A Natural Religion

After reading up on some of that, I have to ask:
In your religion, what is a god? Precisely what distinguishes a god from anything else?

Thank you for asking this. I know I have to clarify this.

Alright. So as I was saying before, there are seven definite concepts of God. This how I break it down:

-Omnipotence. Infinite energy, possible to be held by non-living as well as living things. The things we know that can hold the most energy are non-living, though.
-Uniqueness. Living and non-living things can be unique, but things that are living tend to be more unique than things than non-living.
-Ubiquity. Being present everywhere. By the definition of being one living thing, this is impossible to obtain for sentient beings. Non-living things can have this.
-Eternalness. The state of existing forever. Again, life has a definite beginning and end, and non-living things can last much longer than people.
-Wisdom, or omniscience. Knowledge can only come from the living. Something that is not living cannot be wise as well.
-All-good, or benevolence. Typically we attribute being good with having good intentions, which only living things can have - although functions that the nonliving do can be considered to be good by nature.
-Versatility/Freedom. The ability to make choices. This is attributed solely to the living. Nonliving things never have any choices whatsoever.

So, let me break this down for you:

Living: Freedom, Benevolence, and Wisdom are all characteristics of living things, typically.
Non-Living: Eternalness, Ubiquity, and omnipotence are all characteristics of non-living things, typically.
The only point where they overlap is with uniqueness, for things that are both living and nonliving can have.

On the other hand, there are non-living deities that possesses much of these qualities. Deities are not unique, per se, but they can be nearly eternal, ubiquitous, and omnipotent.

I’m going to go from the impersonal to the most personal. This is the breakdown:

Omniverse, Local Multiverse, Our Universe, Superclusters, Galaxies, Stars, Planets, Societies, Governments, Corporations, Parents, and Yourself.

Omniverse:
-Directly or indirectly creates all Multiverses - Omnipotence
-Is present everywhere, and contains all the mass that exists, including the Universe - Ubiquitous
-(Presumably) existed forever - Eternal
-Uniqueness - There is literally only ONE Omniverse. It is literally - impossible to have two of them.
Things it does not have
Freedom, Benevolence or Wisdom - But life with omniscience of the Omniverse would have those three things.
FINAL JUDGMENT: 7/7 Qualities. GOD

Local Multiverse:
-Directly or indirectly creates all Universes - Omnipotence
-Its presence is nearly endless. - Ubiquitous
-Existed for a very long time. - Eternal
-There are probably more than one multiverse, so it’s not entirely unique, but what it holds inside itself is unique unto itself.
Things it does not have
Freedom, Benevolence or Wisdom - But life with omniscience of the Multiverse would be able have a high amount of all three things.
FINAL JUDGMENT: 6/7 Qualities DEITY

Our Universe, Superclusters, Galaxies, and Stars:
Same thing as Multiverse only more localized.

Earth:
-Only responsible for its own power, much of it which comes from the Sun - NOT omnipotent.
-Its presence is concentrated by its gravity and everything it pulls towards it. Its presence can only be felt as far away as satellites that orbit it. - NOT ubiquitous.
-The Earth existed for a long time. Almost eternally.
-Earth is very unique with its flora and fauna that most planets don’t have.
-Freedom, benevolence, or wisdom - Life with omniscience of Earth (like modern humans) would have a lot of power, but not to the scale of ultimate freedom, benevolence, or wisdom. People need to outside their planet to have all three of those qualities.
FINAL JUDGMENT: 2/7 Qualities NOT A DEITY

Obviously anything smaller than our planet, like societies, governments, corporations, parents, and the self would not hold the characteristics of being divine, although all of those things could be viewed as “living”, nothing that is living is divine. The only thing that (some) life has is its unique qualities. Like how it is nearly impossible for anyone to have your exact look or DNA, or talk and think like you. There is a certain degree of freedom, benevolence, and wisdom that nearly all human life possesses, but its scope is limited to terrestrial matters. The Omniverse works with a top-down approach, achieving all of the qualities of the non-living deities, whereas its creations, life, works from the bottom-up. We have to work with nature to mend the differences between us so that one day we may create something beyond comprehension, something that can possess all seven of those qualities at the same time. Like an Omniverse that could also be living and thinking.

Doesn’t that sound like something you may already know of?

I wasn’t asking what the word means to everyone. I was asking specifically of the meaning of the word in your religion. Do you have both living and non-living gods in your religion?

Well, there can only be one of those.

So, I take it that you believe in more than one universe. Can you give some description of how that works? What would be in one universe but not another?

There are four attributes of God that can only truly be applied to a non-living identity, and three that can be. The Omniverse is not living, but as I see it when the Omega Point is truly breached The Omniverse itself is going to be alive, with the extropy-consciousness of post-humans, thereby fulfilling my prophecy of true divinity.

True. However, like how I said the Earth is eternal, and it is not, I see things like the Sun, the galactic black holes, the Universe, and Multiverse as being nearly those qualities. If we were able to harness all the energy of the Sun we’d probably be able to do incredible things, such as visiting other star systems relevantly quickly (yes I know nothing can go faster than the speed of light, but still…).

I am not an expert on physics. I saw a diagram of different Universes that live in different time and spatial dimensions and according to that chart one time dimension and three-spatial dimensions is the only way that life can exist. So there are probably a lot of Universes which don’t harbor any kind of meaningful existence.

Evidence of a natural god is found in extensions of DNA as described by the anthropic principle.

Religion divorced from science produces cults of imagination in which the dogma has nothing to do with physical reality. Science vs religion, the battle over the last few hundred years, would not have had to take place if religion could have recognized the personal experience of DNA in genetic evolution as sufficient evidence of a God who acts in the here and now of the real world. Where the natural is eschewed in favor of some dogma, the supernatural, with all of its superstition, will dominate religious thinking. In the throes of supernatural thought, many see the Earth as inferior to some sky Heaven and consequently overlook the ecosystems that make life on Earth possible.

Physical existence would not be seen as inferior to spiritual existence. Mortifying the body would make no sense.

Knowledge and understanding would come from interactions with the physical world rather than from a retreat away from the world.

Exactly!!!

Experiments with LSD and the like in the past midcentury proved that brain/mind, with the aid of certain chemicals can go to those places considered spiritual, once arrived at via meditation, fasting., etc. So, if our spirituality is discovered to be a matter of brain chemistry, why would we continue to relegate such states to afterlife or continue to describe them using abstract metaphysics?

Are drug induced states spiritual states?

Are meditative states spiritual states?

To answer one would need a very clear definition of ‘spiritual’. And even then … how could you really know if you are in a spiritual state when you have abandoned external references and you are purely in you own head?

How can you know that it’s not all a dream or hallucination?

Since drug induced states act the same as fasting or meditation induced states, I’d say they are both spiritual, if spiritual is to mean the hinterlands of the mental. We do not see outside of what minds are capable of seeing. Don’t you get tired of hearing abstract and ephemeral Eastern mysticism or Western metaphysics based on body hatred?

I’m not sure that “the hinterlands of the mental” show us anything real. Maybe it’s just an entertaining dreamscape at best and a waste of time at its worse.

I can’t think of a single positive thing coming out of ‘body hatred’.

I guess that I’m skeptical about mystical and/or altered states. I tend to think that God is in the ordinary.

I mentioned the altered states of consciousness only to show that the spiritual has a place in the physical world. If the soul is not to be found in the pineal gland :smiley: where is it located? Finding God in the ordinary requires a spiritual vision. The brain/mind is equipped to handle that.

A subtle profundity Ierrellus.

How can one see something that can’t be seen … ergo: invisible … without spiritual vision.

Spiritual vision … like telepathy and intuition … is a natural human endowment.

Why are these human faculties exercised so rarely?

The appointed time has yet to arrive.

We are walking with one leg and cooking with one arm. :laughing:

It could be that ‘soul’ is just shorthand for your essence and that it does not reside anywhere. IOW, it may be inseparable from body and mind.

So long as the physical can be seen as separate from the spiritual, hence inferior to supposed loftier considerations, the true nature of what physicality entails will not be learned and science and religion will remain opposing ways of seeing.

I agree.

‘Spiritual vision’ would be some kind of mental processing of sensory inputs which uses different assumptions and filters than are used by those who lack ‘spiritual vision’. Right?

I don’t think anyone is devoid of spiritual vision; some choose not to see things that way. This does not mean they are not equipped to do so. You may be right on the nature of mental processing involved. All I know is that some Eastern religions consider what is physical to be illusion at best and some Western religions consider physicality as the source of sin. Neither way of seeing the flesh admits to its natural beauty and the possible consideration that limitations imposed on the spirit by the flesh may just amount a self-imposed, limited way of seeing.