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Sistine Chapel

vatican.va

201–210 of 246 posts

Re: Sistine Chapel

#201

There's nothing technically novel about this. It's also kind of offensive given the mass genocide committed in the name of religion. Hacker News turning to Christian News.

I can separate the work of the man that created this from religion, and I don't see your link between this work of art and genocide. And that's from someone who strongly identifies as an atheist. It's impossible to see something like this that someone worked on for approximately 5 years and not both respect it, be awed by its technical mastery and to appreciate the fact that it came to us through hundreds of years in…

The art is the work of a religious institution, paid for and commissioned by a religious institution, and it has the purpose of glorifying that religious institution through art. If you fail to see that, and the link between religion and genocide then I fail to see why I'd waste any time here. What if Stalin had commissioned a painting. Would we see a 3D version of it at the top of HN? I doubt it.

Re: Sistine Chapel

#202

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Having tried the Oculus Rift, the potential to experience this would be incredible. Although there's nothing quite like just sitting on a worn stone bench alone in a cathedral, just the chill air around you. It often makes me wish for a non-religious religion -- just a refuge of tranquility.

> It often makes me wish for a non-religious religion -- just a refuge of tranquility. Like Buddhism? Try chilling in a Tibetan high altitude monastery someday.

We always love the hipsters comments on HN. Yeah, we get it's cool to be Buddhist in the US, it does not mean that opinion is shared universally across the world.

You can feel tranquil and at peace with yourself in non-Buddhist areas too.

Re: Sistine Chapel

#204

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It often makes me wish for a non-religious religion -- just a refuge of tranquility. Have you looked into Buddhism yet? Because that's exactly one of the ways I'd describe it--a non-religion whose focus is on tranquility. If you haven't looked into yet, this is a great easy-to-read book to start with: http://www.amazon.com/Peace-Every-Step-Mindfulness-Everyday/...

Or something you can attend, http://afsc.org/ with people. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quakers are the closest thing we have to Buddhism in the Americas.

Interesting quote from that page: "Today, around 89% of Friends worldwide practice programmed worship[6]—that is, worship with singing and a prepared message from the Bible, often coordinated by a pastor." Note the usage of the phrase "programmed worship". Bit of an unintended pun there.

Re: Sistine Chapel

#205

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's a better one still IMO. It's a place of worship, you're supposed to look at the images and ponder your relationship with, and position before, the Almighty Creator. If you're messing around with your camera, or others are, then you're invariably far to distracted to meditate on higher things.

That's a terrible reason, it's a tourist attraction, not a place of worship;even if it still were many don't care about your superstitions and don't need or want your superstitions imposed upon them. We don't all walk around with delusions of a creator in our minds.

Yeah, sure, Mr. "Smalltalk and C# developer", the Sistine Chapel is a tourist attraction.

I am not sure if you have "delusions of a creator" but you sure seem to have other delusions.

Some people on Hacker News are honestly embarrassingly retarded.

Re: Sistine Chapel

#206
post #155

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In this case I should have probably used 'funded', but in those days not having a religion was not really an option. Michelangelo was at continuous odds with his employers during his lifetime, he dissected corpses illegally at first, later with tacit approval of some of the church bigwigs in order to improve his skills as an artist. It was a continuous give-and-take to see who got the most out of the arrangement. In…

> "declared himself unfit as a painter" ? Wasn't it more like "declared painting as unfit for him"? Michelangelo had a strong disdain for paintings and painters especially Leonardo Da Vinci and his friends. My only source is [this biography](1). Not sure how accurate that is. [1]: http://www.amazon.com/The-Agony-Ecstasy-Biographical-Michela...

I did not write that he declared himself unfit as a painter, I wrote that he did not consider himself to be a painter. Michelangelo's first love was marble, not paint.

Re: Sistine Chapel

#207
post #6

Very nice. In fact, almost nicer than being there (though you should do that anyway if you get the chance). Because now you can experience the details for as long as you want without a hundred other people around you who are just as annoyed at you as you are at them. I get it that a tourist complaining about tourist attractions being too crowded is total hypocrisy on my part. But at the same time what I wouldn't give…

And without the guard constantly clapping and saying "SSSSSSSHHHHH", very annoying indeed.

Re: Sistine Chapel

#208
The performance of this is crazy good. I clicked from mobile and the scrolling was very fast and smooth, which is strange because the desktop version is flash I think :O

Re: Sistine Chapel

#210

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's a terrible reason, it's a tourist attraction, not a place of worship;even if it still were many don't care about your superstitions and don't need or want your superstitions imposed upon them. We don't all walk around with delusions of a creator in our minds.

> not a place of worship // Your contention is that the Sistine Chapel¹ is not a place dedicated by Christians to the glorification of God? Like it's not, say, a chapel? And they don't have art work depicting the lives of important people in the Christian faith, or imagery that Christians might use as part of their worship. When the Sistine Chapel choir sings the Miserere, say, to assembled members of the Roman Catho…

> Your contention is that the Sistine Chapel¹ is not a place dedicated by Christians to the glorification of God? Like it's not, say, a chapel?

They don't use it as one, at least most of the time. There are too many people passing through for it to be a place of worship or reflection. Once you start selling entry to tourists you lose the right to demand they do something other than tourism, IMO.

If they really wanted to keep it as a place of worship they'd close it to the unbaptized and allow free entry (as is done with the Kaaba IIRC). Of course, that would be much less profitable.

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