on discussing god and religion

And to think I once actually took satisfaction in reducing folks down to this sort of, uh, retort. :laughing:

Again, with respect to what really motivates me here [subjunctively], I’m still convinced it more or less revolves around whatever this means:

He was like a man who wanted to change all; and could not; so burned with his impotence; and had only me, an infinitely small microcosm to convert or detest.
John Fowles

Human psychology [I suspect] will always be more than I can handle. And not just my own.

On the other hand, I have engaged in discussions with folks like Bob here, in which the “judgements” are kept to a minimum.

All it really takes is a respect for each other’s intelligence. And a willingness [on my part] to forgo polemics.

Unless of course by “judgement” you mean something else? :wink:

Where is there to go? There is no ‘there’ other than an imaginary place in a deluded mind.
I’d contend that this is the game we’re playing here; pretending there’s somewhere to go, some place to get to.

There’s that “deluded” word again. :evilfun:

For me the direct experience was like an electric shock in one instance and like a calm ripple of a stream in another. God does not come to me and speak to me in English, yet I’m aware of God’s presence when he does make it known. I know all this seems rather vague to a diehard nonbeliever such as Iamb. He still wants to be persuaded by those who believe that this life merits an afterlife of reward or punishment. For me, that’s infantile religiosity. Buddhism has moved far beyond that in basic religious psychology. For me a combination of Christianity and Buddhism is the best possible religion for the 21st century.

Ierrellus"

I once had an epiphany (not a God one) that almost seemed to be like a calm ripple of realization flowing over me. It was unexpected - but I wouldn’t call it an electric shock.

How did the electric shock part came in - did it actually feel like an electric shock?

Oh, I certainly that God would not speak in English to you. You might doubt in that instant, don’t you think?
He? What He? Why can we not strip off this paternal aspect?

What are you usually doing when the Presence comes to you?

We all seek the holy grail in one way or the other. It doesn’t necessarily have to be a symbol for what is holy - though holy simply means whole, in harmony.
I suppose that one can say at-one-ment - as some say.

I’m a die-hard agnostic. lol
He’s a philosopher. Wouldn’t that be a legitimate challenge?

But there are many people who do believe that.
Why do you think that is?
As far as the infantile religiosity goes, Ierrelus, you called God a He. I might say that that is infantile religiosity. Wouldn’t you? :-"

Life after death. Buddhists believe in a cycle of death and rebirth called samsara. Through karma and eventual enlightenment, they hope to escape samsara and achieve nirvana, an end to suffering.

So couldn’t you say that Buddhism is somewhat the same? How far removed is it?

But isn’t Christianity also somewhat the same? The powers that be preach that there shall either be a reward or punishment after death.

:evilfun:

Arc,
I did not intend to use the word “he” in reference to God in a paternalistic fashion. It’s only because there are so few words that describe an entity that is a force. As I have often said before in these threads, I believe God is he, she, it, father, son, mother, daughter—all possible personal relationships.
I will no longer attempt to describe my God experiences,
Buddhism is not into dualism as in afterlife reward or punishment.

From another thread…

[b][i]Body Decomposition Timeline

24-72 hours after death — the internal organs decompose.

3-5 days after death — the body starts to bloat and blood-containing foam leaks from the mouth and nose.

8-10 days after death — the body turns from green to red as the blood decomposes and the organs in the abdomen accumulate gas.

Several weeks after death — nails and teeth fall out.

1 month after death — the body starts to liquify.[/i][/b]

Another, more detailed rendition of it:

aftermath.com/content/human-decomposition

Now, in the context of God and religion, one can’t help but wonder why on earth a God, the God, your God would require – choose? – that it all to unfold in precisely this [ghastly?] manner.

It is almost as though God may well be constrained Himself by the immutable laws of matter.

And how does a mere mortal even begin to wrap his or her mind around that?

When the house is empty, it begins to decay. According to Plato, the soul that was in that house is “freed from prison”. But that was just an idea in Plato’s mind, even though billions of rational people have believed it is true.

Umm, what is “autonomous”? Autonomous or independent from what? If it is science, then it seeks an objective answer rather than a subjective one. If you question such an investigation outright, you will never be satisfied.

Those are a lot of words, but do they mean anything in the end? How will anyone quieten your insecurity and requirement of absolute certainty? I can’t and I doubt that anyone on earth can . it’s called the human dilemma!

Who is “demanding”? We make assumptions from our own experience or that of others, and have to live with that. The best “God experiences” fail to give a maintenance guide for life, but they give assurance much like the comforting hand of a mother, or insight into something that has been mystifying us. Inspiration helps us proceed, but it doesn’t complete the journey for us, and judgement day is probably a confrontation with what we fear. But who knows?

I can’t begin to imagine the “struggle” of those people in Puerto Rico. I know that in my own small “struggles”, inspiration came when I needed it most. However, do I have a right to assure others that this will happen? How can I be sure?

Well, good luck with your reconfiguration then … sadly you don’t just have one operating system to reconfigure, but probably 7.442 billion

Yes, Plato believed this of the soul “in his head”. And, sure, many, many folks deemed rational since have believed in one or another rendition of it.

Some from within particular religious denominations, some in embracing a more ecumenical ideal, some rooted in one or another Spinozan/deistic narrative, and others in embracing one of the countless “New Age” agendas.

The “soul” certainly seems to engender lots and lots and lots of converts.

And why wouldn’t it? It is, after all, a belief in the soul that allows one to believe in turn that it is as a soul that we attain immortality, salvation and divine justice.

And very, very few things comfort and console mere mortals as much as believing that does.

On the other hand, there are also many, many folks deemed rational who do not believe in the existence of a soul.

And, “here and now”, “I” happen to be one of them. And, really, all that folks like me can do is to engage in discussions in places like this with those who do.

I just happen to be someone who draws that crucial distinction between what we claim to believe is true “in our head” and that which we are able to demonstrate that all reasonable men and women are obligated to believe in turn.

And not just regarding the soul.

Sure, I’ll be the first to admit that you are making a point here I am just not able to grasp correctly. But it would seem that scientists exploring the extent to which human beings have “free will” either do or do not have it themselves in going about the task. If human consciousness [mindful matter] is not independent of the “immutable laws of matter” then it would seem that “all there is” is encompassed in this one objective [and wholly determined] cosmological truth.

That which revolves around this: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cosmogony

But a belief in God is one way in which to reconfigure that into…what exactly?

What they mean “in the end” to me has come to revolve around this:

If I am always of the opinion that 1] my own values are rooted in dasein and 2] that there are no objective values “I” can reach, then every time I make one particular moral/political leap, I am admitting that I might have gone in the other direction…or that I might just as well have gone in the other direction. Then “I” begins to fracture and fragment to the point there is nothing able to actually keep it all together. At least not with respect to choosing sides morally and politically.

As this revolves in turn around the many, many conflicting goods that we are all familiar with.

Then all I can do is to elicit reactions to this from others. To what extent are they not entangled in it? To what extent are they able instead to convince themselves that there is a frame of mind able to precipitate behaviors that they are convinced reflect the optimal or the only rational choice in any particular context.

And then take their “words” out “into the world” and describe [to the best of their ability] how this all unfolds ''for all practical purposes" when their behaviors do come into conflict with others.

Yes, this seems reasonable to me. I merely intertwine [existentially] any particular individual’s “lived life” into the manner in which I construe the meaning of dasein, conflicting goods and political economy – out in a particular world historically, culturally and experientially.

Then wonder if philosophically arguments can be devised able to reduce conflicting value judgments down to one or another set of moral obligations.

Philosophers like Plato and Descartes and Kant and Spinoza constructed them. But they were all basically predicated on one or another rendition of God. That crucial “transcending font”.

From my frame of mind “here and now”, No God = no way up out of my dilemma. Thus when you note that, “I know that in my own small ‘struggles’, inspiration came when I needed it most”, I can’t help but wonder what “on earth” you mean by that. Inspiration from God? And how is whatever measure of comfort this brings you able to be conveyed to others such that they might be comforted in turn?

And if it can’t be…if it is largely entangled in your own personal experiences…what of those who never have them? And that just brings me around to the aim of this thread: describing the choices that religious folks make on this side of the grave in order that they attain what they construe “I” to be on the other side of it.

With – [b]again[/b] – immortality, salvation and divine justice at stake.

On the other hand, as you note in turn, “However, do I have a right to assure others that this will happen? How can I be sure?”

I hear that.

In other words, me too.

  1. I don’t see how having a “free will” has any bearing on the investigation of whether a free will is at all possible.
  2. Is human consciousness “mindful matter”? Your use of the word “matter” intrigues me most. On the internet I only found “Mindfulness matters” or “mindful matters”. I anticipate that this stems from an assumption you have made along the way, but where did you get the idea from? I also searched the Wiki-Article and found nothing.

Perhaps we just can’t …

Yes, we have been here numerous times before. We can only judge on what we know, or believe to know, or what we have experienced, or believe to have experienced. That means it is always impure and prone to failure, which is why we can only have humility in all our dealings with others. There is nothing else.

Yes, they were children of their time. We have profited by their insights but there is no conclusion to be reached until its all over.

I see such inspiration not as an eternal truth that has eternal value, but a timely truth that helps us proceed. Where does inspiration come from? Did I always “know” but couldn’t access the truth? Did I create a touching story that helped me over a gap? Is a blockade dissolved in that instance? I’d love to tell you, but it could be all of them.

The same obviously applies to others, when we comfort them. Normally, non-pious people won’t accept the comfort of believers and vice-versa, unless they care for each other. Caring can help overcome this bias and, yes there is some interpreting done, but love is what matters more than the validity of the advice.

Most religious folks of course are not convinced. Without an omniscient and omnipotent “transcending font”, human morality devolves into either…

1] might makes right — it’s moral because we say so and we have the power to enforce what we say is so
2] right makes might — it’s moral because it is in sync with one or another renditon of the philosopher king, nature, humanism, or ideology
3] the rule of law — it’s moral because “here and now” we have the political power to compel a particular set of legal prescriptions and proscriptions

Only God makes all of the ambiguity, uncertainty and potential for tyranny go away. Why? Because with God there is a guarentee.

This one:

1] something either is a sin or it is not
2] the sinner is always known by God
3] the sinner is always punished by God

And if you are not a sinner then God [and only God] can assure your immortality, salvation and understanding of His divine justice.

On the other hand…

1] Perhaps science will at last provide us with the hard evidence needed to support the one and only empirical distinction between ethical and unethical behavior

2] we live in a wholly determined universe and all of this is subsumed in the only way it ever could have been

From my perspective, it is the difference between someone choosing to investigate it, while assuming she was able to freely, autonomously, willfully etc., choose not to investigate it, and someone convinced that this is the case when instead it all unfolds entirely in accordance with whatever set into motion the immutable laws of matter.

The investigation proceeds as it does, but only because it could never have not proceeded in any other way but the way in which it must.

Matter has many definitions, but the most common is that it is any substance which has mass and occupies space. All physical objects are composed of matter, in the form of atoms, which are in turn composed of protons, neutrons, and electrons.

And going all the way back one supposes to [at least] the Big Bang. But somehow along the way the matter that we call “star stuff” was able to evolve/reconfigure into the matter that we call “the brain”.

Sans God, anyway. Or, sure, maybe not.

In any event, living matter. Matter able to reflect on itself as matter able to reflect on itself as matter. Which precipitated down through the ages all manner of debate regarding “dualism”. The ghost in the machine. The Homunculus. The soul. The autonomous human mind.

But: what on earth does that really mean in a wholly determined universe?

On the contrary, the objectivists insist, re either God or Reason or political ideology or Nature or – philosophically – one or another deontological contraption, we are able to extricate that frame of mind which allows us to live our life on this side of the grave wholly in accordance with the moral and political truths righteously embodied in “one of us”.

And then, with God, it all reconfigures [through the soul] into immortality, salvation and divine justice on the other side of it.

Well, the aim of this thread was basically to explore the implication of this when particular behaviors are chosen by particular people who are inspired by conflicting renditions of “the good” derived from conflicting renditions of God.

Again, as that relates to how they go about “for all practical purposes” making a particular choice out in a particular world understood from a particular point of view given certain assumptions about their soul – “I” – on the other side of the grave.

Insofar as their own narratives may or may not facilitate me in extricating myself from my own [at times] brutally grim assumptions.

What’s the difference between a “chosen” investigation into free-will and a “determined” investigation into free-will? Absolutely nothing. Right? :-"

Hmmm, determinism. I’m not such a friend of determinism because I haven’t witnessed it in my life, even if you can look back and say that some things probably couldn’t have worked out any other way, given the circumstances. But if the circumstances are not “given” completely new possibilities arise and, like Murphy’s Law suggests, will arise.

Of course you can then assume that one set of “given” circumstances lead to another set of “given” circumstances, and then start asking about the giver. However, when you have a background in practical psychology, even as limited as I have, you begin to see how we ourselves create our circumstances – even unwittingly – and that an outside agent is often not needed. We just fail to grasp the bigger picture. I have often found myself explaining to people that their experiences are often caused by their personality traits, of which very many people are oblivious. They think they are just “normal” and fail to understand that there is a whole variety of Norms throughout society, let alone in the world.

The only thing I can find that is “given” is the constant psychological interaction between individuals, groups and nations, very much like the interaction between physical bodies, which is just as in need of investigation in order to discover the influences. This interaction is not conscious and takes place on a subliminal plane and therefore it is often others who notice it in our behaviour before we do ourselves.

Okay, there was a lot of “Stuff” in there which assumes that Matter is the basic ingredient of the physical universe. Under the microscope though, matter dissolves into ever smaller parts and the Primary Matter eludes us. Far more, we have form of all kinds which dictates how the physical world will appear to us. The combination of protons, neutrons and electrons give us atoms which give us elements etc., but the primary matter is missing.

Just the same with consciousness, which is said to be located in the brain, but where? It is something that eludes us. A comparison has been made of the brain with receivers, saying that yes, consciousness fires areas of the brain and we have a lot of information stored in our brains, but isn’t that knowledge rather than consciousness? Is consciousness coming out of the brain, or going into the brain? This just shows us, how uncertain we are about basic ideas.

The ancients had a lot of ideas, whether it was God breathing awareness into mankind or whatever, how much helps us on in our quest?

Sounds familiar, and perhaps it is comforting. We all scrape hope from wherever we can find it.

Well, the best of luck with your brutally grim assumptions.

Right. And what’s the difference between that and “a chosen investigation into free-will and a determined investigation into free-will?”

What precisely then is being suggested in putting “chosen” and “determined” in parentheses on the one hand and emphasizing them on the other?

If this exchange that we are having could only ever have unfolded as it did, wholly in accordance with the immutable laws of matter, how is that different from the fact it may not have unfolded at all had either one of us freely chosen not to pursue it in the first place?

How, going all the way back to whatever – whomever? – is responsible for the existence of existence itself, are we to grasp what is [b]really[/b] true here?

Did Hitler “choose” to pursue the Holocaust or did Hitler choose to pursue the Holocaust?

And, if he did choose to pursue it, given some measure of autonomy, how is that autonomy itself to be understood given the manner in which I construe the is/ought world as more reflective of dasein, conflicting goods and political economy? Or given the manner in which you construe the meaning of objective morality and God?

And then, finally, re this thread, does God “choose” to judge us on the other side of the grave or does God choose to judge us instead?

And how is that related to the extent to which neuroscientists [and epistemologists] can determine definitively the extent to which the behaviors that we engage on this side of the grave are either “chosen” or chosen?

In other words, for all practical purposes, what’s the difference?

I put those words in quotes because “chosen” and “determined”, when used as adjectives, have a different dictionary meaning from the way I’m using them in that sentence.

It ain’t as complicated as you try to make it.

Unless, of course, it ain’t as simple as you try to make it.

Note to others:

Would you construe his reaction here to the points I raised in my post above adequate?

Me, I’m of the opinion he did not really address them at all.