Anarchy, Equality, Humility, Charity, Community

Five Qualities

Anarchy
Anarchy is the natural and optimal state. We have no authority over one another, and we owe no one. Controlling influences rob people of their will. Without rulers, you develop a knowledge of:
Equality
No one is better or worse than anyone else. We are all in this together. When you know that your worth is the same no matter who you are, what you believe, or what you've done, you are led to:
Humility
Arrogance and Pride are invariably harmful. The Humility that is required to develop friendship also provides:
Charity
A willingness to give what you have for the benefit of all, charity is a recognition of the true nature of property. When charity is extended without discrimination, you create:
Community
People can only come together as one when they choose to not consider their differences important. Living united, a community is commanded by only:
Anarchy


Entered into problogger's Top 5 writing project.

God was in the can

I stayed out with friends till 2:30am talking about theology, free will, morality, religion, consciousness, and philosophy in general. It was a very good conversation and we covered a lot of ground.
It started when an evangelist got on stage for open mic night at the coffeehouse. His first analogy was to compare religions to life jackets. He actually had a variety of life jackets on stage. Apparently when we get on a boat, it is our responsibility to make sure our life jacket isn't fake. Also, Jesus is made of foam.
Next he displayed a large tin can. I think it was a can of pineapples. He said that a human couldn't get into the can, but that that wasn't something to be ashamed of because we weren't designed for that. Then he said God was in the can, and I think the can itself represented sin. Jesus was the can opener.
We were not doing a good job at containing our disbelief, and after his set he came and talked with us. It's a very friendly coffeehouse, so this isn't unusual. I was used to talking to evangelists because I did it almost every week last summer, so I got tired of him pretty fast. CJ kept talking to him till closing time. We were on a roll when we left, so we ended up going to Denny's. I said they should put us far away from people, they asked if we were going to be loud and obnoxious and I said no, but I think that was a mistake.
They put us in a corner, but later in the night two men ended up seated in the booth next to us. They overheard us talking about logic at some point, and joined in briefly. It was cool to make a completely random connection over philosophy and computers.

Synchronicities

This is an excerpt from my NaNoWriMo novel:

The most important synchronicities are the ones we never notice. When you see a coincidence, infer meaning, and attribute that to some higher power or system of reality, it is because God is beating a message into you because you are a moron. God is fluid and subtle, no one can prove God's existence because that is the way God wants it. If you are in touch with God at all, you will never see a mircale, ever. They will simply happen all around you, but your life and your focus will already be beyond them.
When you look into a microwave oven, you see the food, but in front of the food is a metal mesh. The holes in the metal mesh allow visible light to pass through, but microwaves have a much longer wavelength. They are effectively too big to fit throught the holes. The mesh is placed the to keep the microwaves inside the oven, and so it is in a certain sense a sign of the existence of the waves themselves. But if you just look and see the mesh, you have missed the whole point of the oven. Look at the food and see what effect the microwaves have on it.
Do not look for syncronicities or coincidences. At worst you are stupid for seeing something pointless as significant, at best you are stupid for missing the point. (but then those are really the same, aren't they?)
Instead look at people. If the microwaves are present, the food will cook. So it is with God.

This is a bit rougher than what I would say, and I can't say with certainty what causes synchronicities in the first place, but I do think it is better to look past them.
Buddha taught not to follow a teacher who claimed supernatural powers. Even if they were true, they did not help with enlightenment, more likely they were distractions.
I think it's fine to notice syncronicities, but I think it is wrong to base your life on them.