Re: my proposals for a philosophical language

I dunno, the folks in the Holy See might disagree...  ^___~

(that is, BTW, a cute little winky smily face thing; I'm being silly)

Certainly, Christianity is a major influence here.  But it doesn't
completely and utterly define every facet of our existence (would you like
fries with that?); there are other influences too.  Christianity is a major
influence in the politics of Northern Ireland (at least, certain aspects of
it are; I'm afraid that the whole Christian "love your brother"/tolerance
deal doesn't seem to have embedded itself fully in that situation)  Its
influence is widespread, especially in terms of *range* (I don't think you
can get much more diverse, geographically, than Uganda, the US, Italy,
Serbia, Brazil...), and its highly institutionalized.  Christianity colors
our perceptions of a lot of things in our culture, even for non-believers.
Now let's all throw a big party/whatever the unhappy version of a party is
for the Romans, the Kievian Rus, those folks who were all into the
prostelytizing business in the Middle Ages, and Philo T. Farnsworth (I
really SHOULD know his name, but I don't... sigh) for spreading it around.

(I BTW do not understand why Islam didn't spread around the same way... or
at least, why it didn't stick in places like Spain, to the extent that I
would have anticipated...)

I have a challenge for you all -- how many DIFFERENT ways can we get
hopelessly off-topic (list-wise)while retaining the same subject line, yet
always stay within the appropriate conversation?  I think we should count
how many more messages before something seriously wild (analagous to a
heated debate over Michael Jackson owning all those Beatles and Elvis
rights...) is brought up legitimately.

I'm also curious -- how many of you have made up religious traditions in
order to influence a constructed language?  I'm toying with the idea of a
human culture that has some very odd ideas, thanks to their interaction with
other societies (e.g. they find all elves weak, because elves in this
scenario choose to die, and they see that as cowardice -- a truly
*couragous* person would be one with the stamina to stay alive and work for
the good of all the world forEVER), and considering the possiblity of giving
them a language (possibly a derivative of another language, Sarah1 or
something) that's been charged emotionally to reflect their theology and
all.  I always knew I wanted them to have a language, but it occurred to me
that by making that general attitude a moral and religious maxim, it'd be
more logical to have it cemented into the language itself.  And from there
all these OTHER ideas about their religious/moral outlook on life
developed...

(I am devoted to saying SOMEthing on-topic in all these messages...)

Sarah Marie Parker-Allen
lloannna@surfside.net
http://lloannna.blogspot.com
http://www.geocities.com/lloannna.geo

"There are some things that it is better to begin than to refuse, even
though the end may be dark."
-- J.R.R. Tolkien

> -----Original Message-----
> Behalf Of John Cowan
> The U.S. is unquestionably the most Christian-influenced country on the
> planet, for good and ill.
>
---
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