Calm

We say “intelligence” and “most intelligent” because that is the scriptural label given to our eternal essence so to speak (I doubt we actually understand what this all amounts to). Joseph Smith seems to have used “intelligence” interchangeably imo with “spirit”. speculation follows: So it may have nothing to do with smarts. The ability to make conscious choices, be an agent and/or interact with matter and other intelligences seems to me to be the most likely fundamental qualities. Sentience may be a better word than intelligence in my view. What it boils down to, imo, is in all necessary ways God is the greatest above us, so much further that while we need assistance, he was able to independently progress to the point of being the Creator. This may qualify as speculation, but a truly independent agent who then after climbing to the highest heights turns around to pull up others…that’s a being worth worshipping, especially since I believe he pulls us up not out of necessity or for his own glory (though it results in that), but out of perfect love. I believe God delights in the Universe. And one of his delights is sharing it with others. I believe God chose his Work and his Glory, which are revealed to be to “bring to pass the immortality and eternal life of man”. Combine that with the revealed purpose of man according to God (which means to me the purpose he blessed us with) is joy (meaning God’s joy imo as in “Man is that he might have joy”), seems like God is doing all this eternal work so mankind can be truly filled with pure happiness, even beyond happiness into joy. We have the example of Satan choosing not to love and respect, so it seems to me God wasn’t forced by ‘programming’ into providing all this for us, but he chose to love us and probably we weren’t that lovable to begin with. That is someone who leaves me in awe, who deserves to be worshipped forever not only out of gratitude, but wonder.

Once you know, you can tell us. Why do you keep asking questions about stuff you must know by now has not been revealed?

Wait, do you mean scholars or scientists as they are not the same?

Lazy today….I don’t think scientists are any more inherently conservative than nonscientists outside of the requirements of the scientific method, which requires a higher level of evidence than casual investigation (and thank goodness or we would have more disasters imo), but not willing to do the research today, so resorted to AI to summarize research (my bold):

CFR please. For the in general…. Anecdotally, the scientists I know are usually nice guys pretty typical overall if intense when it comes to their area of study. They love talking about innovations. I can see arrogance perhaps in the scholarly elite, but there are far fewer of those than the up and coming ones who want and need to establish reputations to get grants, good teaching positions, book deals, etc. Of course, there are the inherent evidence requirements for the scientific method. Do you really want to compromise on that?

My experience is the ones with broader reading tend to go this direction or just leave it as an unknown (my preference since nothing is satisfying since I can’t wrap my head around an eternal past where there is always a time before, I don’t see how anyone mortal can view the reality of time—if it is a reality—accurately, so any solution we propose is highly likely to be wrong), the ones who accept as truth the infinite regress of Gods study primarily those who agree with this speculation.

And reputations to be made.

We talked about it most as kids, what kind of far out things that we would make. It was not serious as far as I could tell though some may have seriously thought about it privately. I think the last time I talked about it IRL was when we were reminiscing about Slartibartfast (sp from memory) and his fjords and I said I was leaning that way myself. That may have been 15 or more years ago.

Not really. I see that as what transgender politics is doing for women’s safety overall. Focus on a minute problem that likely would be taken care of by the actual organizations involved rather than focusing on on actual systemic issues.

Back in the 50s (or so I heard), 60s and at least early 70s, mediation was presented by many outside the Church as a spiritual practice associated with Eastern religions, gurus and such. However, it morphed into a nondenominational practice that was about mental discipline. Doctors and psychologists were the ones more often seen teaching it rather than nonChristian religious leaders from what I saw. Same thing with yoga (which my mom was doing in the 60s with Lilias). Transcendental Mediation was what I heard the most about, but there were popular retreats (that pushed meditation as part of the retreat experience) in Northern California where the majority of my youth was spent. Mom picked up a couple of books on meditation and I tried it, but couldn’t make it work, though I loved yoga. (I have figured out that type of meditation doesn’t work with my RLS as not moving triggers it, yoga has enough movement in it I could do it until my RLS got severe). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Transcendental_Meditation In the Church there was a lot of negativity with this new age type of meditation and yoga got dragged into it as well as another gateway to disbelief and paganism. Back then I remember it getting tied into hippies, drugs, and pop culture (Beatles and other celebrities studied under gurus https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Beatles_in_India ). I have seen quite a few members who got into the new age stuff with energy healing leave the Church (never heard of it with meditation or yoga though), but that tends to be when they see these practices as deeper, meatier doctrine that leads to greater spiritual knowledge…which, imo is something that can happen with fundamentalist beliefs as much as the spiritualist type of beliefs, if not more, in our faith it seems to me. My memory says (but if it’s accurate who knows) I was hearing positive things about meditation as a mental discipline in my psych classes at BYU, which would be late 70s, early 80s. I can’t remember when it was being brought up as church as part of prayer and personal study. A search on the Church’s website shows pretty consistent use of meditation and meditate with increases around 2000, so my guess is it was more a cultural thing. Didn’t deep dive to see when it was a main focus of discussion instead of part of a list of personal practices tied with prayer, etc. What exactly was meant by meditation matters, of course. The one thing I did note was an announcement about the Priesthood Revelation talked about Pres Kimball’s meditation and prayer. I doubt they meant the formal practice though as opposed to pondering, etc. Now both meditation and yoga are very mainstream basic health practices.

If you mean cisgendered men going to the extreme of claiming to be women so as to have access to women only spaces, the amount of times this actually happens compared to cisgendered men not pretending or perhaps pretending to actually care about women while still violating their privacy and consent and rights…. I see it would be a much better investment of time and money to go after the latter given the rate of occurrences are significantly higher. I don’t want to see someone who can easily dominate me in a space I am inherently vulnerable in, but please target where it will actually make a major difference for myself and women rather than something that occurs to very few women overall. Work on the major problem of assault we have been living with for centuries rather allow yourself to get distracted by the rare occurrences so little to nothing actually changes for women. But for this to happen we would probably have to elect politicians that aren’t into assaulting women themselves or are okay with others who do as long as they align politically, Iow have a no tolerance rule for everyone that gets enforced.

No, you misunderstand. The only part the nope applied to was what I quoted. I believe in the perfect oneness that God the Father has promised. I believe hierarchies are a mortal necessity because we can’t truly be one.

But there is a difference between ‘natural’ advantages and man made advantages in many people’s minds (but training itself is a man made advantage).

Nope.

Congratulations. It is good to find a home where one feels one belongs.

Any comment in the case about trans men joining women’s teams?

It does seem odd to me that biological sex is so focused on as if that is the only relevant attraction in determining viability of relationships variable when there are others that are just as impactful for many, especially when it comes to marriage. I dated a guy who was an inch or two taller than I was and it just felt wrong (my dad was 6’2, Mom was 5’4). My brother married a woman who was 12 or 13 inches shorter, I love her, they make a great couple, but visually it looks mismatched to me. I don’t know why this matters to me, but I know I would be uncomfortable in a relationship where the guy was my height or shorter or I was way shorter than he was. I would also not be physically comfortable with someone whose build was more slender than my own at my healthy weight. My husband and my build and appearance are close enough that someone mistook us for siblings once when we were first married. Apparently I need to coordinate my husband as much as I do my clothes and home. I know women who were repulsed by hairy chests, others who were attracted by them. Besides shapes and textures, there’s smells and colors and sounds that affect attraction and repulsion.

No garlic?

I see this as a reasonable conclusion and my own conception is much like it. Mapping this idea onto LDS beliefs…. Even if someone believes gender is eternal (and what does that even mean when the existence of the eternal self has gone from intelligence alone to the addition of a spirit and then the addition of a mortal body, which one day will be an immortal perfect body and likely keep progressing eternally rather than become static imo since progression has been its constant state from the beginning), I don’t understand why someone would assume the mortal expression of gender is equivalent to the perfected eternal version given how messed up the mortal expressions of our physical forms can be and how limited out spiritual expressions seem to be. There are other aspects of the mind that are expressed that show significant limitations and possible damage even…extreme sociopathy for one example. One just has to look at the variety of significant mental illness to recognize mortality does not allow us perfect expression of our eternal mental being any more than it does our physical and spiritual aspects. Given this, why would anyone assume that the attribute of gender is somehow protected in mortality from such confusions? If a charitable society makes adjustments to allow those with physical challenges to more fully participate in the community, to not miss out on activities and experiences they can accomplish with such accommodations and does that same for many other mental challenges, it makes sense to me that there should be adjustments when it comes to gender as well. What those need to be is certainly open to debate, I get that, because we have limited economic resources to apply to such. A few wider parking spaces reserved nearer the activity costs little, but requiring ramps and elevators everywhere could amount to significant costs where the need isn’t that great (building codes requiring every two or more story home to include an elevator would be unreasonable since many will never have that need). Makes sense to me that no to low cost adjustments when identified are accepted as immediate relief for those in need. Allowing those with physical challenges to get on and off the plane first because it will take longer for them to get settled or to make connections rather than requiring them to wait to be the last so as to avoid risk of injury in the crowd is another simple no cost except a bit of patience requirement. Out of curiosity…Does anyone here believe handicapped parking shouldn’t be a standard part of our community accommodations because it might require a few more steps of those of us who don’t currently need that aid? Is there some reason you feel you have an inherent right to park as close to a store as possible and it should be an individual’s choice whether or not to make that charitable adjustment for someone in need? Do you perhaps believe it should always be first come first served no matter the risk to others?

What makes us human is eternal imo. Do you mean who gave him a physical form as I believe that is what Joseph meant? We assume if the Father went through mortality as the Son did…which seems logical from what Jesus himself said (John 5:19…btw, how do nonLDS Christians explain this passage?)…the Father had parents and a family life like Jesus.

I appreciate the questions and explanations.

I try to remember to refresh a page before writing a long post. That seems to help most of the time. The robot test seems to happen most when I have left the site open, but wandered off to do other things before getting back to it.

It is normal clothing, but that never stopped the comments when I was young. I wore T-shirts and jeans and everything shown occurred for me. I just still remember when the typical response when hearing of an assault was to ask what they were wearing or where they had gone (implying they should have known better). Though such a focus may be due my age and my grandmothers (did not grow up in Utah, though visited included one extended stay for 4 months, but I hadn’t hit puberty at that time and hadn’t yet started to get the catcalls and older men being overly friendly,, though my grandmothers were definitely commenting about what other girls and women were wearing). I would love it if I am out of date on this.

I wonder how many will gut react to this by thinking it’s her own fault because it’s obvious she wants the attention by her choice of clothing even if they don’t say it out loud?

Or that they were heavily vetted, which would be impossible without charging major money.