Dave's ESL Cafe's Student Discussion Forums

[Oriani]

[beancurdturtle]

eddfx:
Sir, your words do not fall on deaf ears. I read and understand every one. Though the falsities have little effect on the things I know to be true.

There's zero hypocrisy here. The ethic of reciprocity is fully in play. If I was making statements that are false - I would hope someone would correct me. I wouldn't want to look foolish making the same misinformed statement over and over. So, when you contradict my factual statements, I should inform you that you have done so.

I respect you - and I also recognize that you are not well informed regarding Philosophical Taoism. These are two separate issues. In any case, being ignorant about any one subject is not a bad thing - while being obstinate might be.

This statement, "I live in Asia and you live in the States. Can you prove you have even stepped foot in Asia? I can prove I am in Asia right now. Eating at a Chinese place in the States is a little different then eating here." I guess is supposed to prove you know more about Taoism than me? Proving one has physically been in Asia (though I have been, and could prove it if I thought it necessary) really has no bearing on a person's understanding of Chinese culture in general and Taoism specifically. Physical location has very little to do with understanding - and your argumentation illustrates this point very well.

It just boggles my mind that you still have this illusion that I have been offensive and rude. It's astonishing.

Oh, and by the way, Philosophical Taoism is not a faith. You still don't get it do you?

Oriani:
In my first post I answered, in my opinion, your question "How do you think God appeared?" I said "God does not exist." That statement is actually an opinion, it carries less weight than fact. Now that opinion can be argued because there is no objective evidence to prove God does, or does not exist. The existence or non-existence of God cannot be proven - though usually proving something doesn't exist is reverse logic.

To all the English learners:
I have been neither offensive or rude to eddfx. If he feels I have been - it's his perception, not my intent. The seminal cause of my responses to eddfx lies in the fact that he argues with statements that I made that are 100% true. Now he has a right to contradict me and even the right to get all blustery, accusative, and insulting as there's no law against it - but that doesn't make him correct. His responses remind me of an old English cliche phrase...

English cliche phrase of the day: "You can lead a horse to water, but you can't make him drink." Which seems to be doubly true when you lead a high-horse to water.
_________________
Daniel

�Be who you are and say what you feel because those who mind don't matter and those who matter don't mind.�
--Dr. Seuss

[hoshi]

[beancurdturtle]

[hoshi]

[beancurdturtle]

Great explanation. Thanks!

I was raised Christian myself - I left when I was 15. So I understand how difficult it can be to let go of beliefs that have been hammered into your head throughout childhood. A deeply ingrained concept of a monotheistic deity is hard to shake, that's assuming of course that you want to move to a different concept of God.

The God of Abraham, Isac, and Jacob works for a whole lot of people. There's no need to change if your faith suits you.

If I was to equate my personal theistic concept with God, I would say that everything manifests from one source. This source is called The Tao. This is similar to Pantheism, but at the root everything is undifferentiated. The Tao is part of everything, and everything is part of The Tao. Even that orange you are eating.

So I guess that orange must taste like heaven. Right?
_________________
Daniel

�Be who you are and say what you feel because those who mind don't matter and those who matter don't mind.�
--Dr. Seuss

[Oriani]

Mmm Ok.. I udnerstand religions .. etc... and thanks for telling me how do you think ( for those who believe God exist) how God appeared..

[eddfx]

beancurdturtle,
You make it very hard not to respond to more of your insults.
I just wanted to defend myself against your accusation of me being ignorant when you compared me to leading a horse to water and prove that it is you that is ignorant and not the rest of us.

You say you believe in philosophical Taoism and you state that all your words are factual and true. I repeat, you say YOUR WORDS are factual and true.

My turn:
That amazes me because not even the most respected scholars cannot determine how much of the original carvings were misinterpreted about Taoism (Daoism). Also, the most respected scholars that have been studying Taoism (Daoism) longer then you have been alive also says that �ancient Chinese language is more ancient and difficult than Latin and that the interpreters had great ignorance when translating the original philosophies true meanings.�

The scholors also said, �The particular people of the time incapacity to comprehend the framework which sustains the whole book and connects all phrases and paragraphs together coherently is another reason why most of the original meaning has been lost. The partial understanding was covered up and smoothed out with out-of-context translation or interpretation.�

I am not even going to waste my time with you to explain the details of the fact the classical Chinese language has evolved into many versions in the past twenty five centuries and even further proves the point beyond a shadow of a doubt that the original meanings of the carvings of Taoism (Daoism) did not make it through to us.

So thank you amazing teacher, you must be very famous and rich because you have unlocked the secrets of Taoism (Daoism) when people since the 6th century BC have been trying to unlock and have failed.

Are you serious when you said you spent 20 years studying this?

Time for you to take a drink from the water.

To the English learners:
We should all thank beancurdturtle for his knowledge on Taoism(Daoism) is far greater then mine, yours and all of the teachers since the 6th century BC. How ignorant we all are in front of mighty teacher.

[ltp-008]

[beancurdturtle]

A note on the English cliche phrase of the day, "You can lead a horse to water, but you can't make him drink." This cliche phrase means; you can show truth to a person, but you can't force them to believe it. It has nothing to do with ignorance.

[beancurdturtle]

[RedRose]

Come on!! guys! Don't you think it's a pure waste of time to argue over religion??

Anyway, I am not interested in the discussion about religion...anymore. I prefer some fun discussion like gossip, celebrity, jokes....

[beancurdturtle]

[eddfx]

[ltp-008]

beancurdturtle wrote: