They don't exist - beetle spirits or thunder gods.
That’s more than I know. And regarding Thor, I know some followers of Asatru who would definitely disagree.
They were invented to explain phenomena that defied the limited knowledge of the day in a pre-scientific world.
That’s a big assumption, one of which I’m absolutely not convinced. Maybe the beetle. But all kinds of spiritual beings? No. I don’t believe that at all. We’ll have to disagree about that.
I suggest Staples' Law (Lewis' Law and Jack's Law are already taken, in rather different contexts.): No online discussion about Christian belief is complete without a quote from C S Lewis.
They don't exist - beetle spirits or thunder gods.
That’s more than I know. And regarding Thor, I know some followers of Asatru who would definitely disagree.
They were invented to explain phenomena that defied the limited knowledge of the day in a pre-scientific world.
That’s a big assumption, one of which I’m absolutely not convinced. Maybe the beetle. But all kinds of spiritual beings? No. I don’t believe that at all. We’ll have to disagree about that.
It's the simplest explanation and in the absence of evidence to the contrary it's the best.
I suggest Staples' Law (Lewis' Law and Jack's Law are already taken, in rather different contexts.): No online discussion about Christian belief is complete without a quote from C S Lewis.
Except that’s demonstrably untrue, and too subjective (what does “complete” mean) to qualify as a “law.”
Now, if it’s phrased more like Godwin’s Law—As an online discussion among ____ about Christian beliefs grows longer, the probability of someone quoting C.S. Lewis approaches one—then I could perhaps endorse the idea.
I think, though, as the blank indicates, you’d also have to state who is participating in the online discussion. In my experience Anglicans and more evangelical (in the classic sense) Protestants are more likely to quote Lewis than people from other Christian traditions are. Not that people from other Christian traditions don’t quote Lewis; they certainly do. But not as often in my experience. So, for example, if the online discussion is between, say, Catholics, the probability isn’t as high as it would be if the discussion is mainly between, say, Anglicans.
I suggest Staples' Law (Lewis' Law and Jack's Law are already taken, in rather different contexts.): No online discussion about Christian belief is complete without a quote from C S Lewis.
Except that’s demonstrably untrue, and too subjective (what does “complete” mean) to qualify as a “law.”
Now, if it’s phrased more like Godwin’s Law—As an online discussion among ____ about Christian beliefs grows longer, the probability of someone quoting C.S. Lewis approaches one—then I could perhaps endorse the idea.
I think, though, as the blank indicates, you’d also have to state who is participating in the online discussion. In my experience Anglicans and more evangelical (in the classic sense) Protestants are more likely to quote Lewis than people from other Christian traditions are. Not that people from other Christian traditions don’t quote Lewis; they certainly do. But not as often in my experience. So, for example, if the online discussion is between, say, Catholics, the probability isn’t as high as it would be if the discussion is mainly between, say, Anglicans.
They don't exist - beetle spirits or thunder gods.
That’s more than I know. And regarding Thor, I know some followers of Asatru who would definitely disagree.
They were invented to explain phenomena that defied the limited knowledge of the day in a pre-scientific world.
That’s a big assumption, one of which I’m absolutely not convinced. Maybe the beetle. But all kinds of spiritual beings? No. I don’t believe that at all. We’ll have to disagree about that.
It's the simplest explanation and in the absence of evidence to the contrary it's the best.
Again, we’ll disagree—on at least three things here in this last post.
(Nor that I have a specific belief in Thor, for example, nor do I attempt to propitiate pagan gods when faced with a dangerous storm (even here in Florida); I do pray to God, of course.)
Just to observe that there is no more scientific rigour to the "laws" of internet culture than there is to Parkinson's Law (or the Peter Principle). Even Godwin's Law started off as an exercise in memetics.
My understanding is that C S Lewis hated the name "Clive".
There could be a team-up between the Inklings and Indiana Jones. At least Williams. There was actually a graphic novel a few years ago involving the Inklings versus Alistair Crowley, which I didn’t pick up—while Crowley had issues, I don’t genuinely see him as being as villainous as he was depicted in that, which annoyed me.
I'm wondering whether to explore the differences between angel investors and white knights, and how this crosses over with our beliefs…
You'd have to tell us what each of those are first
The use of these terms make me wonder to what extent capitalism can be considered to be a belief system. From their wikipedia entries:
In business, a white knight is a friendly investor that acquires a corporation at a fair consideration with support from the corporation's board of directors and management. This may be during a period while it is facing a hostile acquisition from another potential acquirer (black knight) or it is facing bankruptcy.
An angel investor … is an individual who provides capital to a business or businesses, including startups, usually in exchange for convertible debt or ownership equity. Angel investors often provide support to startups at a very early stage (when the risk of their failure is relatively high), once or in a consecutive manner, and when most investors are not prepared to back them.
More traditionally, a white knight "usually represents a heroic warrior fighting against evil" while the term "is used in modern-day parlance to mean any kind of saviour". As suggested by the definition above, the group of people who a white knight saves are the board of directors & management of a business - a black knight typically dispenses with their services, as would also usually be the case when facing bankruptcy. (Contrast this with the fate of the investors and of the workforce.)
‘Angel investors’ are wealthy individuals who provide funding and advice for small growing companies. … The power of the ‘angel’ metaphor provides a smokescreen for the system that investors both prop up and are propped up by: in reality, angel investors only exist because the status quo capitalist process of creating high-growth companies requires them. If we are to believe there are other better ways of bringing new technologies into the world, we must reckon with, and directly address, our lack of disenchantment with growth-at-all-costs market capitalism. To do this, we can point directly to the role of the angel as depicted in religious texts: a servant of a higher power. Instead of ‘angel investor’, why not servant of capitalism?
Notable recipients of funding from angel investors include Uber, Airbnb, and Facebook. (See also enshittification.)
The portrayal of certain kinds of investors as heroes, saviours and angels suggests a morality or code of conduct is involved. But this is a code where those in peril are employers running a business; a morality where benevolence is shown to those seeking to start up businesses of their own, in exchange for a share of the profits. The quality that enables the white knight's chivalry and the angel investor's benevolence is, of course, their wealth.
To me, this starts to look not so much like a belief system, but like a parody of a belief system.
I'm not sure you aren't reading far, far more into these terms than the people who originated and use them intended.
Doesn't matter a rat's what the people who originated them intended, only what those who use them on the regular intend. Word meaning is governed by usage, not origin.
I'm not sure you aren't reading far, far more into these terms than the people who originated and use them intended.
Doesn't matter a rat's what the people who originated them intended, only what those who use them on the regular intend. Word meaning is governed by usage, not origin.
But do most people talking in a business context about “white knights” or “angel investors” think of those terms as suggesting some kind of moral code? I wouldn’t think so. I’d think it just involves reference to easily understood tropes.
I'm not sure you aren't reading far, far more into these terms than the people who originated and use them intended.
Doesn't matter a rat's what the people who originated them intended, only what those who use them on the regular intend. Word meaning is governed by usage, not origin.
Quite. But does anyone mean by them what @pease is inferring from them, or is that just his personal interpretation?
It feels a bit like saying "people consider the stock market to be a zoo, hence the talk of bulls and bears"
I'm not sure you aren't reading far, far more into these terms than the people who originated and use them intended.
Doesn't matter a rat's what the people who originated them intended, only what those who use them on the regular intend. Word meaning is governed by usage, not origin.
Quite. But does anyone mean by them what @pease is inferring from them, or is that just his personal interpretation?
It feels a bit like saying "people consider the stock market to be a zoo, hence the talk of bulls and bears"
I think people create a world in their own imagination and in some senses embody that imagining in the world, to the extent that the connection between the initial idea and the embodiment is almost entirely lost.
I cannot think of a good example, but a bad one is the imagining that a dead person becomes an angel. As far as I know this is not a prevailing idea in any major religion but has become repeated so often in the kind of street religion that is replicated on greetings cards that it seems people actually now believe it.
Using your example, it is likely that the terms bear and bull markets were used because of something about the shape of curves. The bull lifting up in its attack and the bear striking down.
But for those involved in buying and selling shares, the words have become the wallpaper of their reality, where it becomes to resemble a zoo or jungle of competing animals fighting to survive. In some sense it seems like the choice of metaphor has forced a form of behaviour.
The terms like White Knight and Angel Investor certainly seem to be words devoid of the context from which they have been wrenched. But at the same time they are metaphors which seem to feed into a self-made myth that many entrepreneurs seem to believe about themselves.
Which is something about Fate and Worthiness. That somehow they have been able to attract unexpected investors because of some "virtue" that they have. Which might be couched in seemingly unreligious language such as "hard-work" or "visionary" but the language itself supports the self-belief that success is accrued because somehow the universe is rewarding them.
I wasn't surprised to find that asking whether capitalism is a belief system isn't an original question.
In 1921, Walter Benjamin wrote, but didn't finish, "Capitalism as Religion" (Kapitalismus als Religion), which has an extensive wikipedia page:
…Benjamin argues that capitalism should be understood as a religion. This thesis reinterprets Max Weber's view of the Protestant work ethic as a condition for capitalism’s emergence. Rather than viewing capitalism as influenced by religious origins, Benjamin argues it is itself a religious phenomenon. He identifies three key features: its nature as a pure cult without dogma, its continuous duration, and its emphasis on guilt rather than atonement. Rather than directly opposing Weber, Benjamin radicalizes and extends his ideas.
The text employs allegory and metaphor, particularly the term Schuld, which can mean both guilt and debt. Capitalism, according to Benjamin, creates an escalating cycle of guilt, ultimately implicating even God and leading to despair and world-destruction.
And in 2010, for Anglican Theological Review, Kathryn Tanner wrote Is Capitalism a Belief System? (Link from Integral Economics, as ATF's own links are broken.) A short extract:
This social character of the market makes it a moral matter. The market is not just a means to goals subject to moral evaluation, of special interest because of its purported efficiency. It is not just that under free market conditions of perfect competition one can expect to purchase for the least possible cost the products that contribute to the pursuit of what, one might hope, are morally evaluated goals. The market is, moreover, a particular system of social cooperation, and as such naturally raises questions about our duties and responsibilities to one another.
Instructive in this regard are early modern reactions in Europe to a burgeoning new market or commercial society (as it was called). … The possible moral attractions of the market were a great part of its appeal; it was the market’s potential moral benefits that made it seem a form of social organization or way of life worth keeping.
Comments
That’s more than I know. And regarding Thor, I know some followers of Asatru who would definitely disagree.
That’s a big assumption, one of which I’m absolutely not convinced. Maybe the beetle. But all kinds of spiritual beings? No. I don’t believe that at all. We’ll have to disagree about that.
***WILD APPLAUSE***
(Is there already a Clive’s Law?)
It's the simplest explanation and in the absence of evidence to the contrary it's the best.
Now, if it’s phrased more like Godwin’s Law—As an online discussion among ____ about Christian beliefs grows longer, the probability of someone quoting C.S. Lewis approaches one—then I could perhaps endorse the idea.
I think, though, as the blank indicates, you’d also have to state who is participating in the online discussion. In my experience Anglicans and more evangelical (in the classic sense) Protestants are more likely to quote Lewis than people from other Christian traditions are. Not that people from other Christian traditions don’t quote Lewis; they certainly do. But not as often in my experience. So, for example, if the online discussion is between, say, Catholics, the probability isn’t as high as it would be if the discussion is mainly between, say, Anglicans.
Now there is a research project!!!
Again, we’ll disagree—on at least three things here in this last post.
My understanding is that C S Lewis hated the name "Clive".
It's also slang for nether regions, at least around here.
Yikes! I’m sure not when he was that young (born in 1898), at least in the UK. (I think you’re in the UK but not sure.)
Meanwhile (abstract only): Notable recipients of funding from angel investors include Uber, Airbnb, and Facebook. (See also enshittification.)
The portrayal of certain kinds of investors as heroes, saviours and angels suggests a morality or code of conduct is involved. But this is a code where those in peril are employers running a business; a morality where benevolence is shown to those seeking to start up businesses of their own, in exchange for a share of the profits. The quality that enables the white knight's chivalry and the angel investor's benevolence is, of course, their wealth.
To me, this starts to look not so much like a belief system, but like a parody of a belief system.
Doesn't matter a rat's what the people who originated them intended, only what those who use them on the regular intend. Word meaning is governed by usage, not origin.
Quite. But does anyone mean by them what @pease is inferring from them, or is that just his personal interpretation?
It feels a bit like saying "people consider the stock market to be a zoo, hence the talk of bulls and bears"
I think people create a world in their own imagination and in some senses embody that imagining in the world, to the extent that the connection between the initial idea and the embodiment is almost entirely lost.
I cannot think of a good example, but a bad one is the imagining that a dead person becomes an angel. As far as I know this is not a prevailing idea in any major religion but has become repeated so often in the kind of street religion that is replicated on greetings cards that it seems people actually now believe it.
Using your example, it is likely that the terms bear and bull markets were used because of something about the shape of curves. The bull lifting up in its attack and the bear striking down.
But for those involved in buying and selling shares, the words have become the wallpaper of their reality, where it becomes to resemble a zoo or jungle of competing animals fighting to survive. In some sense it seems like the choice of metaphor has forced a form of behaviour.
Which is something about Fate and Worthiness. That somehow they have been able to attract unexpected investors because of some "virtue" that they have. Which might be couched in seemingly unreligious language such as "hard-work" or "visionary" but the language itself supports the self-belief that success is accrued because somehow the universe is rewarding them.
In 1921, Walter Benjamin wrote, but didn't finish, "Capitalism as Religion" (Kapitalismus als Religion), which has an extensive wikipedia page:
And in 2010, for Anglican Theological Review, Kathryn Tanner wrote Is Capitalism a Belief System? (Link from Integral Economics, as ATF's own links are broken.) A short extract: