I believe in being open about myself and honest with people. Diabetes and the complications that i have developed becuase of it are a very serious and important part of my life. If someone can't handle that, i certainly don't want them as a friend much less someone i would date or marry. My former fiance left me when i suffered a insulin reaction and ended up in the hospital for two weeks. We had been together two years and were engaged to be married. Then she decides she can't handle it and leaves me. I would rather weed those kinda people out right away. That's why its in the first sentence of my profile.

I wonder how many of these girls are getting a "fair and equal" education now from their teachers and i wonder how many of those teachers are female. What subjects are they being taught? Just because they are in school does not mean they are getting the same education and treatment as the boys.

Sounds like your a type one diabetic also. Yeah its pretty funny everybody seems to think now diabetics are all over weight. I have had Type one since i was seven and i still have trouble keeping the weight on. i was at the hospital recently and a new nurse asked me if i was sure i had diabetes becuase i was not overweight. yeah that crap does happen but what can you do. oh well.

Everybody needs to trace and check the sources of such information on these so called credible websites, stories and emails. Sounds like general hatemongering, fear and wildly imaginative scenarios from digruntled conservatives and right wingers. I am an independent and this kind of careless fear inspiring talk without fact checks and evidence is meaningless.

I was recently on another dating site in chat with about fifty other singles of different races and health conditions. When a young woman(28) made a statement directed towards me as i was talking about Taoism with two others. " I reviewed your profile and you stated that you had diabetes and various other health conditions. I believe you need to know that no woman on this site would date you because you might pass this genetic disorder on to your children."
Naturally i was shocked by this statement and was not immediately sure how to respond. I was reminded of the practice of euegenics and how discriminating and racist this kind of thinking is. As i wrote my intial response i was even more shocked to see that no one else had responded to the comment. I then waited five minutes to see if anyone would say anything. Well no one did. I then promptly closed my account and left. My question: Is this kind of thinking and mentality acceptable and are these the kind of things that go through people's mind as they choose who they date? Let me know what you all think.

I was trying to find Taoists specifically. I have nothing against Buddha and i have many buddhist friends but i made this thread for those who practice Taoism. The two are seperate eastern philosophies and religions. I am not saying you can't practice them in combination. There are many people who combine beliefs as an example: Many Japanese practice both Shinto beliefs and Buddhist beliefs. I am just saying i made this spread for Taoism specifically and i would prefer we keep to that. Thanks

Still preaching science over everything else is a sign of a limited and constrained mind. I remind you all again that it is but one part of the big picture that is reality.

I respect both jeremy and your views however i disagree that there is any proof that becuase something by theory is housed in the brain that it is in fact a part of the brain. To use jeremy's arguement science and pychology have to yet to quanitively or physically determine a location to which conciousness resides. Just saying that is something somewhere is not proof. Are brainwaves really your conciousness much less your mind? Even stating the ego resides in the mind is questionable. question the question and question the answers. Scientist would have us believe we are nothing more than synaptic reponses to stimuli, I ask is that really what the conciousness is. What makes the concept of "I am" an actual person much less an entity taking residence in the body. What about the Soul? What is the essence of our being? Just becuase you are satisfied with definitions and statements that you believe have substance does not mean that those definitions or statements have any meaning in what is actually real. Question evrything, especially the percieved definitions and statements. Truth is more than Logic. Logic is just words that try to agree with each other.

I see what your saying now, sorry for the confusion. I have studied many religions and faiths. As a Taoist I personally believe in the concept of the transfiguration of the Tao/Wu-Chi into the ten thousand myriad things or everything in our universe as it were. The One creates two: Yin and Yang. The two created the greater and lesser four. The four produced the eight trigrams and the eight trigrams created the sixty four heaxgrams this continued on into the creation of the ten thousand myriad things-our universe. What is Tao? you might ask, I cannot in words define the Tao. You find it spoken of in every faith in some form or another. Semantics really. What you call God I go as far as to compare Tao with your christian ideologoical view that is called a god or holy spirit. For me all comes from this and will return to this. From nothing comes everything and in everything there is nothing. I not sure what version of the Bible your faith derives from but if you read in Genesis you will find that God before creation took counsel with God before creating all things. If i am not mistaken this counsel would indicate a conference with others with the self that was God. Father, Son and holy ghost or perhaps even the angels or more. I respect your views and as i see it my views and your views do not conflict. All is One and One is All. Everything is connected. I am you. You are I am. Creation in my view is a collective effort of the one source.

<Quote>Except that in 500 years science has given us everything we know and love here in modern life, where as any other philosophy or religion has given us what?

Name 5 things that religion or philosophy has given us that has changed our understanding of reality . . . .


The way I see it, is science requires hard work, where as any "guru" can claim to have spiritual knowledge . . . . He just has to sell his claim to "guruness"

You want to understand reality, time to pick up some science books, you want to mentally masterbate to feel better about yourself, then go find some religion or some new age "energy"
<Quote>
5 things huh.....lets see jeremy...
who do you think started all your cherished science. Churches and monasteries were what helped bring us out of the dark ages. They kept and maintained books, kept records. Hell jeremy monks were some of the first biologists, only they were called naturalists back them. Eygptian priests were some of the first astronomers. Taoist, Gnostic and Kabbalist alchemists were the first chemists. Philosophy is responsible for the very development of the scientific method. I can name hundreds of philosophers who were scientists before there ever was such a title to go by. Heres a couple, Archemiedes, Pythagoras, and Socrates. Hell many scientists were religous or philosphical. Here's a few, Issac Newton, Galileo, Copernicus, Francis Bacon, Kelper and even Carl Sagan. Hell Albert Eistien was jewish. We owe are knowlegde of nuclear power to a jewish woman. Jeremy nothing irritates me more than some punk spouting the virtues of something to which he himself knows nothing about. I don't care if its science, religion or philosophy. Your statements are arrogant, foolish igonorant. You attack and fear what you yourself do not understand which you no better then anyone else. Heres some advice; Get over yourself and quit coming on here playing mental ego head games. Take your own advice and pick a book and read it. If you had done that then maybe you would actually know something about your precious science. The Japanese samurai had a saying,"When speaking and acting one must think twelve times before speaking. That way no one will doubt what he says. When acting one must think twenty times before taking any action. That way no one will doubt what he does." My sensei told me that when you could do that in a instant then you would be a master. Your screename speaks of the Bushido but i get the impression you know nothing of it meaning let alone understand the Bushido Code. Arrogance is unbecoming of the samurai and i counsel you to remove this aspect of your behavior before you can even begin to talk of the Way.

<Quote>What you should ask yourself instead of going into the metaphysics of "guru's" and "sensei's" is why a computer when it is rebooting does not display your desktop and cannot connect to the internet, but when it is done rebooting it then again has all of its functionality . .. I mean it never lost power during a reboot . . . yet you still cant make use of all its features. . . .

Consciousness is a function of the brain which is not required in the short term to sustain the organism, where as breathing, blood flow, and metabolism are . . .

You will not die without consciousness for 20 minutes, where as if the brain has to choose between consciousness and those other "features" . . . well. . . if it choose consciousness vs the other items listed it would be a fatal error that your system would not recover from.



Jeremy your arguement is flawed becuase you presume that conciussness is hardwired to the brain, like that of the hard drive in your computer i would have remebered that the hard drive(conciuosness) can be removed from the computer and still mantain its directives and functions. In fact it can be placed in another computer even (brain,body) and continue to function. The real fatal error here is presumption thats ones existence is determined and isolated to the brain,the body and its functions. A medical note for you: My heart stopped functioning and i was "rebooted" several times, so my "computer" as your metaphysically flawed comprasion did lose power, repeatly amd last time i checked they don't have surge protectors for the brain... I think i will stick to the wisdom of my teachers thank you and not presume to know something prior to understanding or experiencing it myself...

No i said that He/She/Them/IT would eventaully get bored. Your arguement is flawed in the fact the it first presumes that one has to be alone in order to get bored. People get bored all the time and their about 6 billion about them last time i checked. Your statment is illogical and points to the assumption that creation is the result of individal effort rather than a collective one and also you presume that all boredom is the result of one being alone. Those presumptions make your arguement invalid....

whoa there adj4u no need to yell...you might get banned by the FCC ,,,,lol

When you become immortal, let me know how well that"one can only become bored with itself." concept works out. As a Taoist i try not lend myself to knowing what i do not yet understand. One must first ask, receieve the answer, meditate upon it and then achieve understanding in order to trully know anything. But then again what one knows passes with the breeze....

I tend to consider myself a traditionalist when it comes to the martial arts. I have trained and studied in Aikido, Kenjutsu, Iaido, Tai Chi Chuan and Tai Hui since i was twelve. I train and live by the mentality that these are combative art forms that are studied and practiced only to do one thing. That would be to defend yourself or others who could be harmed. These are not sports.
These are not games. People who use them for such do not embody the martial mind. They have allowed ego,pride and blantant aggression to blind them from the true essence and nature of their martial arts teachings. Competition never improves the martial artists' true potential and abilities. I would have to agree that such 'bloodsports' that encourage such behavior should be restricted, limited and controlled. However as much as i disdain saying it these 'bloodsports' will continue as they are until someone dies or the masses grow weary of such violence.

Love is double edge sword if you ask me..it does as much harm or saving of others as the one who allows its use.

Why would a "god" need to create. If by the term god you mean a sentient being who is all powerful and exists forever... i would have to forever is a long time to spend and all likelyhood He/She/Them or It would probably get bored and need something laugh about....

Michael Nichols
Aug 5 1981 to whatever date of my demise.
The proverbial thorn in everything's side
May He be the same in eternity or the next life.

Science does not determine what is real, at least not completely. I am reminded of a story of a man and elephant doing a painting of each other. When they finished they both took the opportunity to critque the paintings. The man looked at the elephants painting of him and gasped," That is not me! It lacks structure,form and any type of consistency." The elephant unphased by the man's remark examined the man's painting of him and then went and sat in front of a mirror. I think we would have a better understanding of reality if we knew why the elephant sat in front of the mirror versus caring about the man's verbal critism. Science is but one piece of the jigsaw puzzle that makes and defines what is real or an absolute truth. It seems to me you are consumed with repetition, consistency, form and structure, all very scientific i might had,but your missing the big picture. Science is nothing without theory, imagination or creativity and therefore fails to completely encompass what is real.

The poor kid was crying out for help otherwise he would not have done it in such a public manner. People who are driven to suicide be it mental or becuase of their circumstances are not doing it for attention. If someone is talking about killing themselves, TAKE IT SERIOUSLY. Five years ago i started having seizures and my diabetes got so unmanagable i could not take care of myself anymore. Then all at once my life was destroyed,I had an insulin reaction and ended up hospitalized for a month.My fiance couldn't handle it and left me and when i got of the hospital all i had was a bag of clothes, eviction notice, dear john letter, $1200 in medication and medical bills and the news that my employers no longer needed me. So i spent the next six months on the streets, sleeping in a cemetary in downtown KC becuase homeless shelters don't take people with health conditions and tell you to go to the hospital. News flash, you cant sleep in a hospital emergeceny room 30 minutes before security asks you to leave or they will have you escorted out for loitering. So there i was jobless,homeless, broke and wasting away on the streets. Government,family,friends and average people refused or said they could not help. I got to the point i realised no one cared what happened to me and that it was only a matter of time. I tryed to kill myself six times. In each case i would have succeded if not for some quirks of fate intervening. Regular people, strangers and people who certainly had more important things to do would find me as i was dying and go get help. To this day i can't thank them enough for saving me.
To all those who would have done nothing take a good look at yourselves and ask if i was dying and had no hope would i have needed someones help. There is an old axiom: Evil happens becuase good men do nothing.