Arthur

[Arthur]

Wow, I’m astonished, actually I’m shocked! I didn’t know this! I mean I knew most gods don’t have much sense of humour, but this is… devilish. Superlordspamulon, did you count them all, page by page?

Tonight another thing crossed my mind, maybe a good argument in this debate also. About 15 years ago I was into youth politics, and I was very much against mixing politics/government and religion. When I was reading about those subjects there was this American Organization that had the same goal, called Freedom From Religion Foundation. They now have a website, and I found back what I read about then, it’s actually on their homepage.

\"The history of Western civilization shows us that most social and moral progress has been brought about by persons free from religion. In modern times the first to speak out for prison reform, for humane treatment of the mentally ill, for abolition of capital punishment, for women’s right to vote, for death with dignity for the terminally ill, and for the right to choose contraception, sterilization and abortion have been freethinkers, just as they were the first to call for an end to slavery. The Foundation works as an umbrella for those who are free from religion and are committed to the cherished principle of separation of state and church.\"

Especially the parts about the end of slavery, the right to choose abortion, women’s right to vote and having the right to choose for a death with dignity for the terminally ill attracted me very much. It all came from freethinkers… And they had hard times convincing the religious establishment. It’s a shame…

[Arthur]

I do see it as two opposites, hence the critique. It’s not as though both can exist. Either there is a God, or there isn’t. Yes, the individual is allowed (in free society, let’s all take a moment to appreciate that…) to choose for himself. However, he/she is choosing a side. And one of the sides is right. And one of the sides is wrong. That’s why people fight over it. You have to defend why you choose which side you do. You are either embracing a God, or you are not. That’s a big choice.[/quote:2q6sd1h4]
Wrong. I debate, but I do not fight. I will not kill for (non-) religion. I will kill when they harm my wife and little children, but I do not fight for "systems" whatever color, taste, leader. Not as long as I’m to my senses. And just think of this… Why aren’t both sides wrong when we know we only use 30% of our brains, and know just little about our feelings and instincts? Why aren’t both sides blind?

Fear.[/quote:2q6sd1h4]
Just my idea. The whole religious concept is grounded from and based on fear mostly. I refuse to let fear control my life and become religious. I do have fears, but no urge to call the gods to help me. I learned to call my friends by phone, they have been more useful so far. And believe me, I’ve been in a few situations myself. Life is way more than fear alone. Life is way more than gods alone. I have always wondered why religious people cannot see that.

Thats a paradox, not a real theological problem.[/quote:2q6sd1h4]
Cool, this is the only answer you could give. And you gave it rightaway in your first sentence. To my opinion, it’s 1 of the most troublesome theological problems religion ever faced. When religious people talk about their gods, their almighty behaviour, their ultimate truth and everything, they always forget 1 thing. Their gods don’t control the paradoxes. The gods didn’t teach us people how to handle the paradoxes. We are troubled by paradoxes. So, the gods are not almighty, and they don’t have the ultimate truth. We made them up, and gave our control to them… I’m not buying it. We mankind are responsible for ourselves, we are our own judge. The bible and koran and all are pretty cool history books with some guidelines made by mankind, but no ultimate truth. There are no answers to paradoxes inside these books.

Can God make two plus two equal six?[/quote:2q6sd1h4]
This is another type of question. Mankind agreed on two plus two equals four. Mankind can also decide to call it six, when for some reason that is more convenient. Let’s say we play god ourselves.

[Arthur]

Question to Tree_Spirit:

Can your almighty creator create a stone he cannot lift?

Think of it… No christian ever could answer this question to me so far.

[Arthur]

You’re one awesomely kwel non-believer..lol..Wish I could change that:P[/quote:2v6yl9sq]
You can change the awesome part (really, I do have a very nasty side), however you cannot change the non-believer part. I believe in non-believing, it controls (and at the same time opens up) the beauty, the chaos and the inner moral for me.

Glad you found your way here also Tree_Spirit! After an almost-pastafarian and an agnost we got the christian point of view also.

PS Tree_Spirit, your texts have partly disappeared, this board has some maximum lenght… Don’t know why… Use the "Preview" button to check before you post. Or the "Edit" button to correct later. Post shorter pieces in multiple posts. (And I just noticed you found your way in that )

[Arthur]

who’s going where?
i already got tickets for london and brussels. i’m not sure if i’ll do any other shows.[/quote:63hzxkff]
Brabanthallen Den Bosch after all. Got 2 tickets, going with a friend from Amsterdam. Yesterday I understood Sven and his girlfriend will be there also.

http://www.brabanthallen.nl/agenda/84-C … pkins.html

Please buy your tickets here:

http://www.ticketmaster.nl/html/evinfo. … 32&l=NL&C= (€ 39,00)

And NOT on 1 of these scalpers websites:

http://www.onlineticketshop.nl/steden/s … ch_Tickets (€ 69,00)
http://www.ticketunlimited.nl/ProductDe … event=4464 (€ 65,00)
http://www.budgetticket.nl/concerten/co … s__Tickets (€ 65,00)
http://www.pepetickets.nl/product/smash … ns-tickets (€ 59,00)

or one of the foreign scalpers like:

http://www.ticketunlimited.de/ProductDe … event=4464 (€ 65,00)

[Arthur]

Wow, what a cool topic this is already. Let me quote the rest to that ontological thing I mentioned before, it fits nicely now.

\"People can be extremely blind, following things that are not good, that’s all I want to say. But next to people I want to mention all living creatures on earth, that don’t do anything on religion. Well, that’s what I presume at least, because we can’t be to sure I guess. But mankind on a whole is only a little part of what lives on earth. We people have some silly instinct that makes us wonder, makes us fearful and wants us to control the fear. Here you go, the food for religion (*). We can talk, we can think, we can write. We want to be in a group, we cannot live alone. But do all billions and billions of living animals do the same? No. As I think the universe and everything inside it is one, I cannot accept that just this few people on earth know the truth by a bible, and by being religious. We only know how to use our brains for about 30%, and we only know very little about our feelings. We do not know the truth, and we have to accept it. I do accept that fact (well, I do my best anyway ), and it gives so much peace, you wouldn’t believe it! It gives so much room for this childish wonder about the amazing universe, and exploring the deepest things inside people. In this whole process I realized there is no truth, and what we like to call the truth is just something we agree on as mankind, and it changes every year, every 10 years and every 100 years.\"

(*) this referred to another part I wrote earlier on:

\"This religion stuffs is all made up by mankind long time ago. It started, I think, when mankind realised they had this little unexplainable feelings of fear. Neanderthaler times somewhere. Fear to have no food, fear to have no next day, fear to have no sunshine, fear to have no rain for the crops, etc… So they started to have rituals and prayings and things, to control the fear. When this religion thing started, also people that wanted to control other people raised and caused tons of troubles, for many many centuries. <edit> Einstein once said \"I cannot accept any concept of God based on the fear of life or the fear of death or blind faith.\". Very true those words.\"

Just think of it… When a bible-like book provides us with the ultimate truth… Then why do we need to fight bloody wars to prove we are more right then other people with another bible with another truth? No idea, but pretty stupid behaviour anyway, which is still inside this religious concept till today. And in this religious concept you can also presume the bible and things are a tool of the devil instead of a loving god. Because it makes us kill each other, it makes us fear the future. So very likely mankind will realise at some point this is not the way to go. There is no devil, there is no god. There are many things out there to explore which I cannot explain, but the concept of religion and all that comes with it, build up in centuries, is a timewaster anyway to me.

Now bring in the christians/muslims/hindoes etc. please, I want to hear the other opinions too!

[Arthur]

Americans are brilliant. Read this. Found the link on that website.

http://www.ketv.com/news/14133442/detail.html

Anyway, in this discussion I mentioned before I reached some thoughts that might be helpful to start a discussion here.

\"Religion with external designers and silly rituals is not the way to go. Not for me at least. My truth is inside me, not outside at some god. I am my personal god, and every single person is his/her own god. Every animal is a god. Every tree, flame, stone, drip of water, gush of wind is a designer without control. Maybe that’s my belief… I don’t know…\"

And there was a pro-religious argument stating \"First, there is the ontological argument. This argument basically says that since over 98% of people throughout history, in all cultures, in all civilizations, on all continents believe in the existence of God – there must be something (or someone) causing this belief.\"

I responded like this:

\"I’m not very impressed by the ontological argument. The majority of Germans allowed Hitler to kill millions of Jews and other people in the 1930’s and 1940’s. All people on earth believed the earth was flat, and we would fell off when we would sail to far to the edge. There are many other examples like this, so I rest my case for the moment, when it is about people. People can be extremely blind, following things that are not good, that’s all I want to say.\"

[Arthur]

Good one Superlordspamulon. I just love the serious and ironic comments on posts like this:

http://www.venganza.org/2007/10/21/is-this-a-joke.htm

[Arthur]

There will be no more singles, mark my words. They pushed it over the top already with many Zeitgeist versions with a few bonustracks, and the single release dates were known quite early.

My wildest guess is: the band is taking a rest now, they will tour next year like hell again, and start recording a new album by the end of 2008, to be released in 2009. Billy Corgan has this habit to release an album every 2 year on average. Another wild guess: Smashing Pumpkins, The Live Album, to be released end of Summer (or early Fall) 2008. This will include Gossamer and some other live hits, like Heavy Metal Machine and Set The Ray To Jerry. Last guess: May 2008 will see another demo tape/CD being leaked.

I wished I was Billy Corgan’s marketing guy…

[Arthur]

This is how Westwood One Show #98-47 should look like. This pic wasn’t good enough for SPfreaks, now it’s maybe useful.

[Arthur]

OK, the MP3’s are on sp.com soon I hope, the lossless files will follow soon after I spoke to the DJ guy. I’ll ask for all the tech details and so on also. And maybe I can get a direct lossless transfer from cassette from him, would be even cooler I guess.[/quote:1q5dqrb3]
I received his first email, which was only a reply to my first quick reaction last weekend. I have now asked for the tech details, and a meeting hopefully soon. He’s telling he’s fan of Skinny Puppy, and if we can help him look around for their stuffs… I have never heard of this band, any of you?

Too bad I wasn’t in The Netherlands on those dates. Maybe I’ll join in on the fun next year.[/quote:1q5dqrb3]
Sure, most welcome!

[Arthur]

Keep on checking this link guys. It’s not on it yet, but I guess it will be someday.

http://www.smashingpumpkins.com/audio

[Arthur]

Created a new topic on the proper forum for this. Please add your other ideas over there, OK? Thanks!

http://forum.spfreaks.com/viewtopic.php?t=298

[Arthur]

right now this is absolutely not confirmed.[/quote:242aexjs]
Exactly. And I’m confused that 1 person has this unnumbered yellow MCIS vinyl since 1997, as he claims, and they all seem to appear only lately, like in the last year or something. They all have the same handwritten matrixcodes as the unnumbered black MCIS vinyl I bought this weekend at the Utrecht record fair. Though not sealed, it looks like it was pressed only yesterday. Really, I’m very confused. Some call it a bootleg, some don’t know.

I have a new thought about it however, tell me what you guys think.

-Let’s just presume these unnumbered MCIS vinyls (yellow and black) are legit and genuine Virgin releases.
-Let’s presume they were pressed in 1996/1997, at the same time when they pressed the numbered HUT release.
-Let’s presume there were 2 pressing plants for this release, with 2 sets of pressing plates. One was in the UK, the other one was in Holland or elsewhere in Europe.
-Let’s presume the sleeves were pressed also on 2 different locations, close to the vinyl pressing plants.
-Let’s presume the European sleeve went wrong, they forgot to include the white box for the number. (Or maybe no number was intended after all for a part of the MCIS vinyl?)
-Let’s presume Virgin decided to pay the bill for this (wrong?) press after all, but put the whole pressing run in stock and forgot about it for a long time (except for a few, like the yellow one). They focused on releasing the numbered version.
-Let’s presume this unnumbered stock came to the market after all about a year ago, when 1 wholesale company bought it. I can image with the raising interest in the Smashing Pumpkins the last year, there would be more interest in this vinyl also, by wholesale guys that have a nose for some quick money.

So here they are, they come to the market only lately, still looking new. It can’t be ordered anywhere, as they are not there officially, as Virgin has no stock left. And the distributors don’t know anything either, as these left-overs were bought by a lucky wholeseller.

I come to this way of thinking, as I try to think out of the box. Just trying guys, don’t flame me! Not that long ago we researched a Virgin inhouse tape, which didn’t make sense at all at first sight. A hoax pretty well done, was the first conclusion. But after all it turned out to be a genuine tape. Only because the background information came from trustworthy people. The story can be read elsewhere on this board.

And when I look at this release (got one here)… there are no flaws on it. It is an MCIS vinyl, as it should be. Sure, without the numberbox and with different matrixcodes on the vinyl, but with all official details, booklet, codes, labels, everything. All known Pumpkins vinyl booties have a very obvious flaw, this one hasn’t (so far). There are 2 things against my story… I can’t compare it on the spot with a numbered copy, maybe the flaws are very obvious then. And we have no trustworthy seller yet with a good story.

Does this scenario make sense? What do you think?

[Arthur]

It would be cool if you could log in and maintain a list of your collection on SPfreaks. Go to an item in the discography and click ‘I have this’ (or even ‘X copies’) and maybe also an option to share your list with other users. Just an idea.[/quote:39g85y90]
This is on our wishlist of future development breun, EXACTLY this cool idea. Let’s say there might be something coming soon, in which this feature might be nicely fitting. I hope I can announce something about it here in December that might surprise us all. No promises however, as I have my first face-to-face meeting about it on December 1. Let’s see how that goes, fingers crossed.

And please don’t forget, this whole SPfreaks thing is a voluntary job for everybody involved… It takes a lot of time sometimes, developing new features, especially this one. I guess you know how it works, running your own website also… But I’m glad your idea already gets support from some other members here!

[Arthur]

Latest emails from Vincent, the MCIS yellow vinyl seller:

\"HI Arthur

Ik weet zelf ook niet meer waar die vandaan komt, ik heb em al wel een tijdje in mijn bezit,.
Een digitale foto wordt moeilijk ben ik bang. Maar de plaat is een beetje doorzichtig geel zeg maar (zoals bier

Ik heb de zwarte versie zelf ook, en die heeft inderdaad wel een nummer op de voorkant.\"

(It’s in his possession already for a long time, he doesn’t know where it comes from, having hard times to take a digital pic, but the color is transparant yellow like beer. He also owns the numbered black vinyl. Then I told him we are not that interested, too expensive, and most likely a bootleg, and asked him if he knows ANYTHING that could change our minds. He came up with a little but interesting detail.)

\"Hi Arthur

Ik heb deze plaat in 1997 (staat met potlood in binnekant hoes) gekocht,ik zou echt niet meer weten waar ie vandaan komt eerlijk gezegd das al bijna 10 jaar geleden !!\"

He bought it in 1997 he found out, as that was pencilmarked inside the sleeve… Furthermore (not copied on the post here) he states to have more Pumpkins vinyl records (lots of them sealed) and amongst them at least the yellow Pisces Iscariot. He will make a list of it and send it to me.

[Arthur]

Oops, he read it. Hugs!

Hippopotomonstrosesquippedaliophobia. Fear of long words. Can you believe it.

Seriously, I’m not aware of having any serious, painful phobia. I do have trouble sometimes with silent people, that keep themselves on an emotional distance. My I-want-to-be-your-nurse phobia then starts tickling me to help them out of their isolation. Doesn’t work in relationships, let me tell you. And I’m not that fond of big bugs, spiders and heights. I control that last one by forcing myself to climb the Himalaya, and lean over balconies.

[Arthur]

Bufonophobia. Don’t let him read it.

[Arthur]

cool about the discogs.com link, but i think the wikimods removed the link you put for SPfreaks on wikipedia.[/quote:1p81pozq]
Tsss, yeah you’re right. But that’s their loss, not ours (we got no extra hits today anyway).

And I don’t feel like writing too many articles everywhere yet, as I was invited last week to become mod on http://www.recordcollectorsguild.org/ for their SP section… Will I ever find time for that… After my retirement maybe!

[Arthur]

And another one…

http://www.discogs.com/artist/Smashing+Pumpkins%2C+The

Also I have send emails to Record Collector UK and a few other magazines. It would be helpful maybe when you come across websites where you can hype this SPfreaks site… start hyping!

[Arthur]

Here’s the conversation in Dutch. He claims he thinks it’s no bootleg, and he provides the same matrix codes as on the recently surfaced black unnumbered vinyl. I asked for pics and more backgroundinfo. Anything else you want to know guys? He seems rather helpful so far.

On 11/20/07, 04:57PM, SPfreaks wrote:
Hoi! Ik kwam toevallig deze genummerde MCIS geel vinyl tegen, klopt dat? Ik ken alleen de zwarte vinyl? Alvast bedankt voor je antwoord! Groeten, SPfreaks.

On 11/20/07, 11:42PM, plastikfantastik wrote:
ja dat klopt inderdaad = geel vinyl

On 11/20/07, 11:50PM, SPfreaks wrote:
Dank je wel! Kun je me dan nog wat meer info verstrekken? Want ik koop liever geen bootleg oid. Ik heb nog niet gehoord dat deze MCIS op geel vinyl is uitgebracht, dus dat zal dan vrij recent gebeurd zijn? Kan jij 100% bevestigen dat dit een echte HUT/Virgin release is, en geen bootleg? Kun je me het nummer geven op de hoes (je plaatje toont een genummerde MCIS, met een wit hokje op de voorkant, waar zoals bij MCIS vinyl, een nummer in hoort te staan).

Ook wil ik graag de matrix nummers weten die aan het eind van de groef in het vinyl zijn geperst. Kun je me die geven aub?

Alvast bedankt!
Arthur

sent by plastikfantastik to SPfreaks on 20-Nov-07 11:59 PM
HI arthur

is bij mijn weten geen bootleg. STaat als eerst geen wit hokje op de voorkant met nummer. is gemaakt in de EU

matrix code op de LPs = HUTTLP 30, matrix code in de groef is\":7243 8 41655 (en dan A, B, C, D, E, F) erachter afhankelijk van welke kant je pakt. is uiteraard een gatefold cover (openslaand) met een geprint boekwerk met alle teksten en tekengingen.

mocht je nog meer willen weten hoor ik het graag,
mvg.
Vincent

[Arthur]

Talking about MCIS vinyl. I found a Dutch seller online that claims to have a numbered YELLOW VINYL 3LP, for US$ 249.99. Does any of you have that, or heard about it? I have asked him about it anyway, will let you know the answers.

It starts to feel like we are flooded nowadays with new, unknown vinyl… Or are the Dutch bootleg pressingmoulds running like crazy these days? I wonder…

[Arthur]

one should be stupid to bid higher on ebay if the website is selling it for $895 (and with lower shipping costs listed), right?[/quote:3oezfte0]
Would be hilarious! I have put that eBay auction in my watchlist and when the winner is known we should all email the person with the link to the website, just for fun.

[Arthur]

yea yea yea and he left me with almost nothing thanks!! found gish and siames dream on vinyl so well im happy after all. wished i found that greatest hits and mellon collie grrrrr[/quote:7qho0b47]
Sorry my friend. You’re going to be lucky next time I’m sure.

[Arthur]

slowly, slowly does this site gain popularity and recognition. but give it time, and (i’ve said it once, i’ll say it again) this site could be up there with the best of them [/quote:32qdg24a]
Next steps taken.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Smashi … rnal_links

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Smashi … rnal_links

[Author]

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