief merely gives you the illusion that it improves your quality of life?
    This is where the intellect comes in. I am not saying that intellectual knowledge does not have a role. We need to balance them.
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