Chelz

I'm working on a term paper for my Existentialism class. The topic I've been working on is related to human relationships, love, and the aspect of responsibility and authenticity that is fundamental to the school of thought. Kind of how it relates to and is different from more classical ideas of love.

I'm working my way through Sartre's 'Being and Nothingness' and am planning on reading some existentialist literature like Dostoevsky.

Anyone have any recommendations for material that I might find helpful? I'm looking for any existentialist literature that deals with love (more specifically, romantic love rather than Kierkegaard's ideas on Christian love, for example) as well as plain old philosophical works.

I've been casually researching for a few weeks but my college library has an abundance of classical philosophy and a shortage of modern and contemporary so even a few hours flipping through the few books is rather unproductive Thanks in advance.

One of the jobs I'm looking to apply for is this killer part-time position as a property manager. I don't have any real professional experience, but I feel that I have the common sense and work ethic to really impress a prospective employer.

I'm currently a waitress, however I put quite a bit of time into learning the ins and outs of the business that I work for - learning the financial programs in our computer system, how to be diplomatic with angry customers, keeping everything clean and in repair, coming in to check up on things and sometimes help out for a few hours on my days off without pay, etc. - and I've made it clear that I'd be interested in more formal responsibility (they let me take on pretty much any extra tasks I want, but they won't make it a regular part of my job). Unfortunately, there are no real opportunities for advancement.

I pick things up fairly quick. I've had experience with managing time, budgets, and tasks when I was president of the writing club / literary magazine at my high school. Not the most important thing in the world but I did plan and oversee everything from the actual putting together of the publication to staging coffeehouse-style poetry nights as fundraisers. I did lots of multitasking, delegating tasks, approving budgets, settling disputes, etc.

I definitely miss having a 'job' like this where I was responsible for managing my own time and overseeing many different people and projects at once. I thrive on being a busybody.

I understand that the job I'm applying for would require me to show apartments and be on call for tenants at all times, and that's not just something I could tolerate, but something that appeals to me.

If I make all of this clear in my cover letter and resume, could my enthusiasm make up for a lack of real estate experience?

I'm trying to get tickets to a game as an "I'm very, very sorry" present for a special guy. I feel like I need to have the perfect spot (or the best possible for how broke I am) or the gesture won't have enough of an impact.

The ones I'm looking at are in section 112, row 20 in Yankee Stadium. They're field level, on the first base side, kind of in the middle of the outfield.

Are they better than I realize? Good enough to at least score some brownie points while I'm trying to make it up to him?

I don't know if you realize this, but calling people names and being rude and hateful actually makes people look down upon you, and sets a poor example for your faith when you claim to be a 'good' Christian.

Personally, if people like *cough*someone whose name starts with a B...*cough* are good Christians, I would never want to be one. I would rather be kind to my fellow human beings than be condescending and rude like some of the Christians here, acting as if their religion makes them better than everyone else, and calling atheists worthless.

I understand that these people I'm addressing are going to justify their rudeness by saying that you're just doing it out of 'love'... a completely nonsense answer, though it is, and use their religion as a free pass to treat people badly and call it justified, never even taking the time to think about how poorly they treat others or care, so now I'll just prepare for a handful of answers calling me a hateful atheist, even though I'm not, and missing the whole point.

The question, truly, is what would you say if you got to heaven, and Jesus asked you why you treated people so poorly, and through your example looked poorly upon him and Christianity?

I wrote a story for my creative writing course that opened with a couple of characters in a post-apocolyptic setting trying to read a book they found, and my professor later asked me to include an explanation as to why they were illiterate.

When I wrote it, I didn't think much about why. I suppose I figured they didn't think it was worth it to know and, if anything, transferred information via an oral tradition. I'd set the story long after the apocalyptic event, such that the characters' grandparents weren't even around when it happened, and the cause (ex. nuclear war, epidemic, etc.) was never revealed, and I never even decided on one.

My professor said that even communities like the Amish value literacy, and there was no reason for a society to stop teaching their children to read. I see his point, but at the same time, I think the Amish would value reading because they have to be able to read the Bible. I'm kind of frustrated because I can't come up with an explanation that would satisfy him. Any ideas?

One, would you do it?

And two, would you judge people to be worthy of your sacrifice based on the goodness of their heart, or whether or not they believed that you exist, or would they all be worthy based upon our common humanity?

I'm looking into getting a small block of text but I wouldn't know where to put it. It reads:

There is no emotion, there is peace.

There is no ignorance, there is knowledge.

There is no passion, there is serenity.

There is no chaos, there is harmony.

There is no death, there is the Force.

Yes, Star Wars. My one stipulation is that I'd be able to see it without the aid of a mirror. Any ideas?

Nice to see some brethren around. I feel like I've been the lone Pantheist on R&S for as long as I've been a regular.

...to rot in hell and kiss their [butt]?

Really, there isn't anything this universal scapegoat isn't involved in, is there?

Dude doesn't agree with me = Satan possessed him.

Drop my coffee = Satan did it.

Burn a piece of toast = Satan did it.

I can't believe I've lived my whole life thinking that 'crap happens' and that's that. That tough class I'm taking? I'm just going to tell the teacher that Satan has a hold of him and that's why he doesn't agree with the answers that I made up in the name of Jesus.

i.e. People are not 'possessed by Satan' just because you don't like them. What a lazy and arrogant thing to think.

A another answerer included a link in a question I responded to earlier and I found it very interesting.

Please read at least one of the pages before judging it.

http://hoperemains.webs.com/index.htm

Because if I were to go off of example, I'd start to think the two were mutually exclusive.

I was just pondering a question that I answered earlier (http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index;_ylt=AqVX1... and I was struck by the proposed idea that Pantheism and atheism are very similar. Like that question says, Dawkins believes that Pantheism is 'sexed-up atheism.' While I'm totally down with 'sexed-up' in most situations, I spent a little while thinking about why I identify as a Pantheist, and where exactly I diverge from atheism.

For me, my 'spirituality' is a mix of naturalistic awe, academic philosophy, and personal development. I study Anthropology and Biology to understand the 'how.' I study Philosophy to learn to properly ponder the 'why.' I study Sociology and Literature to gain perspective and understand different aspects of the universal human experience. I have an insatiable passion and fascination for the workings of our humanity and the world around us. Oftentimes, I lose myself in the wonder of it all.

Even from my own definition, there seems to be nothing 'supernatural' about it. I'm hard-pressed to describe the difference, actually, which certainly surprises me. I suppose the difference I see is an openness to, but not necessarily an insistence in, a certain degree of sentience.

So I guess my question is, what do you see as the difference between Pantheism and atheism, and what do you believe are the high and low points of both?

I've recently been working on a few short stories and have been considering submitting to various fiction magazines.

I've never published before but I don't particularly want to lead with that in a cover letter. Would it be appropriate to mention that I'm an English undergraduate and that I've taken two Creative Writing courses with a published and best-selling author?

I'm kind of astounded that people would actually say that a person who has devoted perhaps decades of their lives to something that the attacker doesn't even have the common decency to even spend five minutes googling, is just an idiot.

I mean, it's one thing to have questions, but another entirely to spout accusations of incompetency and lack of intelligence. Must others go to their job and harass them? Is that really the mature, honest thing to do?

It's certainly one thing to believe something, another entirely to be hateful, rude, and arrogant toward others about it. I'm not sure I've seen a handful of questions or answers from creationists that were not rude or hateful toward others. Kudos to those that stay kind and honest.

I think it's terribly sad that some of those that claim to follow a loving, just God must resort to accusations, name-calling, and treating your fellow human beings terribly.

Then surely atomic theory, germ theory, cell theory, and the theory of gravity are just as bunk, right?

I mean, now that I don't believe in cells, germs, atoms, or gravity, I feel like I really shook off the oppression that those evil scientists had placed upon me.

It's a fact that there is a direct correlation between the number of elephants in a city zoo and the number of crimes committed in that city.

It's a fact that there is a correlation between ice cream sales and instances of rape.

Now some of you have such a problem determining the difference between correlation and causation.

Are elephants the cause of crime? Is ice cream the cause of rape?

I'm getting a bit tired of all the nonsense going on in here, not to mention all the people who claim to believe in a loving god cursing at atheists and absolutely harassing them.

So some of you wonder why people make fun of your questions and/or answers, and just chalk it up to them being mean, but truly that is not always the case. Some of you make some terrible leaps of logic and just plain make things up.

So my challenge to you is to not violate a single logical fallacy for one week on Y!A and see if you don't get treated better, because quite honestly, I don't get made fun of nearly as much as some of you and it's mostly from other theists making fun of me for pointing out holes in their argument.

Here's a link to an explanation of logical fallacies and the types:

http://www.nizkor.org/features/fallacies/

If you're just going to say that you don't need to use logic and reason, then I'm sorry but you kind of deserve it then. I'm a fan of intelligent discourse and I believe you have to be intellectually honest to even begin to do that.

I've noticed that every time someone asks a question about a passage, there is inevitably a handful of Christians who say that they're taking it out of context and leave it at that.

So my question to those Christians is how are people supposed to ask questions about the passage if they are always 'taking it out of context'? Should they post the entire text of the Bible and then ask the question? Isn't the 'out of context' thing just an excuse to not answer?

Also, aren't the people that use this non-answer typically people that quote scripture to others too? Why is that when anyone but you uses a passage it is invariably 'out of context' but when you do it it is invariably relevant?