Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Eight Secret Societies (2016)

smithsonianmag.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

111–120 of 125 posts

Re: Eight Secret Societies (2016)

#111

Post by [deleted] »

Bayart wrote: post #106
abrenuntio wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would say that the reasons run deeper than a power play. Freemasonry demands active participation in a religious liturgy in which Christ is implicitly excluded. When the Church warns against such worship and the basic attitudes (beliefs) it inevitably expresses, it is not expressing hatred but charity: concern for souls and loyalty to the mission it received from Christ in Mt 28:19-20. My guess is that you will fin…

I agree with you. I wanted to include in my post that it had likely to do with Freemasons having ritual without much in the way of doctrine, but I didn't want to appear inflammatory.

[deleted]

Re: Eight Secret Societies (2016)

#112

Post by bovermyer »

motohagiography wrote: post #85
bovermyer wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have not visited a lodge since I moved across country. My "home" lodge was Blue Lodge #24, in Brookings, SD. But yes, I agree with your observation about Masonry being a kind of neutral territory and equalizer. I have known Masons that, in public, I am adamantly opposed to... but under the roof of a lodge, get along with perfectly fine. Another thing that always struck me as interesting is that Masons do not recrui…

It's a huge barrier, but also, it sets a high bar where the only way it grows is by being great somehow. I always acknowledge to applicants that it takes a lot of courage to approach a bunch of guys like that, and also mention that we do have to get to know them a bit because it's very possible they're just nuts. I watched the clubhouse.io thing play out pretty closely because they were dealing with the exact same tr…

My wife and I are planning to move to Canada as soon as circumstances allow. Toronto is not out of the running.

Re: Eight Secret Societies (2016)

#113

Post by bovermyer »

ljf wrote: post #99
weard_beard wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I went as far as asking a friend who was in the initiation stage to recommend me. My great uncle was a mason. Ultimately I decided any group that would have me I wouldn’t want to join. There must be some lone and hungry men left solitary in the world, like Diogenes, to irrationally and unpopulary make war on the consensus of kings and groups reasonable men.

I've always been interested in them, my brother found a load of old Masonic items in his attic and when I moved to a new town the masons held an open day and I was really impressed by the charity work and the meals/drinks sounded fun. I was about to join (or rather begin the process) when I mentioned it to my aunt who was visiting. She went on to tell me a long story of how my grandfather had to join the masons to be…

You don't have to believe in a god, but you do have to believe in a higher power. That's a really subtle but crucial difference.

Also... it's also my experience that once you become a Mason, you are a Mason for life, regardless of your feelings on the matter. You can't quit. This, I think, is similar to how you can't be an ex-Marine. There's a whole lotta philosophy I could chat about there, but that's really a subject for an in-person talk over a few pints, not something to spout bytes over the Internet about.

Re: Eight Secret Societies (2016)

#114

Post by bovermyer »

abrenuntio wrote: post #105
Bayart wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Interestingly, the Catholic church _hates_ Freemasonry, for some reason. Freemasonry (and secret societies of the same style) was very active in the Age of Revolution and participated in the uprooting of the Church's power base. As an active Catholic, Freemasons have always been seen with extreme suspicion, if not outright fantasies. But you could say the same of the way Catholics are perceived in some places, in p…

I would say that the reasons run deeper than a power play. Freemasonry demands active participation in a religious liturgy in which Christ is implicitly excluded. When the Church warns against such worship and the basic attitudes (beliefs) it inevitably expresses, it is not expressing hatred but charity: concern for souls and loyalty to the mission it received from Christ in Mt 28:19-20. My guess is that you will fin…

That's an interesting way of putting it, and not inaccurate, either.

When I think about it... Freemasonry has a very different religious focus than most Abrahamic religions, despite its origins in the same. Yeshua ben Yosef is basically ignored in favor of other historical, and explicitly allegorical, figures.

Re: Eight Secret Societies (2016)

#115

Post by galaxyLogic »

oq_computer wrote: post #45

'The Power of Ritual in Prehistory: Secret Societies and Origins of Social Complexity' by Brian Hayden is a super interesting read on the origin of secret societies. Apparently there has always been a dynamic in communities that whenever there is a production surplus (according to the author happens in 'transegalitarian societies'), there tends to be a very small number of individuals that feel entitled to the surplu…

> hey need to be very public (to get new members), and what is a secret instead is the reason why the society exists

Isn't that like Scientology, I've read you must spend a lot of money and time to get read in to their secrets.

Re: Eight Secret Societies (2016)

#116

Post by galaxyLogic »

billybuckwheat wrote: post #11

Isn't the whole idea behind a secret society that the general public doesn't know about it? I thought that's what secret meant.

"Secret" means there is less supply of information. And when there is less supply but same demand, it means the price goes up. Isn't that a bit like Non-Fungible Tokens?

Re: Eight Secret Societies (2016)

#117

Post by galaxyLogic »

pyinstallwoes wrote: post #62
more_corn wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There’s no such thing as evil. It therefore has no fundamental traits. You’d be hard pressed to find anyone who thinks of himself as evil. Everyone is the hero of his own story. Take “the dread pirate roberts” you know it’s a reference to The Princess Bride right? The hero of The Princess Bride? Now Ross ram a high drug site on the dark web. Was Ross evil? He certainly didn’t think so. He philosophically disagreed wi…

Evil exists. You’re rationalizing pure logic. If I stalked you, terrorized you, did the most irrationally consistently irrational things to anything in your world and those near you, you’d be hard pressed to call me anything other than driven by evil. There is meticulous, introspective, malicious, terrible intent that reads its head. Luckily it seems rare but sadly I’ve come across it.

3 kinds of evil:

1. Greed: You desire something that someone else has so you steal it, or cheat to get it etc. and thus cause harm to those who lose what you gain.

2. Jealousy: You love/want somebody but they give their love to someone else, you hate that someone else - because you think it prevents you from getting love. Then you do bad things to those people who you are jealous of to make them look bad etc., or even do things to make them disappear from the scene etc.

3. Envy: You see that some people have what you don't and therefore you hate them and want to destroy their happiness.

The last one is the worst kind of evil. In 1. you get something by stealing. You benefit from that. In 2. you (try to) prevent someone from directing love away from you. But you still do it for love, to get love, and maybe you do. In 3. you are just pure evil because nobody benefits, not even you, from destroying the happiness of others.

Envy is the worst kind of Evil. You try to prevent others from having something you can not have.

Re: Eight Secret Societies (2016)

#118

Post by galaxyLogic »

Game-theoretically I think it is clear that members of a secret society have an advantage over individuals who are not part of the society, and who don't know that the other people they are interacting with are.

Think about a game of Poker where the members of the society gave each other nodes and winks about their hand.

Re: Eight Secret Societies (2016)

#119

Post by ljf »

bovermyer wrote: post #113
ljf wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've always been interested in them, my brother found a load of old Masonic items in his attic and when I moved to a new town the masons held an open day and I was really impressed by the charity work and the meals/drinks sounded fun. I was about to join (or rather begin the process) when I mentioned it to my aunt who was visiting. She went on to tell me a long story of how my grandfather had to join the masons to be…

You don't have to believe in a god, but you do have to believe in a higher power. That's a really subtle but crucial difference. Also... it's also my experience that once you become a Mason, you are a Mason for life, regardless of your feelings on the matter. You can't quit. This, I think, is similar to how you can't be an ex-Marine. There's a whole lotta philosophy I could chat about there, but that's really a subje…

I look forward to that pint one day!

Re: Eight Secret Societies (2016)

#120

Post by [deleted] »

bovermyer wrote: post #114
abrenuntio wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would say that the reasons run deeper than a power play. Freemasonry demands active participation in a religious liturgy in which Christ is implicitly excluded. When the Church warns against such worship and the basic attitudes (beliefs) it inevitably expresses, it is not expressing hatred but charity: concern for souls and loyalty to the mission it received from Christ in Mt 28:19-20. My guess is that you will fin…

That's an interesting way of putting it, and not inaccurate, either. When I think about it... Freemasonry has a very different religious focus than most Abrahamic religions, despite its origins in the same. Yeshua ben Yosef is basically ignored in favor of other historical, and explicitly allegorical, figures.

[deleted]
Post reply on HN