This is just childish, yet far too common trait fo christians (America, churches)

[Asheville Native]

Update: Does kudzu look like Jesus on cross? : News-Record.com : Greensboro & the Triad's most trusted source for local news and analysis (http://www.news-record.com/content/2011/06/29/article/kudzu_growth_resembles_jesus_on_cross_some_say - broken link)

It's kudzu on a pole, that is what kudzu does. Kudzu is an invasive species imported from Japan that covers huge swaths of countryside in the south east.

[manquaman]

Are you sure its not a sign of the second coming?

[SuperSoul]

How respectful of you. Way to make yourelf look unchildish.

[allen antrim]

"Far to common" ?

a "trait" ?

So you have data to back this up? How do you judge "far to common"? What is your criteria? What is a "trait", and how do you place your concept within the entire religion? What gives you the right to make this judgement (since you have no structure or data?)? Since you merely post an opinion and have no philosophical structure to validate anything here, you are lost in mere subjective opinion and really say nothing; in that case...well, except to appeal to other baseless subjective opinions (is that not like the blind leading the blind?). Or are you just looking at isolated events reported in the media that some how has convinced you that the quantity of the media incidents equals the entire quantity of the entire religion? Perhaps it is actually the "childish, all to common trait" of simple minded folk who equate reported incidents from media as equalling their entire knowledge of reality that is really at work here-long live the American simpleton state. Philosophy has really become non-philosophy when it lowers itself to this inanity rather than dealing with the concept.

When I was in Copenhagen, thinking over Kierkegaard's grave, after having just looked at Hans Christian Anderson's head stone....well, when I was about finished thinking, my impatient wife wanted to get to the little museum there, so along we went.

Turns out the "real" head stone of Anderson was inside the museum. It had broken in two sometime ago and an exact duplicate was made that replaced the "real". If one does not go to the museum, one never knows that the head stone at the grave is a "simulation".

There is a law for simulation, that it goes through. The real is replaced by the simulation, and then the simulation is replaced by another, a second order simulation, and somewhere in this movement the simulation becomes the "real" displacing the original (I suppose this law may be conditioned by the mental level of the observers in a lot of cases; the dumber the observer the easier to pass a simulation off as the real). This is what happened to Anderson's head stone, for me as the observer, ignorant of the switch, the simulation had become the real; that is, until I "discovered" the real, then I realized the "trick".

Obviously, philosophy has become a simulation, of the highest order, as mere opinion now passes as deep insight. And those who wish to be true philosophers, those who wish to search the concept, will have to back track to rediscover the real (one will have to do this on one's own nowadays, as obviously the herd is lost in many simulations simultaneously); or else remain in the world of simulation-themselves being simulations of thinkers.

[allen antrim]

Well, let me see if I can bring this thread into philosophy and divest it of ridicule and a feeling of superiority, with the tendency to marginalize a group of people as somehow stupid. After all, if one deconstructs the orignal post, that is what lies between the lines. Of course, we are in the post modern; therefore, the original intent of its author is irrelevant; the text is its "own thing" that the reader must, in a transcendental or idealist fashion, must bring into cognition. And if he/she wants to avoid sucking up by scabbing his opinion with the text, but desires to reach some genuine thought, one reaches for understanding and ignores opinion.

The picture presented does look like those crosses that some churches put out around Easter, I believe, and drape cloth (purple) on them. The plant (and type) and pole are irrelevant except for the occasion for the "presentation" of the idea. Therefore to attempt sarcasm at this point is futile. Cloth is also cloth, that is what it is, but it too can be representational (just as all things are representational for mind, mind does not get the "real" thing in the brain except through sensate activity: representation). Imagination projects the idea on to the object (Art is similar in what ever medium, and is the most abstract or near the idea when in words as thoughts are words, but inwardly-the word exteriorized is social).

Imagination is probably strongest in youth and more remote from the idea, and obviously wanes with age, it should not, but should become mature and be in conjunction with an idea or aid in developing the idea. For example, the fist iron ship with a revolving gun turret (the Monitor) was referred to as a "cheese box on a raft", because that is how it looked, in a general form (minus much detail). I do not know if Erricson, its inventor, was stimulated toward the idea by seeing a cheese box on a plate, but one could think that some sort of incident spurred his imagination. For the people at that time, a phrase or an actual similar representation of "a cheese box on a raft" brought up in mind the Monitor, either pictorially (lower), or at a higher representation; the idea.

In higher thought, or consciousness, the mind is driven to view the idea in thought as thought, rather than in exterior "things" or picture thought. Bringing the "thing" into existence brings the idea into "actuality" (in thought, as idea, the "thing" is real, and there is the idea that in thought, a thought may also be brought into an actuality as pure thought, after all thoughts have reality in their sphere as well-early christians proved god's existence in this way with out the need for the external "thing" [see Anselm], as the external thing is always mere representation anyway for mind). Lower consciousness skips the idea (reflectedly I guess) and goes straight to the "thing"-as the child or animal (qualitatively different, of course). Simple people (and as one becomes complex one does not leave the simple behind him, he merely complexifies it, transforms it into a higher order) need the exterior form for the mind (which means, the idea is not as developed), where as more complex people need the idea that is in the mind and is thought, not external form (this is why the christians destroyed so much pagan symbols, catholic statues, alters, and such: despite the ravings found at data forum, these christians, in a higher mental form were destroying the exterior form of the idea and retreating into a higher form of consciousness based on the idea only, and were signifying this paradigm shift in mind, where the idea remained and developed in consciousness rather than the "exterior"). The complex person can still use the exterior form (the actualization of the idea) but the simple person can not use the idea as easily.

Those who see Jesus in this picture, could be composed of the simpler people who rely on the exterior form for the idea, but also the more complex who rely on the idea, but still have the imagination to see the idea as exterior form, but realizing or knowing that it is only mere representation and that the idea is above it. Christianity, especially protestantism, is one of the highest expressions of consciousness because it is the idea which is primary, as it forbids the making of exteriorized forms of its idea. One sometimes see forms in clouds, one sees forms from mountain profiles, etc, and no one thinks anything of it. Why is this different?

[Asheville Native]

Originally Posted by allen antrim

Well, let me see if I can bring this thread into philosophy and divest it of ridicule and a feeling of superiority, with the tendency to marginalize a group of people as somehow stupid. After all, if one deconstructs the orignal post, that is what lies between the lines. Of course, we are in the post modern; therefore, the original intent of its author is irrelevant; the text is its "own thing" that the reader must, in a transcendental or idealist fashion, must bring into cognition. And if he/she wants to avoid sucking up by scabbing his opinion with the text, but desires to reach some genuine thought, one reaches for understanding and ignores opinion.

The picture presented does look like those crosses that some churches put out around Easter, I believe, and drape cloth (purple) on them. The plant (and type) and pole are irrelevant except for the occasion for the "presentation" of the idea. Therefore to attempt sarcasm at this point is futile. Cloth is also cloth, that is what it is, but it too can be representational (just as all things are representational for mind, mind does not get the "real" thing in the brain except through sensate activity: representation). Imagination projects the idea on to the object (Art is similar in what ever medium, and is the most abstract or near the idea when in words as thoughts are words, but inwardly-the word exteriorized is social).

Imagination is probably strongest in youth and more remote from the idea, and obviously wanes with age, it should not, but should become mature and be in conjunction with an idea or aid in developing the idea. For example, the fist iron ship with a revolving gun turret (the Monitor) was referred to as a "cheese box on a raft", because that is how it looked, in a general form (minus much detail). I do not know if Erricson, its inventor, was stimulated toward the idea by seeing a cheese box on a plate, but one could think that some sort of incident spurred his imagination. For the people at that time, a phrase or an actual similar representation of "a cheese box on a raft" brought up in mind the Monitor, either pictorially (lower), or at a higher representation; the idea.

In higher thought, or consciousness, the mind is driven to view the idea in thought as thought, rather than in exterior "things" or picture thought. Bringing the "thing" into existence brings the idea into "actuality" (in thought, as idea, the "thing" is real, and there is the idea that in thought, a thought may also be brought into an actuality as pure thought, after all thoughts have reality in their sphere as well-early christians proved god's existence in this way with out the need for the external "thing" [see Anselm], as the external thing is always mere representation anyway for mind). Lower consciousness skips the idea (reflectedly I guess) and goes straight to the "thing"-as the child or animal (qualitatively different, of course). Simple people (and as one becomes complex one does not leave the simple behind him, he merely complexifies it, transforms it into a higher order) need the exterior form for the mind (which means, the idea is not as developed), where as more complex people need the idea that is in the mind and is thought, not external form (this is why the christians destroyed so much pagan symbols, catholic statues, alters, and such: despite the ravings found at data forum, these christians, in a higher mental form were destroying the exterior form of the idea and retreating into a higher form of consciousness based on the idea only, and were signifying this paradigm shift in mind, where the idea remained and developed in consciousness rather than the "exterior"). The complex person can still use the exterior form (the actualization of the idea) but the simple person can not use the idea as easily.

Those who see Jesus in this picture, could be composed of the simpler people who rely on the exterior form for the idea, but also the more complex who rely on the idea, but still have the imagination to see the idea as exterior form, but realizing or knowing that it is only mere representation and that the idea is above it. Christianity, especially protestantism, is one of the highest expressions of consciousness because it is the idea which is primary, as it forbids the making of exteriorized forms of its idea. One sometimes see forms in clouds, one sees forms from mountain profiles, etc, and no one thinks anything of it. Why is this different?

It's kudzu growing up a pole (I'm sure you are familiar with kudzu living in Missouri) nothing more.

To make any more out of it is frankly childish and absurd. The next clump of kudzu might look line a Buick Roadmaster, or the alien from the movie Alien. So......................

[perry335654]

Originally Posted by Asheville Native

Update: Does kudzu look like Jesus on cross? : News-Record.com : Greensboro & the Triad's most trusted source for local news and analysis (http://www.news-record.com/content/2011/06/29/article/kudzu_growth_resembles_jesus_on_cross_some_say - broken link)

It's kudzu on a pole, that is what kudzu does. Kudzu is an invasive species imported from Japan that covers huge swaths of countryside in the south east.

Not this Christian that is ridiculous to see these images and if one did, Christ is not on the cross but resurrected, that is why I don't care for crucifixes

[gabfest]

Silly extremist exist every where.

[allen antrim]

Evidently my philosophy fell on unable to comprehend what is reads eyes (I even got the whole thing highlighted and some cute faces; evidently to convey a thousand words and two faces are to equal 2 thousand; saves typing, I guess, and thought), and merely reinforces what I said about simulation-and on a philosophy thread of all places. The point is not what it looks like, its the development of understanding of how mind sees what it does. Again it has nothing to do with a plant-duh. I drew a similarity with art and imagination, and simple minds want the plant, and that passes for philosophy!

[allen antrim]

Oh, by the way, no one answered my questions from my first post of this highest order philosophy thread discussion.