Knowing And Naming God

[Khandro]

Thomas Aquinas (1225-1274) asks how can we know anything about God. He considers whether God may be named by us at all, whether we say things about God properly or only metaphorically, whether our names for God are synonymous univocal or equivocal, and if analogical, is God or the world or the analogue? Whether the names for God are tensed, i.e. is the word 'God' a noun or a verb?

[Khandro]

v_e; The 'Summa Theologiae' alone, runs to over 1,500,000 words, and I don't know where within he says it, but from secondary reading I can quote "Saint Thomas Aquinas, the greatest of the medieval scholastics, refused to admit the Immaculate Conception". He also (Thomas) quotes mostly from Aristotle not Lucretius.
Also you seem to concur with that great clown Dawkins in his belief that science in some way negates religion - despite the fact that so many scientists uphold religious beliefs - this is a well-trodden path on AB and I don't want to enter it, but suffice to say that science and religion are not talking about the same things at all.

[vetuste_ennemi]

"Whereas the only issue with the monotheist hypothesis is that one doesn't understand why things one doesn't like, still occur...
I see no issue with an entity having responsibility for all though. But it may not confirm to what we insist it should be.".
That's my point, OG. I'm not attacking the idea that the world was "created" by some powerful being (although I don't believe it was}, I'm attacking the traditional monotheisms which claim to know the character and intentions of this God. There may be other reasons to believe in such a God (revelation, for example), but there aren't any facts observable in the world we actually live which would lead us to such a conclusion. If we are going to infer a supreme being from his works, then he's more likely to be a Zeus than a Jehovah. I say this, of course, slightly tongue in cheek. But it's not that different from the last sentence in the excerpt of yours I've just cited: "not what we insist it should be"?

[vetuste_ennemi]

Your last post repeats the conflation of true and false propositions, Khandro, and rests on the special use you make of the word religion.
If you were to replace the word religion with the word spirituality every time you used it then clowns like Dawkins (and me) would deny any conflict.
The clowns are not objecting to spiritual values, they are objecting to claims to knowledge unsupported by evidence or reason.
Science and religion ARE talking about the same thing when religion proposes theories to explain physical phenomenons and propounds facts about the world which can be scientifically tested, e.g. the world was created 6,000 years ago, the sun goes round the earth.
Let me test you on "religion".
Is Mormonism a religion?
If it is, is it a better or worse religion than, say, Islam? (Please interpret "better or worse" in any way you please, EXCEPT to say that Islam has been around a lot longer, and there are more of them).
Does it make sense to say of any religion that it is better or worse than another?
If so, how do you judge?
As such a judgment cannot come from any particular religion (which will usually be self-validating and condemnatory of rival creeds - see Goodlife passim), where can it come from?
Why is the opinion of a priest or an imam more to be respected or trusted on ANY issue of human morality and well-being rather than, say, mine?

[Khandro]

v_e; you protest too much methinks, //Why is the opinion of a priest or an imam more to be respected or trusted on ANY issue of human morality and well-being rather than, say, mine?//
Well if he's a good priest he may have a better road-map. A one-time neighbour of mine (RIP) told me how as a very young priest and feeling completely inadequate, he had to give comfort and last rights to dying men on the Normandy beaches 6:6:1944. No disrespect to you, but I think they would have preferred to have him there than you (or me!).
Incidentally the declared religion of British servicemen quoted recently in The Spectator;

Christian 86%
No religion 12.6%
Hindu 0.4%
Muslim 0.3%
Buddhist 0.2%
Sikh 0.1%
Jewish less than 0.1%
Other 0.5%

Source: MoD

So to paraphrase; There are (not many) atheists in the trenches.

[naomi24]

Khandro, //Well if he's a good priest he may have a better road-map.//

I can't see why a priest, good or otherwise, should have a better road map than anyone else. He has no more knowledge than the next man.

[Hypognosis]

The Road Map analogy seems to have been chosen to conjure up the concept of direction, journeys from one place to another, even that of planning. Very cunning choice.

I prefer the analogy that most people can sing but not everyone can remember the lyrics, on demand. Wisdom is widespread but coming up with the right words to comfort someone who wasn't ready for death a few moments before is a real skill. Presumably, even the dying atheists received comfort in the battlefield scenario Khandro referred to?