Quizzical Quorum

For the holiday (I get out of a whole TWO HOURS), I thought I'd go a-quiz hunting. Results below the fold.

You scored as Nature, You're the NatureGoddess. You protect the woods and care about all of its creatures. Besides having a green thumb you also can control plants and somewhat of the earth below them. Hunters don't come near your woods because otherwise they'll get struck withan arrow. Nature 85% Water 75% Fire 65% Light 55% Air 50% Dark 40% What type of anime goddess are you? created with QuizFarm.com

I like this result. I'm a bit surprised I didn't score higher on "Dark," though.

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You scored as Epicurean, Epicureanism is named for Epicurus, its founder. While its ends are similar, Epicureanism differs from Stoicism in its methods andits beliefs in the afterlife. Epicureans believe the soul (if it even exists) dies with the body and that no afterlife exists; therefore, one's life on earth is of the utmost importance. Epicurean 75% Cynic 58% Stoic 54% Ascetic 42% Hedonist 17% What's your ancient philosophy? created with QuizFarm.com

Hmmm.... My opinion on the afterlife tends to shift, honestly. The one constancy is that I do NOT see death as "the end," at least as that phrase is generally used. I subscribe to a somewhat Buddhist notion, that consciousness can be neither created nor destroyed. Whether that is simple "awareness" or "awareness with some memories" I don't really have an opinion on. But as a lot of who we are is carried in the body, the traditional notion of an immutable soul doesn't make much sense to me. But here is Wikipedia's article on Epicureanism. Kewl. The Epicurean Paradox is a variety of the objection that led me to reject Christianity. Hmmm... I think I scored as Epicurean by agreeing with most of the "avoid excess" questions...

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You scored as Daoism, You are daoism. You don't like rules and believe that people should not be told what to do. The only punishment for talking in class is you'll miss out on the information and you'll fail the test. You hate being told what yo do and you know you can make your own desisions. Daoism 70% Confusiousism 65% Legalism 5% Which Chinese Philosophy Should You Follow? created with QuizFarm.com

'Kay, someone's going to have to explain that picture to me, 'cause I don't get it. I should mention that this was a very short quiz (15 questions), and showed a very shallow understanding of the philosophies involved. Still, I would consider myself a Taoist (Daoist is another way of transliterating the Chinese alphabet, and is closer to the Chinese pronunciation). Reading Useless Tree has given me a greater appreciation of the Confucian point of view, however. Oversimplified: Taoism is at the level of the individual and Confucianism as at the level of the individual's relationships with others.

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You scored as Neo-Paganism, Neopaganism or Neo-Paganism is an umbrella term used to identify a wide variety of new religious movements, particularly those influenced by ancient and pre-Abrahamic Pagan religions. These movements are extremely diverse. The beliefs of adherents of Neopaganism range widely from duotheism to polytheism, and even monotheistic and other paradigms. Many Neopagans practice a spirituality that is entirely modern in origin, while others attempt to reconstruct or revive culturally historic Pagan and indigenous belief systems. Neo-Paganism 92% Satanism 75% Agnosticism 67% Catholicism 67% Atheism 58% Protestantism 58% Judaism 58% Quakerism 50% Deism 42% Evangelism 0% Western Religious Philosophy created with QuizFarm.com

This one just makes me laugh. I have explored paganism. The whole Magick Ritual thing wasn't to my taste. But since I see all gods as equally real, I suppose 'pagan' is as good a label as any. I think "pantheist" might actually be more accurate, but that wasn't one of their options. I'm not really sure why "Satanism" wound up so high. As a matter of trivia, Wicca uses a five-pointed star, as in the graphic*. The upper-most point symbolizes "spirit" while the other four symbolize the four physical elements. So it's symbolic of spirit taking precedence over the physical world. The Satanic pentacle is inverted, point down, to symbolize that the physical world should take precedence over spirit. My response to these is to lay the pentacle flat and draw a circle around it, indicating equal importance. That or just use a yin-yang/taiji symbol.

*The pentacle in the graphic has nothing to do with western paganism, strangely enough. It symbolizes Chinese 5-Element theory. Around the outside is the "creation" cycle. Wood creates fire, fire creates earth, earth creates metal, metal creates water, water creates wood. The star is the destruction cycle. I think. It's been a while.