11-07-2016, 06:07 AM
(11-07-2016, 05:03 AM)Eric the Green Wrote: Living one's life without spirituality of some kind (what means is beside the point) I would call "pretty empty."
I would expect this. If one's central values are based around X, for any value of X, one would be apt to think life would be "pretty empty" without X. For me, science and the basic Enlightenment values of equality, rights and democracy would stand for X. Anyone who doesn't embrace these things might seem to me to be shallow or pretty empty. For a Christian, X might involve living in accordance to Christ's words as recorded the Bible. Those who have not found The Word would seem pretty empty.
(11-07-2016, 05:03 AM)Eric the Green Wrote: I also value science and do not consider spiritualism and science to be mutually exclusive. So that's a different choice than Bob makes, apparently.
I'm not sure "mutually exclusive" to be the best phrase, but the two ways of looking at the world apply to very different problems and areas of life experience. Lab equipment isn't much help in finding inner peace. Astrology isn't a good tool when programming a computer. I also just am not going to find inner peace if my understanding of the world isn't well anchored in observation, experience and experiment. Without such things, life, to me, would be pretty empty.
That this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom, and that government of the people, by the people, for the people shall not perish from the earth.