Rick B. (bup) -
The United States' founding fathers were not, as a group, Christians, as most even dilettante history readers know. If we want to paint with a broad brush, they were Deists, but there's really no need to paint with a broad br-
Oh, what's that? There is a need to do that? And "Deist," if you really know your stuff, actually means "atheist," so all the founding fathers were atheists? And you have to have someone super smart like Stewart to show you how different quotes actually secretly mean "I'm an atheist!"?
Or maybe Stewart has an agenda he's emotionally invested in.
I loved the first hundred pages, which were really about the founding fathers and the religious environment of the times, then found the next two hundred dense solipsistic sophism*, the questionable conclusion of which was the founders were all atheists who knew better than the rest of the citizens of the country they were founding, and kept their brilliance on this point secret because the world just wasn't ready for their awesomeness. I stuck with the book out of sheer consarnedness.
But I'm glad I did. It picked up again for the last hundred or so pages, and made a good case with a strong narrative about the separation of church and state, even if he pauses to say things like when George Washington mentions the nation being religious, he didn't really mean Religious religious, he was using a secret but obvious word that means morals based in atheism.
Oh, I went off on a tangent again. If one can mentally numb oneself to that sort of stuff, the peoples' own writings (who he, to his credit, uses liberally) show a questioning, even a dismissal, of many of the supernatural elements of Jesus, and the trinity, and shows people like Ethan Allen to have had surprisingly fertile brains.
It was also neat to hear people like John Adams speculating on how many other worlds there must be out in space, and how many inhabitants of those distant places there must be. I love it when John Adams does anything, you know?
*Yeah, I know. But I used the phrase dense solipsistic sophism with a chick I was trying to impress, and it seemed to work! Please indulge me.
Oh, what's that? There is a need to do that? And "Deist," if you really know your stuff, actually means "atheist," so all the founding fathers were atheists? And you have to have someone super smart like Stewart to show you how different quotes actually secretly mean "I'm an atheist!"?
Or maybe Stewart has an agenda he's emotionally invested in.
I loved the first hundred pages, which were really about the founding fathers and the religious environment of the times, then found the next two hundred dense solipsistic sophism*, the questionable conclusion of which was the founders were all atheists who knew better than the rest of the citizens of the country they were founding, and kept their brilliance on this point secret because the world just wasn't ready for their awesomeness. I stuck with the book out of sheer consarnedness.
But I'm glad I did. It picked up again for the last hundred or so pages, and made a good case with a strong narrative about the separation of church and state, even if he pauses to say things like when George Washington mentions the nation being religious, he didn't really mean Religious religious, he was using a secret but obvious word that means morals based in atheism.
Oh, I went off on a tangent again. If one can mentally numb oneself to that sort of stuff, the peoples' own writings (who he, to his credit, uses liberally) show a questioning, even a dismissal, of many of the supernatural elements of Jesus, and the trinity, and shows people like Ethan Allen to have had surprisingly fertile brains.
It was also neat to hear people like John Adams speculating on how many other worlds there must be out in space, and how many inhabitants of those distant places there must be. I love it when John Adams does anything, you know?
*Yeah, I know. But I used the phrase dense solipsistic sophism with a chick I was trying to impress, and it seemed to work! Please indulge me.
