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 religion in gaming, oh no - oh god - what have i done? |
 Sep 17 2006, 09:12 PM
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#51
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Moving Target  Group: Members Posts: 313 Joined: 5-March 04 From: UK Member No.: 6,125  |
Unless you are still playing SR3 and took missile-mastery. (or if you were Gambit and could blow stuff up by throwing playing cards at them) |
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Sep 17 2006, 09:53 PM
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#52
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Moving Target Group: Members Posts: 398 Joined: 25-August 04 From: Denver, CO Member No.: 6,599 |
ok - you definitely got me on that one! |
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Sep 22 2006, 12:06 AM
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#53
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Great Dragon Group: Members Posts: 6,640 Joined: 6-June 04 Member No.: 6,383 |
These days, I don't really like religon, but I still thought the Code was a crappy movie and a worse book. See, my theory about that was that the movie got all this attention because a lot of people around the world are religious and when the movie appeared to go "Hur hur, teh chuch is teh suxxor" people got hilariously defensive and outraged, even though IMO the storyline was so stupid as not not even merit reaction. The real reason that the Code sucked wasn't because it dealt with religion. No, the real reason the Code sucked was because it was essentially adhered to a radical and historically unsubstantiated feminist version of history. "In the past when we revered vaginas the world was wonderful. Today life sucks because we rever the penis. Becuase quality of life is so much worse today than in 500 BC, and women are incapable of being mean." |
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Sep 22 2006, 12:12 AM
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#54
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Great Dragon Group: Members Posts: 6,640 Joined: 6-June 04 Member No.: 6,383 |
You're basically right in terms of canon. However, I think that my way is much more entertaining. I actually got the idea of doing it this way from a DM who ran some games for me many many years ago. His parents were Catholic and he was in a perpetual and constant backlash against religion since it was a cause of a great deal of the stress and unhappiness in his life, so in his style the more "lawful good" someone was the bigger asshole they were. The thing is that it ended up being extremely funny and extremely entertaining, like an episode of Blackadder or something. My opinion is that if you do it right you can really rachet the entertainment provided by the game world through the roof. I'd also make an additional point that some D&D products have tried to explore the subtlties of the implications of what various alignments mean, such as Planescape: Torment, where admittedly Planescape is an avant garde piece. I think Hyzmarca pointed out how restoring cosmic balance by releasing a demon was the single most evil act possible in the game even though it could be argued that it was for the greater "good" or "health" of the universe. |
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Sep 22 2006, 08:58 AM
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#55
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Moving Target Group: Members Posts: 681 Joined: 28-February 06 From: UK Member No.: 8,319 |
It took the basic hypothesis from "The Holy Blood and the Holy Grail" (a better book, IMO, even if you treat it as fiction, which it's not supposed to be) and turned it into a conspiracy thriller. Fair enough, I say. Sure, it's now pretty well established that the Priory of Sion was 'real', but a hoax. But the Cathar heresy and the Albigensian Crusade, and the tradition concerning Mary Magdalene in Sainte Marie-de-Mer in France are on a slightly surer footing. I also don't think it can be doubted that there really was a vote on the humanity or divinity of Jesus at the first Council of Nicea in 325, that the Bible really has been edited throughout the centuries, and that during its development some accounts were favoured over others (such as the Gnostic Gospels) that didn't reflect the version of Christianity that the Church wanted to promote. I always find it a little bizarre to hear so many people complain about the ridiculousness of the idea that the bible might not be wholly accurate, that Jesus might actually have been human, had physical relations, fathered a child etc etc, and that the Church might have been shaped by people with a certain agenda and outlook. Whereas Jesus being the son of a virgin, walking on water, rising from the dead etc etc is oh so much more believable? |
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Sep 22 2006, 05:29 PM
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#56
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Neophyte Runner Group: Members Posts: 2,174 Joined: 13-May 04 From: UCAS Member No.: 6,327 |
You betcha, because he's the son of God. ;) I know, I know, bad circular reasoning. :P |
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Sep 22 2006, 05:59 PM
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#57
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Shadowrun Setting Nerd Group: Banned Posts: 3,632 Joined: 28-June 05 From: Pissing on pedestrians from my electronic ivory tower. Member No.: 7,473 |
Sure you can. Just don't let him have playing cards. And don't be a banana. |
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Sep 22 2006, 06:28 PM
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#58
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Moving Target Group: Members Posts: 834 Joined: 30-June 03 Member No.: 4,832 |
My spoon is too big! |
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Sep 22 2006, 07:30 PM
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#59
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Moving Target Group: Members Posts: 533 Joined: 26-February 02 From: In a hot tub, with lots of bubbles and champagne waiting for you. Member No.: 1,972 |
it has been proven by religious scholars world wide as well as scientists of all different stripes and colors from around the globe that roman catholicism is the number 1 best religion out there. Mother church (protector of our souls)is THE best institution headed by the Pope (who is infallible while sitting on the throne of St. Peter) is the most kick ass awesomest guy ta boot!.
How certain organizations within the church could be considered a "threat" in sadowrun I"ll never know. Might as well label oxygen a threat to humans and grass a threat to toasters. Silly gooses. |
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Sep 22 2006, 07:32 PM
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#60
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ghostrider Group: Retired Admins Posts: 4,196 Joined: 16-May 04 Member No.: 6,333 |
The largest flaw of the Davinci Code was that so many people can't seem to separate "fiction" from "reality" and get on with their lives.
Oh wait. That's not a problem with the book. |
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Sep 22 2006, 08:29 PM
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#61
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Incertum est quo loco te mors expectet; Group: Dumpshocked Posts: 6,546 Joined: 24-October 03 From: DeeCee, U.S. Member No.: 5,760 |
That said, if you read the forward to the book and listen to the author's comments, it really is difficult to determine what is meant to be actual and what isn't. This is even moreso the case with Da Vinci code when it is based on a real theory (as shown in Holy Blood, Holy Grail). When the author goes out of his way to conceal how much he made up and freely mixes fact with fiction, it does become more difficult to tell how seriously he believes his own stories. Of course, that's no excuse for not doing your own research, but it does upset me that Brown has gone out of his way to portray his story as more real than he had to, bordering on deliberate falsehood. |
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Sep 22 2006, 08:38 PM
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#62
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ghostrider Group: Retired Admins Posts: 4,196 Joined: 16-May 04 Member No.: 6,333 |
Stephen King, in an interview with, I believe it was Jay Leno, was once asked: (paraphrased, of course)
"I've heard that you have night lights all over your house. That you can't sleep if there aren't lights on, because you're terrified of the dark, because of your having written the books that you write. Is that true?" "Oh, absolutely. I have to have them." This went back and forth. Then, the interview was repeated with Tabitha King. Same question. Her answer? "Of course not. He loves to keep up little acts like that." (again, paraphrased) Point? The more King exaggerates his own mythos, the more he appeals to his fans. Ditto for Brown. If it would make him enough money, he'd claim to be the pope. Again, not a problem with the book. |
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Sep 22 2006, 09:02 PM
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#63
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Moving Target Group: Members Posts: 681 Joined: 28-February 06 From: UK Member No.: 8,319 |
Actually the only falsifiable statement in that foreword is that the Priory of Sion was "founded in 1099". And there I think Dan Brown probably just believed what he read in "The Holy Blood and the Holy Grail" (it was a fairly compelling hoax, to be fair). The statements about Opus Dei, that have probably caused the offence here, are statements about "recent controversy due to reports of...". That isn't actually untrue- there have been such reports and they have caused controversy. |
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Sep 22 2006, 09:06 PM
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#64
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Incertum est quo loco te mors expectet; Group: Dumpshocked Posts: 6,546 Joined: 24-October 03 From: DeeCee, U.S. Member No.: 5,760 |
I suppose we'll have to agree to disagree there. I am of the opinion that intentionally misleading millions of people about subjects as important as history and religion for personal gain is unethical. Lying about how many night lights you have in your house, not nearly so much.
Just so you are aware, I do agree that: 1) Dan Brown did personally profit from intentionally misleading people, and so he had a motive for this 2) He did not outright lie about what is factual and not in his books (although even the things he said are 'absolutely true' in Demons in angels, namely locations, are oftentimes simply wrong. But I'll give him the benefit of the doubt that that was due to exceptionally poor research rather than an intent to mislead.) 3) People should research stuff on their own rather than simply assuming what someone wrote in a single fictional book is true |
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Sep 22 2006, 09:09 PM
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#65
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Moving Target Group: Members Posts: 681 Joined: 28-February 06 From: UK Member No.: 8,319 |
One could argue that church officials have been intentionally misleading millions of people about history for centuries! ;) :P |
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Sep 22 2006, 09:17 PM
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#66
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ghostrider Group: Retired Admins Posts: 4,196 Joined: 16-May 04 Member No.: 6,333 |
I'm not just poking at you to further an argument, I'm fine with disagreeing, really. :) But still, I have to wonder:
Important to whom? Again, it's up to the individual. If a person places importance on the subject matter of a particular work, then it's up to that person to find the facts for a given statement (or whatever is in question). I know you've already said you agree with this, but I wanted to tie it in to the discussion as a whole, rather than just having it attached to one single book. I think the problem is not that individuals personally decide that they're angry with Dan Brown's book, but that so many people let others tell them to be angry about Dan Brown's book, and never bothered to try to separate the fact from the fiction themself. I cannot count the number of times I've almost damaged my eyes, by rolling them back too far upon hearing another person say that "their church was having a sermon on 'how to deal with the Davinci Code' and its readers" or some such nonsense. Not just churches, either, but that's the most prominent that jumps to mind. |
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Sep 22 2006, 09:19 PM
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#67
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Moving Target Group: Members Posts: 681 Joined: 28-February 06 From: UK Member No.: 8,319 |
Amen brother. |
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Sep 22 2006, 10:31 PM
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#68
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Moving Target Group: Members Posts: 398 Joined: 25-August 04 From: Denver, CO Member No.: 6,599 |
+1 |
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Sep 23 2006, 04:06 PM
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#69
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Incertum est quo loco te mors expectet; Group: Dumpshocked Posts: 6,546 Joined: 24-October 03 From: DeeCee, U.S. Member No.: 5,760 |
I'm not sure what to make of this paragraph. Are you saying history is only as important as the person studying thinks it is? I feel... a little sick to my stomach to hear such a thing :P As for the rest, that's a natural (and perhaps even important) human phenomenon called 'creating a community'. How many times has someone gone to you and said "Bob did this and cheated me out of that" or "Jane was so unfair" and you agreed with that person? How many times have you thought "look at those people cheering because the US was attacked. We should just carpet bomb the whole city"? The simple fact is that as humans, when a member of our community is attacked, we are more likely to defend the community (even if it's only acknowledging that the attacker was wrong) than work to defend the attacker. This doesn't apply solely to religion, although religion seems to be a convenient kicking dog for it (I suspect because it's a clearly defined group separate from most of the people doing the complaining. It's a lot tougher to complain about yourself.) So should people research things before complaining? Yes. But that applies to EVERYTHING, not just Dan Brown or religion. That also happens to apply to people complaining about religion. |
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Sep 23 2006, 09:32 PM
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#70
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Moving Target Group: Members Posts: 681 Joined: 28-February 06 From: UK Member No.: 8,319 |
Religion generally means believing what you're told, and what you're told is that the religion in question holds all the answers and represents the ultimate truth, presented by God to some human who in most cases lived a long time ago. It's all well and good until humans have acquired sufficient evidence to prove that certain of the aforesaid truths aren't true. Religion then faces a problem. It can take the hits, accept the evidence, and adapt. Or it can reject the whole principle of evidence and reason, and seek to turn the clock back to a supposedly better world of the past where such things didn't matter so much. I have no problem with religious people or organisations willing to take the former route, but it's the increasing popularity of the latter one that really worries me. If the bulk of humanity turns down that path, then wave goodbye to modern medicine, space exploration, trial by jury and intellectual freedom, and say hello to snake oil salesmen, religious war, Sharia law and the Spanish inquisition. |
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Sep 24 2006, 12:06 AM
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#71
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Incertum est quo loco te mors expectet; Group: Dumpshocked Posts: 6,546 Joined: 24-October 03 From: DeeCee, U.S. Member No.: 5,760 |
I think this is an example of the same statement you quoted. Didn't the pope just give a big speech (it was on the news, but for very different reasons) about religion and reason? Haven't we seen great philosophical systems that not only coexist peacefully with science, but serve to encourage such discoveries? Yes, there are religious groups which encourage faith before logic. However they are more of a minority than your statement would seem to indicate. A very vocal minority, but a minority nonetheless. Most religions do not require a belief in creationism or any similar thing. Most do not preclude using modern medicine and space travel. |
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Sep 24 2006, 01:44 AM
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#72
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Creating a god with his own hands Group: Members Posts: 1,405 Joined: 30-September 02 From: 0:0:0:0:0:0:0:1 Member No.: 3,364 |
A++++++ GOOD POSTER WOULD READ AGAIN |
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Sep 24 2006, 01:56 AM
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#73
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Moving Target Group: Members Posts: 745 Joined: 12-August 06 Member No.: 9,097 |
I am angry about Dan Brown's book because it's practically a carbon copy of all his other books. Damn you, Dan Brown!
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Sep 24 2006, 09:17 AM
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#74
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Moving Target Group: Members Posts: 681 Joined: 28-February 06 From: UK Member No.: 8,319 |
I've read somewhere that the new Pope believes that Catholicism has given too much ground and needs to return to some more traditional stances. Where the old Pope is quoted as having said that evolution is "more than just a hypothesis", the new Pope has come out quite firmly in favour of 'Intelligent Design', and critical of evolution: “We are not some casual and meaningless product of evolution.” He might praise 'reason', but he's more notably silent on the subject of scientific evidence: he talks the talk, but he doesn't walk the walk. I've read polls somewhere that suggest that the majority of Americans believe in creationism, and that an athiest president would be discriminated against more than a black president, homosexual president or woman president. A prominent Kenyan Bishop has recently attacked evolution too, in fact his words are a great example of religion regarding evidence as a threat and retreating from it rather than embracing it: "When you use evolution as God's tool in creating man in his image, you have to reckon with the fact at what stage in the evolution process does man attain to that image? The conclusion is either God's image is evolving or God Himself is evolving or every creature has God's image. God could be anything and I'm afraid I cannot put my faith in a 'changing God' or an 'anything God'.” As for modern medicine: the Catholic Church's stance on birth control and AIDS is also pretty shocking, and the prevailing attitude towards AIDS in African politics and religion- that it can be prevented by 'raw garlic and the skin of a lemon' and the like, is genuinely tragic. The Taliban, of course, weren't keen on science and technology (unless used for making weapons, of course)- and this was an experiment on a national scale.
I'd accept that it is still a 'vocal minority', at present (I did say "If the bulk of humanity turns down that path") but I fear it's a rapidly growing trend in the modern world. Especially as religion more and more entangles itself with politics. |
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Sep 24 2006, 02:02 PM
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#75
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Incertum est quo loco te mors expectet; Group: Dumpshocked Posts: 6,546 Joined: 24-October 03 From: DeeCee, U.S. Member No.: 5,760 |
Keep in mind, intelligent design != creationism. The Catholic Church has also publicly said that parts of the bible, especially the old testament, are not literally true. So far all the pope has said is that the creation of the world was guided by God. Of course it was! That doesn't mean God didn't use evolution as His tool of choice, it simply means that the creation of humans was not random chance. I don't see that in any way as against science. Nothing the pope has said would indicate you cannot believe in God and evolution. Simply that if you accept evolution as the tool, you need to accept God as the artist. If you're a Christian, I'd think that's a given. To quote the vocal minority (I hope they're a minority): http://www.cuttingedge.org/articles/rc120.htm And the Catholic view: http://academic.regis.edu/mghedott/evolut.htm
http://www.csicop.org/doubtandabout/polling/ These polls? Not that I'm saying the article here is right, I just did a quick google search to see what came up and this was number two. The pollsters could be right, but I honestly don't see a lot of people campaigning for creationism in schools. So far there have been three incidents, two of which were fairly localized (that I know of).
Firstly, the Catholic Church does NOT support 'raw garlic and the skin of a lemon'. I'm not sure where you got that. The Church has traditionally had a stance against using condoms (for unrelated ethical reasons). Unfortunately, the Church is also tremendously slow when it comes to changing stances on things. So the Church IS considering supporting condom use between couples where one person has HIV/AIDS, but it's very slow going. Currently the Church supports (and actively teaches) chastity, which has been proven to be more effective than condoms at preventing AIDS (when used correctly). So it's not that the Church isn't pushing effective methods of AIDS prevention, it's that they currently espouse one you don't seem to agree with, while carefully considering whether extenuating circumstances would allow for the other. The RCC will *NEVER EVER* take the position that people should be taught to use condoms when engaging in pre-marital sex. It would be akin to teaching people to take firearm safety courses before committing homicide. The Church does and will continue to teach people not to have sex outside of marriage. Anything else is seen as encouraging unethical behavior and will NOT be supported. I expect within the next ten years we may see an official decision in regards to the use of condoms between married people to prevent the spread of disease. So again, I don't see the Church as taking a non-scientific standpoint, simply one you don't seem to agree with. You don't want STDs? Don't have sex. |
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