Comments on A Hell of a Question

oh here come the Star Wars dorks and Muedede h8rz

Maybe the planet Corellia has a religious system with a concept of hell. There's a lot of different cultures and planets, what suggests that there is one universal dogmatic belief in the sw universe?

Ugh I'm lame.

Or maybe it's just that George Lucas failed to create a coherent world for his movies to exist in. Actually, what seems more likely to me at the moment, given Lucas's legendary inattention to flesh-and-blood actors, is Harrison Ford simply ad-libbed the line and nobody gave it a second thought.

yup. That sounds about right.

Any and all the above could be true.

I'd also like to point out that the "lowly rebel member" mentioned is (to the best of my recollection) Cliff Clavin from Cheers.

why no lohan posts today?

lets discuss the real news.

Because Lindsay is taking her imprisonment like a lady, not whining about it like Paris did - who even called in mommy and daddy's favors.

That's why it's not news.

But, I should point out many more people believe in Hell than believe in Heaven.

Sigh. Hell, a place of punishment in the afterlife, is not a universal concept. Prior to the Babylonian Exile, Jews had no concept of hell. The afterlife was seen as a dark place, a place of sleep, eternal rest. Only after being around all those Zoroastrians and their dualistic ideas did the idea creep into Judaism, where it was inherited by Christianity and Islam.

The existence of hell no more implies the existence of heaven than the existence of Dick Cheney implies the existence of an anti-Dick Cheney somewhere. God exists, and he delights only in our misery.

In case anyone else was wondering...
Spi·no·zism (sp-nzzm)
n.
A monistic approach to philosophy in which all reality is held to consist of one substance, usually termed God or Nature, of which minds and bodies are both attributes.

Wonderful Slog Charles

@9 - yes, but if the two could meet, they would cancel each other out.

Maybe he was referring to the vast emptiness of space, the absence of Nature and life as hell. To explode into nothingness, to die in space, in what was then understood to be the ultimate void would be hell indeed according to Spinoza. But maybe it was lack of character development on the part of Lucas.

I agree with Eric F (@3.) I always found the Star Wars films almost unwatchable (especially 1-3) because of the absolutely unbelievable dialogue. George Lucas movies take good actors and make them sound like soap opera stars. Although, Chewbacca's (sp?) lines were always well written.

I noticed something even crazier: Is it just me, or all those wacky dress up Star Wars nerds in the picture, like, pretty hot?

The word "hell" is itself older than Christianity, i.e. the Anglo-Saxons had a concept of hell, as did the Norse, the ancient Romans, etc. The ancient Greeks actually had three concepts of hell (gehenna, tartarus, and the better-known hades), the Chinese have tiyu, etc.

Given the intentional cultural mish-mash that is Star Wars, it is very difficult given the concept of hell in the real world to ascribe any kind of concrete, specifically Christian sense to Han Solo's use of the word "hell."

One of Han Solo's favorite "swear words" is the expression "minion's of Xendor." Perhaps Xendor is something akin to God? I don't know.

Why must all Leia fans wear that demeaning outfit? The point of the outfit is that Leia is a slave! Why not wear the cool, white Princess garb?

Yes, I'm speaking rhetorically. I know the answer. (Dressing like a slave is more fun and the Princess garb comes with stupid hair.)

Never has so much time been devoted to something so silly.

Star Wars is at best a nice diversion and at worst a rather poorly made and acted movie. To attribute anything to the random rantings of those unfortunate enough to act in it is to see agency in what might better be explained by happenstance.

Hell is unrelenting pain. Spinoza attributed pain to actions that moved a person farther from perfection.

Refusing to join Han Solo was an act of profound inadequacy, and would result in profound pain. Aka, hell.

Isomorphisms? What are you some sort of fucking topologist now?

You're all horrendous nerds. And by nerds I mean virgins.

@14: It's not just you. GodDAMN.

What's a concept again?