Elliott

So by God do you just mean a purpose to life, or how do you try to describe it? Is your perception of God just a hopeful belief, faith, or do you think it is a matter of fact and certain? How does believing in this God affect your life?

Do you not believe in worship or doctrine? Is the following not "looking without for signs"?

The Peterson Process

Would God be happier with us if we worship no God, given that we've not been presented with convincing evidence, obviously anyone would believe in God if God were revealed to them. Or would God be happier if we accidently worship the wrong God, possibly even leading others to the false God's teachings, in a desperate attempt to please God and avoid hell?

I'm amused by the Christian Pseudo-Intellectual arguments that all morality sets are from indoctrination, yet the fear of suffering such as from eternity in hell is assumed to be natural. All of following Christianity is based on avoiding hell, can someone fear suffering without Christianity, if so, can't they then also understand morality without Christianity given that morality is based on not causing suffering. If someone cannot fear suffering without Christianity, then why would non-Christians need to fear the suffering of hell, given that they don't understand suffering how would they suffer if they don't even know suffering. Either people naturally understand suffering and therefore morality, therefore they don't need God, or they don't understand suffering and therefore need not fear the suffering of hell, either way God has no purpose other than a scapegoat for community leaders.

What hegemony, there never even was one, the U.S. never compared to the British empire. What makes you think the U.S. ever had a hegemony? Who has the U.S. ever dominated, Puerto Rico?

I think Ezra Klein explains the current barrage of lunacy in his recent video. It's a tactic from Steve Bannon and has as little efficacy as you would expect coming from the Bannon think tank.

I find it useful for empathizing with other people. I can see the different expressions in my life, by thinking of how I probably was as a baby and small child I can even see the primal ones. I'm skeptical of categorizing by stage or thinking of this as a developmental process. By seeing the prominence of certain behaviors in people you have a better chance to understand their perspective, but to me it seems everyone has all of the traits throughout the spectrum just in different proportions. I don't think the different traits indicate development, I think it's more a result of circumstance and catalyst emphasizing and subduing traits.

To take over the world, for sure. Not for improving the lives of the people though, where would you want to live?

I think you're looking at history through rose colored glasses, just look at the civil rights movement, the Vietnam war, westward expansion of the U.S.. There's really nothing new going on, Democracy is messy, society is messy, look at the anti-communist propaganda and laws in the U.S. back in the 50s, the Kent State massacre. It's like when teenagers do stupid things because they're struggling to understand the world. Democracy doesn't compensate for the lack of ethics in the society, obviously, but just like letting a teenager experiment and have freedom society will make mistakes in the process of learning. This angst I'm reading from you all seems to come down to believing an embellished version of recent history, and possibly some naivety toward Republican sincerity with their beliefs. The U.S. has for the most part been a bit wild with just short periods of calm like we in our generations have experienced, something I attribute in part to Democracy, I mean look back just before Democracy, you have the Dark Ages. Democracy seems to have worked so well that many people now dissociate with their culture's not too distant past of savagery.

Ahhh, no way, it will all be okay. I think this could really re-energize coming generations of Liberals, something that is needed. We needed a bit of a recalibration as well, in my opinion, I hope this catastrophe will expose the risks of over-centralization to the people that lean socialist. National Republicans just have support for cutting funding, something pretty popular after seeing the current Progressivism with immigration assistance, tuition forgiveness, and limiting drug prices. Democracy is messy, but most Americans are good and many are intelligent. Trump barely even won against record inflation and arguably the largest conflict with Russia we've ever had, pair all that with the current male identity crisis being pumped by influencers right now. Liberals have just gotten too comfortable, a bit caught off guard.