on discussing god and religion

Over and again, I note that even in regard to “I” in the either/or world, there is that gap between what we seem able to know about ourselves objectively – biology, demographics, empirical facts etc. – and an objective understaning of how that all fits into a thorough understanding of existence itself.

We don’t even know beyond any and all doubt if we embody actual free will in this exchange!

Or, okay, “I” don’t.

Let alone the part where we are able to encompass a complete understanding of “I” grappling with morality here and now and immortality there and then…through God and/or religion.

On a thread like this.

Unless, of course, that’s just me. Maybe others have encompassed this understanding. Maybe I will come upon one here at ILP.

And how on earth would one – I, you, anyone – know that?!! We’re all in the same boat here: “They give birth astride of a grave, the light gleams an instant, then it’s night once more”…“Where I am, I don’t know, I’ll never know, in the silence you don’t know, you must go on, I can’t go on, I’ll go on”.

So, sure, some find their own antidote here in God and religion. Either in being brainwashed by others as children or in groping with questions of this sort on their own as philosophers in places like this.

So, okay, to them I say, “tell me about it”. How do others connect the dots between here and now and there and then given their own understanding of God and religion. In all earnestness, polemics aside.

Look, I set aside a few hours a day groping with and then grappling to understand questions of this sort. Why? Because the stakes couldn’t be higher. But I’m running out of time. So I also set aside many more hours a day for things – distractions – that take me away from these things and bring me enormous amounts of existential fulfillment and satisfaction. That part doesn’t go away just because I construe life as being essentially meaningless in a No God world.

But there it is – oblivion – getting closer and closer. No more “fulfillment and satisfaction” of any kind ever again. Unless someone in a place like this is in fact actually able to link their arguments to demonstrable proof that practicing objective morality on their path here and now can bring about immortality [and even salvation] there and then.

Sorry, I can’t explain it better than not. Not even to myself.

On the other hand, let me say that posts like this from you are actually a pleasure to read. You note what I construe to be important points that actually prompt me to think through my own. And I truly do appreciate that. Above you are not only not Curly, you’re not even a stooge.

Thank you. You say the stakes are high. So you still hold onto the possibility of an afterlife AND the possibility that you can know what to do today with respect to it?
It may interest you to know that according to American New Testament scholar, Bart Ehrman :

What’s New About The New Atheism?
Victor Stenger answers the question.

Sure, as long as the discussions unfold in a series of intellectual contraptions, scientists and theologians can speculate endlessly about their “domains”. One working from one end, another from the other. But sooner or later both have to weigh in on extant sets of circumstances in which some insist that one set of behaviors bodes well for the soul down the road while others insist it is an entirely different set of behaviors. And, as well, they both have to come together to announce any actual evidence that “down the road” includes immortality and salvation.

Until then we are left only with more or less intelligent speculations in assessments like this.

That’s certainly how it can all unfold for any particular scientist or theologian. A mental construct is anchored to a mind such that both can fall back on the possibility that science and religion are two sides of the same coin. As long as the actual reality of human interactions is kept to a minimum up on the pulpit and in the lab. Theoretically, morality and immortality can be conceived as intertwined in any number if “assessments”. So, let’s just leave it at that.

Then this in itself becomes embedded in an intellectual contraption:

You know where I would take this particular “world of words”.

Seriously, what point is he making that someone here might find applicable to their own life in regard to God and religion? What scientific matters do those who are faithful to the Abrahamic religions constantly deal with? And if scientists are not prohibited from delving into “ultimate meanings and morals”, cite some examples of this. Whether as a scientist, an ecclesiastic or a philosopher, we all have our own reactions to “observable phenomena” day in and day out.

But not all of us share the same reactions. That’s the part that interest me. Why this “I” and not that “I”.

Once again a mind-boggling – surreal! – intellectual contraption about God that in no way, shape or form even makes an attempt to demonstrate that it is grounded in anything other serial assumptions that circle around and around and around each other.

I know why people want to believe things like this, but it still amazes me how someone is able to actually think themselves into believing that God creates atoms as building blocks that, through evolution, configure into things like covid-19…and then blame the staggering suffering this disease has caused on the atoms themselves!!

What’s New About The New Atheism?
Victor Stenger answers the question.

On the other hand, come on, would not someone who genuinely believed in a God, the God, my God, not rationalize any and all behaviors in the name of God? Think about it: If what you do here and now is judged by God as the only way in which you can attain immortality and salvation there and then, would not attempts to water down the Scripture be deemed sacrilegious? And rightfully. After all, if others do not join you in worshipping and adoring the one true God [yours] are they not inherently a danger? Could they not, perhaps, corrupt your own youth by touting the false God? Or No God.

Either my religion does revolve around the real me [my soul] in sync with the right thing to do [the will of God], or I can never really be certain how to achieve immortality and salvation.

That assessment of religion has always seemed to be the most reasonable one to me. And, again, precisely because of all that is at stake here if you get it wrong. That’s why based on my own experience with religious men and women over the years, many might have professed to have faith in God, but that’s not really what they believed at all. It’s not faith, it’s certainty.

And, if believing that human existence is not just an essentially meaningless trek to oblivion, the closer you get to certainty, the more comforted and consoled that you are.

Thus…

That is clearly the aim of any number of evangelicals here. But I wouldn’t call this faith. On the contrary, the attempts to politicize religion seems to revolve almost entirely around the absolute certainty that Jesus is coming back. And thus that God must exist.

Blind faith?

And while folks like Trump and his crony capitalist ilk will merely mold and manipulate them into sustaining their own “show me the money” rendition of nihilism, all that really matters in the end is the extent to which they can sustain it. Perhaps all the way to fascism itself.

In the beginning was… Dharma. Dharma is not bound to any one religion or sect…

I doubt we all ponder daily about our fate, but probably do about daily morality and living for longevity. That is my reply, to my interpretation, of your inquiry.

Haven’t you recently been called fatalistic, here, at ILP? I recently learned about a new term… the term ‘OCD thoughts’ …it’s more common than you’d think… perhaps you think constant (OCD) thoughts, such as fatalism and deasin? I’m sure we all have our own…

What’s New About The New Atheism?
Victor Stenger answers the question.

Again, in my view, it’s not really faith we are dealing with in regard to most “God world” folks. Or, rather, in all my years of interacting with them [from both sides] it wasn’t. It is all but rock solid belief that there is a God, the God. And that of necessity it was/is their own God.

Now, I’m sure in times of travail, doubts crept in for some. And I’ve known a few who, like me, pulled out of it completely. But must were way beyond faith. Especially when they are willing to divide the world up [politically] between the righteous and infidels.

And that’s where the danger lies. In objectivism linked to God linked to an authoritarian political agenda. Up to and including the theocrats. And, up to a point, even to those secularists who treat one or another ideology or humanism as the equivalent of religion.

On the other hand, the argument goes, are not the New Atheists more or less in the same boat? Only their own understanding of God and religion is allowed to prevail in any particular discussion. Here, there, everywhere.

Sure, go ahead, challenge it. But the bottom line never goes away: moral nihilism and oblivion. Or, yeah, my own bottom line anyway. Ever and always the atheists [old and new] are stuck there. They somehow have to convince the faithful and the true believers to abandon all hope of immortality and salvation. And to abandon all attempts to propound a moral agenda that can never be more than one or another hopelessly tangled/problematic rendition of “moderation, negotiation and compromise”.

Unless, of course, as with folks like Sam Harris, you actually attempt to connect the dots between morality and science. And how is that not for all practical purposes pretty much the same thing? Okay, you won’t go to Heaven for doing the right thing “down here”, but at least science is there to tell you what all rational and virtuous folks are obligated to choose in regards to, say, abortion?

Clearly, taking into account the actual social, political and economic “situation” in which suggestions like this might be pertinent, the arguments that I raise don’t go away.

Or, perhaps, not so clearly at all? Well, all I can do here is to hear out those who see it all differently. And hope that those who still have faith in or firmly believe in God are willing to explore how that impacts the behaviors that they do choose in regard to conflicting goods “out in the world”.

As I noted previously, whether in regard to an actual religious denomination or to any other “spiritual” path, the aim of this thread is to explore the manner in which those who espouse either connect the dots existentially between the behaviors they choose on this side of the grave and what they believe the fate of “I” will be on the other side of it.

[b]Dharma: (in Indian religion) the eternal and inherent nature of reality, regarded in Hinduism as a cosmic law underlying right behavior and social order.

(in Buddhism) the nature of reality regarded as a universal truth taught by the Buddha; the teaching of Buddhism.

an aspect of truth or reality.[/b]

How do you understand Dharma and how is it pertinent to the behaviors that you choose insofar as you understand the relationship between morality here and now and immortality there and then.

What’s New About The New Atheism?
Victor Stenger answers the question.

In a word: Huh?

Or, rather, the word that pops into my own head in reacting to “critiques” of this sort.

Think about it…

Does this or does this not sum up succinctly – for most, compellingly – why religion is still embraced by the preponderance of human beings around the globe. This is precisely the mindset that a leap of faith can provide members of the flock.

And one reason that atheists – old or new – often fail to break it down is precisely because there is no secular alternative to God. None, in any event, that comes even close to providing the same measure of comfort and consolation.

Not only that but historically there have been any number of secular alternatives that have revolved around such things as survival of the fittest, political ideology, scientism, nihilism and the like. And, ironically enough, these folks have often succeeded in bringing about only greater human pain and suffering.

And then the part about oblivion to boot.

Nope. From my frame of mind the only possible way to construe “the best of all possible worlds” sans God is in one or another political manifestation of moderation, negotiation and compromise. And look at all the turmoil that ever and always brings with it.

Not to mention the fractured and fragmented personalities like mine.

But of course Dharma sprang from other, previous, geo-political concepts, all of which precede indigenous Indic religions… religions having adopted Them. Chicken/egg / politics/religion dichotomy, solved… for India anyway.

I simply, absorb… do… and be, within the moral boundaries I set myself, which are derived from the expectations I have of myself.

What’s New About The New Atheism?
Victor Stenger answers the question.

Again, as soon as you take words of this sort out into the world of human interactions, the very meaning of the word coherent itself when made applicable to the behaviors we choose becomes increasingly more problematic. Believe in a particular God in a particular way and almost anything can be rationalized as intelligent, rational, sound.

Same with any number of secular beliefs. Interpret a political ideology or an assessment of nature to mean [and only to mean] either this or that and everyone becomes fair game: sexism, heterosexism racism, ethnocentrism.

All one needs here is the font.

On the other hand – and for all practical purposes – that is at least an answer. And it is one more than the atheists [old or new] have. They also have other “answers”: the Devil, free will, human evil. The point being to have an answer. In other words, when the alternative is an essentially meaningless existence, senseless suffering and oblivion.

This however is [to me] just another “world of words” in a philosophy magazine. Actual religionists across time historically and across the globe culturally, are able to construct and then reconstruct all manner of complex rationalizations able to make their actual lived sense of reality far more sophisticated. Given, among other things, the very different lives they have to work from.

Still, the true believer is able to convince herself that whatever God’s purpose might be in taking a loved one from her, the loved one is now with God as, in time, she will be too. And given how easy it can be for mere mortals to rationalize their behaviors, the fear of God for many is anything but “constant”. For some, you confess your sins, are forgiven, and go about the business of rationalizing more behaviors still. Between treks to the church on the Sabbath.

The behaviours I choose in life, are not based on my thoughts of the resulting consequences in my demise… why do you ponder on the resultant aspect so?

Even at the height of my allergy-induced illness, the only time such thoughts ever crossed my mind was when my health would dip dangerously low to the point of forcing my mind to ‘go there’ …but otherwise I didn’t and don’t, so why does yours constantly do?

I don’t practice my Dharma with an end result in mind… I guess I do have Ṛta (/ˈrɪtə/; Sanskrit ऋत ṛta “order, rule; truth”) in mind, and simply hope for the best. :laughing:

this is an interesting read, but you may have come across it before.

Well, as I have noted time and again, I created this thread because my own fractured and fragmented “self” is unable to move much beyond human identity as the embodiment of “I” reflecting political prejudices rooted in dasein as an existential contraption. Why? Because I speculate further that in a No God world, human existence appears to me to be but an essentially meaningless trek from the cradle to the grave. Ending in oblivion.

On the other hand, those who choose God and/or religion as a font onto/into which they can anchor “I”, think about these things very differently.

So, this thread was created in order for them to note just how differently they think about them.

If, however, connecting the dots existentially between morality here and now and immortality there and then is of little or no interest to you, I’d suggest you not participate in the discussions here. Because that is invariably what I will tug the exchanges back to.

Dharma then.

What’s New About The New Atheism?
Victor Stenger answers the question.

Talk about an existential contraption. Talk about needing an actual context.

Sure, if your life is bursting with all manner satisfaction and fulfillment. If you are young and healthy and a million miles away from death. If you are in fact reveling in the freedom to think your own thoughts, to live your own life on your own terms, God and religion can be shunted off to the back burner.

But let things start to crumble and the diagnosis be terminal and what’s all that vaunted freedom mean then? It’s not for nothing that most churches attract the old and the infirm. When meaning in your life sinks down into the circumstantial hole that you are now in and the only alternative is oblivion, being a freedom loving atheist can itself be of little consolation.

As though this sort of “rational assessment” actually sinks in with those who recognize God and religion basically as an embodiment of Pascal’s wager. It just depends on how conscious one is that this is all it is. A leap of faith. A leap that really is just that: a leap of faith.

Again, and that’s before we get to the part that Marx preferred tp stress. God used as a political devise to sustain the interest of the rich and powerful. “Keep them doped with religion” as John Lennon once assessed it.

And any number of children in any number of communities around the globe continue to be indoctrinated to sustain a belief in one or another religious dogma. And, in part, because science and the secularists still have nothing even remotely as comforting for the kids as morality here and now and immortality there and then.

What’s New About The New Atheism?
Victor Stenger answers the question.

Let’s face it, given the gap between what we think we know about the ontological explanation for existence itself and all there is to be known, a God/the God is certainly one possible explanation.

And it is the existence of the gap itself that allows us to “think up” any number of possible solutions. And the beauty of situations like this is that all one need do is to believe that what one thinks up [or others think up for you] is true.

And nature here may as well be another God. At least when it comes to its creation. How can the world around us not exist and then exist? Or is it more mind-boggling still to insist that it has always existed?

On the other hand, can’t mere mortals be just as ignorant about the creator being God? For me it always comes down to that most profound antinomy of all: Why something and not nothing? Why this something and not something else? Let’s face it, this may well be beyond the capacity of the human mind [given its evolution to date] to even grasp. Or the attempts to grasp it may well be just an inherent/necessary manifestation of nature/God itself.

On the other other hand, given human autonomy, scientists at least work with the world around us: experientially, experimentally: phenomenally.

Still, the bottom line is that science to date is not able to calibrate “the final solution”. At least not to my knowledge. That they embrace the quest empirically may allow them to speak more substantively, but that ultimate gap between what they know now and all that there is to be known doesn’t go away.

And, again, this is all in relationship to “things as they are” in the either/or world. Most scientists [in their fields] are still averse to connecting the dots between what is and what ought to be – morally, politically, spiritually. Even political “science” is must contend with dasein, conflicting goods and wealth and power.

If I do say so myself.

But why are you fractured and fragmented? What happened, that made you so and took you there?

Can you not think or feel beyond that fractured and fragmented state of self?

Yes… even as a (non-practising) RC, since birth, I am subconsciously tethered to that Faith, whether I like it or not. It played a major part in forming Me, my thoughts and feelings, and probably still does, well… I guess it does.

Iam said: “human existence appears to me to be but an essentially meaningless trek from the cradle to the grave. Ending in oblivion.“

Is that how you have lived your life? Did you not yearn to or seek out, anything otherwise and contrary to that?

Religion gives lives purpose and meaning, gained from being a part of That community, so perhaps that is the aspect you have noticed missing from your own life, that of belonging to a forming concept of self, so all you see is the end/oblivion/demise, where I instead see a continuation of I to where I am now and will be tomorrow onwards.

Have you ever sat in the back of a church, just to experience the experience?

Morality/immortality? Taking the sacraments I guess, to seal the deal with One’s god… ensuring a person their rightful place in heaven, sitting on the right hand side of Their god. That’s the primary reason for religion… following the rites and passages of your extended (religious) clan.

Dharma, rta, rights… not so much a solely religious thing as a societal one, initially spread through clans or faith-based systems… before the advent of mainstream State-ran societies and metropolises.

Do you dharma? I don’t mind if I do…

Over and again, I have made attempts to explain this. Encompassed in particular on this thread: viewtopic.php?f=1&t=194382

Here in regard to abortion.

So, let me ask you this: In regard to your own views on abortion, how are you not “fractured and fragmented”? Because clearly the moral and political objectivists among us [left and right] have managed to think themselves into believing they are in touch with the “real me” in sync with the “right thing – the only thing – to do.” And then most religious folks among us connect this dot to the one that encompasses Judgment Day. Because they did the right thing in the course of living their life on this side of the grave, God grants them access to immortality and salvation on the other side.

Right? Isn’t that how “for all practical purposes” it works?

Sure: In my interactions with others in the either/or world.

Nope, not always. I was once myself a committed Christian. And, after “transcending” religion as a result of my experiences and relationships in Vietnam, I embraced any number of secular/political renditions of objectivism: Communism, Marxism, Trotskyism, social democracy, democratic socialism. Then came William Barrett, “rival goods”, existentialism, deconstruction, semiotics, nihilism, moral nihilism.

Okay, but from my frame of mind, this is religion as an “intellectual contraption”. Which was basically the manner in which I reacted to Zinnat’s posts way back when. Instead, the aim of this thread is to bring words like that out into the world of actual human interactions. In particular, interactions that revolve around conflicting goods in which various religious denomination have their own “scriptures” which very much connect the dots between morality here and now and immortality there and then. These are the discussions I am interested in pursuing.

Yes. Only my interest on this tread is in reconfiguring that into discussions of actual chosen behaviors in particular contexts in which individuals “think through” morality and immortality in a philosophy venue. How are these “idea/ideality” dots connected existentially by individuals in the course of living their lives from day to day.

Dharma here [to me] is just another word that particular individuals come into contact with enabling some to embody it in lives that sustain meaning and purpose that sustains emotional and psychological comfort and consolation.

Here, for them, dasein doesn’t enter into it at all. And why would they want it to? After all, for me, dasein has become the source for my fractured and fragmented "person"ality in the world of value judgments and mortality.

I keep not getting your replies showing up in my ‘view unread posts‘ list, so only just seen it now… as I was scrolling through my ‘view your posts‘ list …will reply shortly.

What’s New About The New Atheism?
Victor Stenger answers the question.

Let’s face it, from the far left to the far right on the political spectrum, the best of all possible No God worlds will miraculously reflect the political prejudices of whichever ideological narrative you prefer.

But the point made by the more conservative advocates above is not at all unreasonable. Once God is taken out of the picture, mere mortals are more than capable of bringing about a world like, well, the one we live in now.

Is or is not the planet we live on owned and operated by those who eschew God and place all their eggs in the dog eat dog capitalist basket? The tyranny of capital for those who govern us by way of one or another rendition of “show me the money”?

As for secular ideology and morality? How about the 20th Century? Fascism on the right, Communism on the left. Let the dogmatic debates begin. Here for example: viewtopic.php?f=3&t=195888

Only here the squabbling tends to revolve more around genes vs. memes. Still, objectivism with or without God, embedded in either nature or nurture, the results are the same: one of us versus one of them.

On the other hand, when politics is involved, there is no getting around what is a stake: our actual lives.

Still, the world seems ever to be sustained by those who bet on God, those who bet on Reason and those bet on bank accounts. Not many folks here are “fractured and fragmented”.

Maybe, but conflicting goods going back to the pre-Socratics are no closer to being resolved. Instead, religious and secular objectivism has given way to democracy and the rule of law as [perhaps] the best of all possible worlds. Moderation, negotiation and compromise. Particularly in regard to many “social issues”. God is still around of course but most citizens are likely to embrace one of another rendition of “separation of church and state”.

Though there is always the danger that authoritarians – either God or No God, left or right – will bring this all crumbling down.

Here is one narrative:

Still, there are no doubt conservative narratives that can pick this apart point by point. Indeed, let the conservatives here among us – God or No God – do precisely that.

How it works for whom?

Abortion? It’s not something I think or worry about, either for myself or others. I have eliminated much in my mind, that is of no concern to me, so as to declutter my mind to make way for that which is… I’m constantly busy rewiring myself, you see.

What about in other worlds? I’m a neither/nor kinda type, myself. :wink:

My experiences have been more social than political… so gaining my worldly experiences through the Catholic church and in places of Catholic education, in Theatre and the Arts, in the workplace, in bars, in clubs, in exploring other countries and cultures, and now… dabbling in politics, which comes with a whole social sphere all of its own.

And now… for you, is? or you would like it to be…

Perhaps it’s an energy thing, so that our soul-energy departs the body and ends up where all dearly-departed energies are supposed to end up, in that, morality aids in achieving that mortality goal.

Even the Dharma/rta Practitioner is present/experiences dasein… albeit in various altered states of mind

exploringyourmind.com/brain-wav … pha-gamma/ according to this <<< I’m a baby or small child… as my delta-wave game is strong. :neutral_face:

[b]“When it comes to our brain waves, the key to authentic health and happiness lies in allowing each of them to work in their way, at their frequency and at their optimum levels. We should also remember that they aren’t static. Rather, they change as we get older. So, the point isn’t to get obsessed with improving our Beta waves for better focus or our Gamma waves to get into a spiritual state.

  1. Delta waves (1 to 3 Hz)
    Delta waves have the greatest wave amplitude and are related to deep but dreamless sleep. Interestingly, they are very common in babies and small children. The older we get the fewer of these brainwaves we produce. Our sleep and ability to relax gradually get worse over the years.

  2. Theta waves (3.5 to 8 Hz)
    This second kind of brain waves goes from 3.5 to 8 Hz and is mostly related to imagination, reflection and sleep. Fun fact: Theta waves are more active when we’re experiencing very deep emotions.

  3. Alpha waves (8 to 13 Hz)
    Alpha waves arise in those in-between, twilight times when we’re calm but not asleep. It’s when we’re relaxed and ready for meditation. When we’re on the couch watching TV or in bed relaxing, but before falling asleep.

  4. Beta waves (12 to 33 Hz)
    We’ve now crossed from low/moderate brain waves to a higher level. We’re now in that higher spectrum of frequencies that come from intense neuronal activity. They’re very interesting as well as complex. They have to do with times when we’re giving our full attention, very alert and on the lookout for stimuli.

  5. Gamma waves (25 to 100 Hz)
    Gamma waves are associated with high level cognitive processing tasks. They are related to our learning style, our ability to take in new information, and our senses and perceptions. For example, people with mental problems or learning difficulties tend to have less than half the usual Gamma wave activity”.[/b]