Cus Geezer wrote:QuartzGooner wrote:CUS
G-D's existence is proven to me. It is just that you do not believe the theory/reasons for this existence, that I believe in.
The basis of which isn't logic though is it, it is faith.
Give me imperical evidence for the proof of the existence of G-D, cast iron facts that are put to test and it's results can be clearly observable in the same way that science is.
There isn't any is there, it's as credible as saying 'Arsenal will win the treble this season, I can put no solid reasoning for their winning the treble, I have no proof that their squad is big enough or good enough, I have no proof they have a team spirit strong enough, I have no proof their players want to put in the extra effort for the shirt, I have no proof that they have the mental strength to deal with the run in for all 3 trophies, I just believe it cause I'm a fan. You're just wrong because you don't believe in my reasoning'
Would you consider the above a credible argument or opinion on football?
If not why do you accept this style of argument from religion as the explanation to life, the Universe and everything in it?
QUARTZ RESPONDS:
You misunderstand me.
I said that G-D's existence cannot be proven or disproven, but to me it is proven.
I was born in and live in London.....You are right, the UK is not my nation in a long term historical one, though my family have contributed as much as anyone else's to this country's identity and wealth for the time they have been here as most others have.
You seem to have missed my point completely and got it arse about face.
My assertion is that the UK is your homeland and not Israel.
QUARTZ RESPONDS:
Did not miss your point, it is just that I do not believe the UK is my homeland, though I am a citizen of the UK.
Depends on what you define as 'cultural', after all we don't play Aussie Rules and 'soccer' gets much less coverage over there, akin to say what the NFL or NBA gets here.When I refer to this country as an Anglo-Saxon nation, I mean so primarily in cultural terms and linguistic terms, in that there are certain shared elements we have in common with the USA, Canada, Australia, New Zealand and South Africa.
Australia also hasn't produced a national music scene with such a diverse range of musical styles as we have had here over the last 50 years, neither has New Zealand. Neither share our modern musical culture.
QUARTZ Responds:
I disagree.
Though there are cultural differences due to cultural evolution, we do share a musical culture with other English speaking countries.
The emergence of mutiple sub genres of music is a very British phenomenon, but it does not obscure the fact that an American or an Australian you might meet on train, will have a decent chance of understanding a conversation you could both have about music.
If you met an Ecuadorian, and if you could speak Spanish, there is no certainty that you would have any idea of his musical universe.
Though there are sports differences, we share things in common too.
Cricket, the Rugby codes, soccer (though soccer is one anomaly as regards the USA and Canada.
We also share a common body of film and TV shows.
We do not share that to the same extent with Francophone nations.
There is no right of abode though for old commonwealth countries that are mainly Anglo-Saxon and Anglophonic like Australia, New Zealand, Canada, though there is for EU countries none of whom are 'Anglo-Saxon', have been part of the empire, or speak English as their official language.Does then an Australian or New Zealander have legal rights to this country?
Some, in that Commonwealth passport holders can work here with beneficial tax arrangements, and share a Monarch.
QUARTZ Responds:
There is of course right of work and abode for citizens from EU countries.
Who are culturally more distinct from us than Commonwealth citizens.
Socccer aside, what do I have in common with a Hungarian?
You are literally confirming my argument for me, the British and Australian national identity is therefore a social construct then is it not?They also very much have a cultural homeland here, though as time progresses their own nation states evolve their own identities, based on subsequent non British immigrations (i.e. the recent Balkan immigrations to Australia)......I clearly said that nation states change in the process of history.
British identity is a very real identity, even if in current form it is only 300 - 400 years old.
QUARTZ Responds:
No, it is an evolved response to the diffuse settlement of a British population in the Australian territory.
It is not so much a social construct as a natural growth.
It is not manipulated in the way you feel it is, beyond superficial ideas such as a composed national anthem and flag
Its just that the imagined community is changing it's view of how it imagines itself.
Interesting that you mention final pushes in creating the German nation state as there wasn't much final about the push in 1870 was there?It is why we fight for the land, and why the modern Zionist movement is but the final push in a 1800 year struggle to return home, to and that was a Jewish state for a 1000 years prior to 200 AD.
It is not the be all and end of the Jewish return to Israel, not a movement in itself, but the politicisation of an existing struggle to return.
To ignore that is to misunderstand the Jewish outlook on the land.....
The emergence of German and Italian nationhood may well have been with a final push from the likes of Bismark and Cavour, but despite being separate and sometimes warring states before hand, they still represented various parts of a wider national cultural identity, and were not artificial constructs as you suggest.
Hitler was still pushing in the 1940s making claims on places throughout Europe that had Germanic peoples and for living space for the German nation.
There never seemed to be a final push with German nationalism, though as you well know being Jewish there was a 'final solution' with regard to those deemed to be obstructing this nationalist dream.
It seems to me the most painful of all ironies that Jews are regurgitating this kind of piffal over half a century later.
It's an irony that is certainly not lost on Jewish MP Gerald Kaufman, a man who's own sick grandmother was murdered in her bed by the Nazis.
http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=qMGuYjt6CP8
QUARTZ Responds:
Gerald Kaufman does not speak for me or most Jews in the world. He is a very assimilated Jew, and not a public supporter of Israel.
Again this is tosh, the borders of the British Nation State are set in Ulster not because G-D drew lines on the earth, but because we placed British people in settlements in Ireland. The British government drew the border there to define where it ended, God had nothing to do with it.I did not say that G-D assigns each nation a nation state. I said that G-D has definitely created nations, who are broadly aligned to nation states.
The Anglo-Saxon Protestant nation being spread out amongst the English speaking Commonwealth countries I mentioned earlier, the French nation spread out over France, plus parts of Belgium, Switzerland and Canada etc.
QUARTZ Responds:
G-D had everything to do with where the borders of each state lie.
You think that the creator of the universe does not manipulate such major events?
The whole Northern Ireland troubles were a physical manifestation of the fault line between the Anglo-Saxon Protestant Culture, and the Gaelic, and more Celtic, Catholic one.
Of course if G-D created these nations wouldn't the very thing the makes these nations to be 'nations' be in existence from creation, such as say language?
However in Ancient Rome the language is Latin, in modern Italy it is Italian.
QUARTZ responds:
The essence of these nation is in existence from Biblical times (There were sacrifices for the 70 Nations of the world in the Temple in Jerusalem, to repent for their sins. Those nations still exist, though can be spread out over several nation states as I have explained earlier).
Though Latin is different from Latin, it is very much at the centre of the Latin branch of languages, and contains the same essence of expression as Latin.
Er....I don't think I did suggest it though did I Quartz.It is incorrect to compare the settlement of Australia with the return of Jews to Israel.
There was no programme of, or evidence of, forced murder of Arab populations by Jewish populations in Israel in the past or today.
You are simply wrong to suggest that.
QUARTZ Responds:
Your post suggested that you did suggest that, though if I misinterpreted you then I reserve the right to withdraw my statement on that.
I stated that Australia is a settler colony, as is Israel.
QUARTZ Responds:
For Jews, the first Jewish settlement in Israel was by Abraham.
He paid for all the land that he lived on, bought it off the inhabitants.
Since then, every Jews that has returned is returning to land that was paid for.
Australia was settled on by the Dutch and British, who did not compensate the inhabitants at the time.
The vast amount of land compared with Israel and the overwhelming size of the migrant population filling it compared with a dwindling indigineous population is the reason why Australia exists today as an Anglo-Saxon European/Western style nation.
Israel has the 'luxury' of neither, therefore has a much, much slimmer chance of being the Jewish equivalent of an Australia 200 years after it's foundation.
QUARTZ Responds:
Israel's fate is in the hands of the moral conduct of the Jews, and G-D's will.
Yeah because religion and G-D has never caused a war has it?Bridge building between ethnic groupings might be useful to bring peace, but secularisation is not the way to do that.
We have had 60 years of a secularist majority in Israel, without peace.
Only be awareness of G-D can peace happen.
The Reformation?
The Crusades?
QUARTZ Responds:
Of course religion has caused war.
I never said it had not caused wars.
Does not mean that all those wars were fought with G-D's blessing though.
The Crusades were an appalling wave of massacres of civilians and looting.
Secular causes have caused many wars too though.