This thread is devoted to the big imponderables. Is there a Supreme Being which manifests itself in different ways at different times and in different place. Or is religion generated from within ourselves to satisfy essential needs. Which are those needs? How to different religious systems respond to them? Is there an objective physical world? Why is there something rather than nothing? Will we ever understand the universe? Will we understand ourselves?
Regular participants and lurkers in Philosophy & Religion are already aware of the style and basic rules of the debate we are aiming for. To others, which I hope will join, I would like to say that the key words are detachment and respect. Please avoid any aggressive pushing of a particular belief system.
The posts that follow have been moved from P&R.
2. angel-five - 10/18/2000 12:02:05 AM
I think it's time to focus Religion again. In lieu of the recent discussions a 'Conceptions of a Supreme Being' thread might be nice.
3. cmboyce - 10/18/2000 2:53:06 AM
I'd like to contend that "a Supreme Being" is a poor way to consider the phenomenon that, imo, has stimulated the idea of "a Supreme Being", and, indeed, religion in general.
That the Universe is inexplicable I take to be axiomatic. We are the buds of an ever-unfolding phenomenon that we understand as energy and matter, and as such we cannot apprehend it fully, any more than we can look up our own optic nerve.
There exists therefore a Mystery about mere existence. And our own existence, involving consciousness of itself and experience of the spectacular range of emotion and thought that this involves, is not only a part of it, but a particularly compelling mystery in itself, both because it is about ourselves and because it seems so peculiar in light of what we know (even as we know it ain't much) of the rest of the matter and energy from which it and we evidently evolved.
This Mystery is not different from, except in range (and, surely, tone), from that which informs the earliest religious ideas about which we know anything, the attribution of divinity to various natural phenomena. It appears that these were gradually reduced in number, as different phenomona became understood (whether "rightly" or not) and the remainder consolidated, eventually to the point where finite, even small, panoplies, yielded to monotheism. The whole shootin match was seen as associated with a single divinity. Thus, "a Supreme Being". A "being", as we ourselves are beings, but "Supreme" in that we are obviously insignificant by comparison with it. (This should only yield "superior", it's true, but I guess "supreme" takes out all the earlier, circumscribed divinities.)
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4. cmboyce - 10/18/2000 2:53:23 AM
[cont'd]
I contend that we can now see that the Mystery has no association with "a being", supreme or otherwise, but rather with "being". The scale that runs from inert to self-conscious through the range of matter and energy has an ultra- end, as surely as the electromagnetic spectrum does, and somewhere out there, some of the mystery is perhaps more clearly apprehensible. We don't know what it is, because we haven't developed the equivalent of radio receivers (if that's ultra; x-ray machines if it's the other way). Some day we may, but as I said, I don't believe we can ever understand it thoroughly. The uncertainty principle of quantum mechanics offers an instance of a similar boundary, I imagine. (Though I'm obviously not scientifically competent to understand just how it is so, I am literate enough to see that those who do understand it, do have an appreciation of this inadequacy in their understanding.)
The Mystery is real. That it is a being, that it is anything like ourselves in any respect, seems patently a parochial proposition. Better we should speak only of not knowing and reserve our awe and wonder and delight and terror for our consciousness of that. The night sky, best viewed with an awareness of its stupendous scale, is a far better effigy of the sacred than any idol or altar or text. Wisdom beyond the practical consists in an admission of ignorance.
5. PelleNilsson - 10/18/2000 3:02:01 PM
All religion tries to answer three basic questions.
6. angel-five - 10/18/2000 3:22:50 PM
I think that's unduly simplified. There are many fundamental questions that religions try to answer -- those are merely the most plebeian of them.
Some other questions of equal primacy:
What is the nature of reality?
What is the nature of deity?
These, and the ones you list, are 'what' and 'how' questions. But we can't overlook perhaps the most significant of the kinds of question, the source of every religious and philosophical tradition which ever found a start, which is why.
Why is our world the way it is?
Why are we here?
7. angel-five - 10/18/2000 3:28:58 PM
It's in the nature of burgeoning intelligence to ask these questions, and to want answers whether or not they exist or can be known. We can't posit the existence of a creator until we wonder first why the earth exists and is as it is -- or, in the case of primitive religion, wonder what causes the powerful natural phenomena we see in the world, be it a lightning storm or the change of the seasons.
8. angel-five - 10/18/2000 4:29:15 PM
I'll have to think about that, Boyce. That's certainly a basic question but I think I might be talked out of thinking it is the basic question.
Note the difference between an initial question, which we derive from first principles, and a basic question, which we're led to as our inquiry gives shape to the structure of religious issues (or, if you're a believer, uncovers that shape.)
The question of why anything exists -- why there's a universe in the first place, where our understanding leads us to believe that there must be a reason for it -- is certainly central. And it bears on a lot of other religious question -- for example, if we know why a creator made the universe, we can shed light on what our human purpose is in that universe. But if you follow that logic, the question 'why is there anything' only illuminates part of the nature of a potential Creator, and therefore a more direct question, such as 'what is the nature of the creator' might bear more directly upon all else in religion.
9. PelleNilsson - 10/18/2000 4:55:02 PM
cm
My memory has gone on the blink. It's a well-known cite. Who said it?
10. mgleason - 10/18/2000 5:43:12 PM
Martin Heidegger, Pelle.
11. mgleason - 10/18/2000 6:13:40 PM
I agree that the fundamental question of metaphysics is an apt starting point for discussing the concept of a Supreme Being, since there can be no greater Mystery than our own existence.
12. cmboyce - 10/18/2000 6:19:19 PM
Um, actually, Pelle, while I know I didn't think it up all by my lonesome, I wouldn't have been able to say where I had seen it. So I thank you, mgleason, for the prompt. I only know it second-hand, from snippets here and there, for I haven't read any Heidegger, but I know I've seen it more than once, and it has been a central notion in my sense of our place in the universe, etc.
As much as anything else, I view it as the central paradox, an expression of that which we cannot comprehend, that Mystery that, as I have said, I see as the stimulus that generates religious considerations in us. That is, to put it another way (which may perhaps seem argumentative, but which I intend with a solemn sense of awe), the divine.
13. mgleason - 10/18/2000 6:41:17 PM
Yes, the awe and exixtential anxiety that we experience when contemplating the unknowable are eased by seeking to impose order upon the world. As Wittgenstein said, 'Tell me how you seek and I will tell you what you are seeking.'
14. alistairconnor - 10/18/2000 7:32:44 PM
The only thing I wonder at is, where does my consciousness come from? Never mind about all you zombies. You could be automats, as far as I can know - I can have no more proof of your consciousness (or of my wife's, or of anyone's) than of the existence of a creator.
But I know I'm here, inside my head. And that's wonderful.
(And I know my tongue is in my cheek, too.)
15. mgleason - 10/18/2000 7:34:52 PM
Alistair, we could all be in your head, too, you know.
16. DanDillon - 10/18/2000 10:35:34 PM
All of these riotous questions you're posing, all of you, reveal nothing more than the final aporia. You've reached a great and immeasurable impasse here. But don't let me discourage you from asking. Over and over and over again. That's all the fun. And yes, it passes the time.
17. angel-five - 10/19/2000 12:23:09 AM
Bite me, Alistair. I happen to know for a fact that you're just a figment of my imagination. One night of Hegel and too much wine, and my subconscious heaves you into being.
18. mgleason - 10/19/2000 9:31:02 PM
Am I the only one interested in this idea?
Of course not. It is religious mythoi which I find so intriguing - the repetition of traditional patterns even in otherwise disparate belief systems - and the sudden breakthrough of a new belief.
We could discuss creation and destruction myths as they appear in various religions, their similarities and differences as grounded in particular cultures. Or how the doctrine of original sin is never mentioned as such in the Bible: how did it develop? Did St Augustine 'invent' it?
There's a lot to talk about. Religions, like all philosophical systems, develop - they don't spring full-blown from an overheated imagination (Scientology excepted). And just like other philosophical ideas, religious beliefs and doctrines must be studied in context, as distillates of a particular time and place. What a religion teaches is only the visible part of the iceberg; the why is submerged.
19. SnowOwl - 10/19/2000 9:48:52 PM
Wonderful, Angel and Maria. I like Maria's ...just like other philosophical ideas, religious beliefs and doctrines must be studied in context, as distillates of a particular time and place. What a religion teaches is only the visible part of the iceberg; the why is submerged. very much and I think we all have some reasonable and interesting discussions centred around these ideas.
Now all we need is a host.
20. SnowOwl - 10/19/2000 9:49:38 PM
Here is the "can" missing from the above.
21. PelleNilsson - 10/20/2000 2:33:40 AM
This is the end of the moved posts. Carry on!
22. bloodnfire - 10/20/2000 10:18:13 AM
Pelle. Your Message # 1 " Is there a Supreme Being which manifests itself in different ways at different times and in different place..
My present conviction fwiw is that indeed there is and that 'It' manifests 'Itself' in similar (but different ways) to 'Its Own' around the planet. However, the 'evidence' that 'It' has done so, is identical.
I hope PhilipDavid is lurking, and participates in this discussion.
23. cmboyce - 10/20/2000 10:59:35 AM
Identical with what, Bloodnfire?
Incidentally, I don't have a Message #1. That's alright, of course. I guess I see what it was.
Dillon's "great and immeasurable impasse" is well noted. It is of course the point. That there is such an impasse is (imo) a measure of our capacity to measure, more than a characteristic of the universe per se (though our capacities constitute an aspect of the universe; see more below).
The combination of whatever the universe is and our wonder thereat constitutes the Mystery that is, again imo, the source of religion and philosophy. And recognizing this seems to me to lead ineluctibly to an atheistic religion, in which my wonder and awe are directed precisely to the amazing apparant reality that the universe is ungoverned; that there is no supreme (or inferior) being, just being itself, evidently eternal, seemingly infinite; and that we are in it and of it, each of us and the collectivity of the planet's biosphere constituting the blossom at the end of a single twig—or the coral bud built on a castle of the dead, or...pick your metaphor.
The universe is composed—as far as we know—of matter-and-energy, which I understand to be variations of the same set of particle/wave thingies, whatever the fuck it is, and one segment of this "population" has, through processes we may never discover (though I'd bet we do), become capable of independent movements, most strikingly that of self-replication. That is, it is "life", all things living. This particularly volatile form of matter-energy can become sufficiently complex to generate the energies we know as thought and emotion. And so we look on it all. Necessarily, it and we being what we are, we look on it with wonder. And, as noted, the wonderment is the root of religions.
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24. cmboyce - 10/20/2000 10:59:54 AM
Just because we are the most thoroughly developed, intellectually, of all the life that we know, the wonder we feel in the presence of the whole shebang and its stunning combination of transcendence (in being eternal and infinite and seemingly incomprehensible) and mundanity (in being that which we live in every bloody moment) requires that we assume at least a measure of responsibility for it. Thus, ethics &/or morals (the distinction could doubtless be the subject of yet another thread, but never mind for now, at least as far as I am concerned). One of the potentially positive aspects of post-theological religion might be the obviation of a possibly (though not, guys, necessarily) irresponsible tendency to rely on God to bail us out of the difficulties that our willfulness—apparantly a feature of animality—gets us into. I'm thinking particularly of over-population and industrial despoilments, etc. And of course, the question of loving one's neighbors, etc., is an aspect of the same thing.
But I guess for present purposes, my point, perhaps over-illustrated here, is that for me there is no supreme being, just being, and it is constructing a sense of our relation to that, that comprises my spiritual enterprise.
Not, I might add, that I am more particularly dedicated to that enterprise than the average schmuck is to Islam or Christianity or whatever. But, feeling the lack of the Christianity I grew up with, I am trying to feel my way to "post-theology". I might as well confess that I fully intend to loaf about on any "Sunday mornings" that might come into view! (g)
25. bloodnfire - 10/20/2000 11:14:48 AM
cm. It was Pelle's #1, as I expect you gathered. You ask..."Identical with what?"
Identical with each other. Each having a gentle, kind, unselfish, sincere 'others-oriented' attitude, which some of us believe / know /recognize (chose your own verb) as being the work of the 'Metaphysical Being' in Whom we have come to trust.
Be they Shinto, Buddhist, Muslim, Christian, Wiccan, or whatever (including Atheist incidentally).
What do you think ?
26. bloodnfire - 10/20/2000 11:17:11 AM
AngelFives phrase..."Conceptions of a Supreme Being" is intriguing and one which I believe we all can discuss without putting the other Motie's faith down (intentionally or inadvertently).
27. cmboyce - 10/20/2000 11:34:18 AM
Well, bloodn, as I hope my posts above make clear, I am an atheist whose "metaphysical being" involves human committment to something on the order of "gentle, kind, unselfish, sincere 'others-oriented' attitude[s]", but I must observe that some of the religions you cite (as well as some you don't) have variants, at least, that are a bit on the bloodthirsty side to qualify. Historically speaking, most everybody, it seems, has had occasion to conduct a jihad at some time or other.
28. Angel-Five - 10/20/2000 12:20:45 PM
Well, I don't think that's true at all, Bloodnfire, to be blunt. It's pretty clear to me that different conceptions of 'deity' lead to different cultures... or, of course, the other way 'round. And that people of different temperment and belief structure find embodiment in the different faiths.
That's actually one of the most interesting things about comparative religion to me -- the religion of a culture has a much more profound relationship with the psyche of that culture than does, say, a preference for fowl over pork.
29. Angel-Five - 10/20/2000 12:36:17 PM
But I guess for present purposes, my point, perhaps over-illustrated here, is that for me there is no supreme being, just being, and it is constructing a sense of our relation to that, that comprises my spiritual enterprise.
The persistence of atavism.
This of course ties back to the original idea in the thread. Setting aside for the moment more Humean objections, we can look around and see that matter has stratified itself in systems of varying complexity. Some of the more complex localized systems -- and perhaps some of the much larger ones as well -- act in a manner which is clearly different from the simple entropy and enthalapy which dominates all other matter. We call this manner 'life'. But what does it mean that Life proceeds in a way that's notably different from all other manner? Or does it?
30. Jenerator - 10/20/2000 1:23:28 PM
One of my closest male friends is from Saudi Arabia. He and I met while in college and he was a devout Muslim. His family was a very, very prominent one in Jeddah and their devotion to Allah was viewed as exemplary to their community. While at school in the US, he became a Christian, which was no easy matter for him. He went back home to Saudi for the summer where his new faith was discovered. He was promptly put on house arrest and was afraid for his own life. Forbidden from the US, he was transferred to --------, where he currently lives (and is still a Christian.)
Over the years, we have had several discussions about God and how Jesus is different from Allah. In the Muslim belief system, God is given great reverence and admiration, but is mostly feared. Because the whole system is based on good behavior (by pleasing Allah one goes to heaven), the adherents face the struggle of knowing whether or not they're ever saved by their own merit. Which, is terrifying in my opinion. I asked him if he loved Allah and what he felt his relationship with his creator was like and he told me that he feared Allah and was afraid that he was never doing enough to appease him. By the ripe old age of 19, my friend had been to Mecca over 60 times. He prayed every day, five times a day, didn't drink, do drugs or listen to inappropriate music. He didn't swear or entertain with rude jokes. He was honestly one of the most "pure" people I had ever met, but he was literally consumed with fear. Once, while he was still a Muslim, he told me that he was angry with Allah for making life so impossible and that he didn't know how poeple could love such an angry God. Then he cried for telling me this out of fear of Allah's retribution for such disloyalty.
31. Jenerator - 10/20/2000 1:25:52 PM
I just thought I'd share a different view of The Creator.
32. mgleason - 10/20/2000 1:41:18 PM
You inspired me to see what I could find on the Muslim view of Allah, Jen, and this is the first essay that I read:
Nature of Allah
I can understand the estrangement felt by your friend, because even from the POV of a staunch believer, Allah seems to be a very distant figure, and salvation a very chancy matter:
Islam is based on monotheism. Tawhid, the oneness of Allah, is an essential belief for all Muslims. Islam teaches that Allah, the one god, has 99 attributes. Although we can understand some of His attributes, His essence cannot be comprehended by a human's limited mental capacity. Allah has created mankind primarily so that they may know their creator through his creations. Realisation of the supremacy of Allah, although necessary for success in the hereafter, has not been enforced on man - it is a test that is based on the fact that man has been given free will. However, man's free will is limited, although he has the freedom to choose between right and wrong, he cannot change parts of his destiny that Allah has pre-determined. Understanding the nature of Allah is essential as it has a substantial effect on a Muslim's duties to Allah.
The blend of free will and destiny is very interesting, and a bit frightening, too, like the belief in predestination that some Christians hold.
33. marjoribanks - 10/20/2000 1:43:50 PM
Jenerator,
You specialize in hanging out with emotional derelicts. Your friend is an ass, and you're possibly worse for buying his crap.
34. Angel-Five - 10/20/2000 1:50:26 PM
Let's not start the partisanship so early, shall we, Jenerator?
35. Angel-Five - 10/20/2000 1:53:32 PM
Nothing that even resembles a polemic, and none of these supposedly subtle attacks on a different religion have a place in this thread.
36. Angel-Five - 10/20/2000 1:54:01 PM
Note: I shouldn't have said 'these'. It's only one.
37. Angel-Five - 10/20/2000 1:58:04 PM
It's quite interesting to me that in climes where Nature is usually harsh, the favored religions quite often incorporate the notion of 'fate' into their theology.
38. mgleason - 10/20/2000 2:00:19 PM
Jenerator has a bias, as do we all, but I don't see her post as an attack on Islam. Her two main points are easily verifiable: a distant god and uncertainty about salvation. That she looks at these issues through the prism of Christianity does not detract from her observations.
39. mgleason - 10/20/2000 2:04:43 PM
Angel,
The concept of 'fate' or 'destiny' is one that I'd like to explore as a thread running through various belief systems. I'm going to work on that these next couple of days.
I think I'll compare the Christian doctrine of predestination against the Muslim view of destiny, first.
40. marjoribanks - 10/20/2000 2:09:41 PM
I disagree with #38. The post in question can be called a number of things -juvenile, irrelevant, wrong-headed, trivial, uninformed, smarmy, self-serving etc. But it's not even worth getting into, so i'll just leave it at that.
41. PelleNilsson - 10/20/2000 2:15:19 PM
Relax, marj.
Perhaps you want to contribute some thoughts of your own?
42. bloodnfire - 10/20/2000 2:24:34 PM
AngelFive. Your Message # 28 "Well, I don't think that's true at all, Bloodnfire, to be blunt. It's pretty clear to me that different conceptions of 'deity' lead to different cultures... or, of course, the other way 'round. And that people of different temperment and belief structure find embodiment in the different faiths.
It might well be my paradigm, but in my experience throughout a large number of cultures I have found people who, to me and imho, demonstrate identical 'Godliness'. By my definition (and Paul's in the Christian Scriptures) that is a man, woman or young person whose
'heart' has been circumcized of its 'fleshly' tendencies.
I read Jen's comments regarding her Muslim friend with interest. I yesterday made a new friend, and spent a couple of hours with him. His name is Derec, and I posted some of his poetry in the poetry thread with his permission. I'm hoping he'll 'come aboard' this lively (and courteous) discussion. He and I found agreement on many issues from our understanding of our individual scriptures. The Quoran also speaks of 'purity of heart' unlike Jen's friend, Derec isn't 'afraid' of Allah. Allah is merciful, and this man radiates
Godliness. He is gentle, kind, and very obviously 'others' centered.
It is this 'circumcision of the heart' which (as I understand things and imho) demonstrates identical 'evidences of grace' (for want of a better phrase), and which, to me, is the best evidence of the working of a Divinity. If indeed, there is a Divinity, I assume it is the same One.
Some people, in all environments, are sumsabitches. Some people are gentle, kind and 'others-oriented'. I didn't choose to give the credit for the difference to a Deity, , but that's my present understanding.
I just identify that Deity a little differently, that's all.
43. Angel-Five - 10/20/2000 2:25:18 PM
That she looks at these issues through the prism of Christianity does not detract from her observations.
So as to avoid making this an issue about Jenerator, let's rephrase this in a way that I'm sure you have no problem with...
That someone might look at these issues through the prism of their own religious beliefs does not detract from their observations.
And, forgive me, but this is precisely wrong. The limiting of perspective in an observation always detracts from its validity and relevance to the general discussion, in a real sense. If I'm a diehard existentialist and I examine Aristotle through that lens, the existence of that lens might add value to my observations to other existentialists but it needlessly complicates and confuses my observations to others who do not share my same built-in biases. And it prevents me from getting the sense of Aristotle that he and his true followers might have had, which of course is a large part of what it means to believe in Aristotle in the first place.
I think that, later on in the discussion, it might be much more apt to start introducing Religion X's take on Religion Y, but at the moment it's going to be much more fruitful if we strive to provide balanced viewpoints which are as free from bias as possible.
44. Angel-Five - 10/20/2000 2:29:26 PM
Bloodnfire:
I see and understand your point -- that a proper understanding of the divine teaches humility in us all and all the rest comes after. This, of course, depends upon your conception of the divine but I'm inclined to agree with this point if it is indeed yours.
Still, at this junction of affairs it might be more fruitful to discuss religion trying to emphasize the differences rather than the similarities, which can of course come later. This is of course just my opinion.
45. bloodnfire - 10/20/2000 2:29:57 PM
Continuing...
It's for those reasons that I find 'Brothers' and 'Sisters' in God in all cultures, and all faiths. We don't share the same 'nomenclature', but have very similar experience. Consequently I have wonderful fellowship with many Jews, Hindu, Christians and some Atheists all of whom demonstrate that same 'others-orientation' and tender-heartedness. Because it transcends culture, race and 'religious persuasion, I personally am forced to the conclusion that it is the same Deity as mine, in a different guise.
46. Angel-Five - 10/20/2000 2:35:02 PM
If we discuss religious beliefs in a balanced -- i.e. as free from bias as possible -- way that highlights the differences between them (so as to emphasize the wide range of variance in belief) we'll end up with a better finished product.
If we highlight the differences without keeping our posts balanced this will all be just an exercise in polemics. If we keep our posts balanced without highlighting the differences between creeds we run the risk of muddling all religions into one without ever understanding the things which make each unique (and therefore understanding the psychological differences that each creed imparts to its mindset).
And I'm sure no one here would like to see imbalanced posts which constantly emphasize why one religion is different from another, because, well, we already have a thread for that.
47. bloodnfire - 10/20/2000 2:36:51 PM
AngelFive. "I see and understand your point -- that a proper understanding of the divine teaches humility in us all and all the rest comes after. This, of course, depends upon your conception of the divine but I'm inclined to agree with this point if it is indeed yours..
It is exactly my point. As for comparing the differences, I think we've been doing that, haven't we, in the Religion thread ? My understanding is that in this thread we are approaching the same 'imponderables' (Pelle's term) from our respective paradigms, and that will be a lot less inflamatory is we courteously try to find areas of agreement, while still respecting our individual experience.
48. Angel-Five - 10/20/2000 2:38:09 PM
Errata; I don't know why this dropped from my previous post.
Imbalanced posts which highlight similarities between religions are likely to drag the discussion down into 'big-happy-familyism' and while that may well end up being the FINISHED tone of the thread that's a useless viewpoint unless it's established by impartial means.
49. mgleason - 10/20/2000 2:39:11 PM
That someone might look at these issues through the prism of their own religious beliefs does not detract from their observations.
And, forgive me, but this is precisely wrong. The limiting of perspective in an observation always detracts from its validity and relevance to the general discussion, in a real sense.
I disagree. We can filter out the Christian POV and look at the assertions made. As I noted earlier, Jenerator makes two declarations in comparing Islam to Christianity:
a) It is not possible to have a 'personal relationship' with Allah.
b) The path to salvation in Islam is not clear-cut.
These points can be examined independently of Jenerator's own beliefs. Reading a person's words in context is part of the mechanics of philosophy.
50. Angel-Five - 10/20/2000 2:39:33 PM
Anyway, enough metacommentary from me.
51. theDiva - 10/20/2000 2:44:12 PM
Interesting post about Jen's friend. It occurs to me that this man, though now grown, sees Islam and Allah through the eyes of a child reared in a faith atmosphere where the lessons were emphasized and reinforced through fear. When I returned to the Church and experienced my adult conversion I realized that I was looking at the faith through the eyes of a child rebelling against similar types of lessons; many lapsed Catholics I've spoken to only examine their beliefs as they formed them during adolescence. The adult conversion (whether to another faith or back to one's birth faith) comes to see these things, and view God, in a totally different light, I believe because the discovery and the journey are undertaken voluntarily. To reinforce what Blood said about his Muslim friend, those Muslims of my acquaintance are so spirit-filled, so full of love for Allah/God that it is a beautiful thing to witness.
52. bloodnfire - 10/20/2000 2:46:34 PM
Let's look at a couple of Pelle's questions, which I believe were among those which prompted this thread in the first place...
"Why is there something rather than nothing? Will we ever understand the universe? Will we understand ourselves ?".
I'd be interested to hear everyone's ideas regarding these questions including most especially yours AngelFive. So far your 'metacommentary' has been very constructive imo.
53. mgleason - 10/20/2000 2:51:26 PM
That's a shrewd observation, Diva.
I wonder, though, whether some adult conversions back to one's own lapsed faith don't entail some measure of rationalization WRT the original objections which caused the lapse.
54. SnowOwl - 10/20/2000 2:51:49 PM
Diva,
This is a quote from the site Maria posted earlier:
For those who have a very high realisation of the nature of Allah, they do not worship him for the fear of His hell, nor for the want of His paradise but because Allah is worthy of all praise.
It reinforces what you were saying, that those who fear Allah (or fear the Christian God) or engage in worship because they want to get to Paradise have an inadequate concept of their god.
55. PelleNilsson - 10/20/2000 2:51:58 PM
blood
So you are now taking a completely relativistic stand? All religions are manifestions of the same Supreme Being and therefore they all have the same validity?
56. theDiva - 10/20/2000 2:56:13 PM
Maria
In my case, it was a maturation of understanding, and a willingness to accept the nourishment the faith had to offer, while still being able to accept the fact there were going to be some areas I struggled with. I suppose as you grow older you are more able to accept that there are shades of gray.
Snow
Yes! Exactly. It's taking only one part of what's offered, almost, or only 'hearing' the negative.
57. bloodnfire - 10/20/2000 3:00:15 PM
I'm not sure I exactly mean that Pelle. What I have been trying to post for nearly three years now is that 'God' as I understand Him, appears to me to work in exactly the same way in certain people in all nations, faiths and classes.
Because of my Christian experience, I define all that I see through that 'prism', and consequently can be very easily misperceived to be patronizing.
I agree completely with SnowOwl in her #54 "It reinforces what you were saying, that those who fear Allah (or fear the Christian God) or engage in worship because they want to get to Paradise have an inadequate concept of their god.".
I try to teach the Students where I work the difference between 'Religion' (which I define as 'knowing some things about God which may or may not be true), and a 'Relationship', i.e. 'Knowing God' whatever that may mean to the individual.
Does that answer your question Pelle ? If it does how about giving us your take on those questions of yours...
#1..."Why is there something, rather than nothing ?"
58. theDiva - 10/20/2000 3:03:13 PM
dadgumit! I gots to go, and this is getting good.
59. marjoribanks - 10/20/2000 3:04:41 PM
No comments of my own yet, Pelle. I'm sprinting in and out of here while getting a fair amount of work into the out tray.
But, my reason for scorn at that post about Allah the mean God was precisely along the lines of the thoughtful stuff posted here since. The person is obviously an absolute juvenile, and his experience as reported to us is in no way either representative or illustrative of Islam in general.
60. Jenerator - 10/20/2000 3:07:42 PM
Maria, Bloodnfire, Diva,
Thank you for the comments. Since the "metaphysics" thread is about pondering the big questions, such as the notion of God, I thought that sharing with you different beliefs about Him was relevant. Afterall, if we're formulating attributes through our own reasoning and experience why is it that some cultures are more afraid of their God and others not? Did you catch where I asked my friend about his relationship with God? That's a western tradition of having a personal relationship God. Christians see their Creator as approachable and loving and some other cultures are more cautious concerning a personal relationship with God.
I think it's interesting how different religions perceive God in relation to them. Is He/She/Them approachable? If so, why? If not, why?
61. bloodnfire - 10/20/2000 3:07:50 PM
I'm sitting here, refreshed and laughing out loud. Let's face it, my answer to Pelle's question, "Why are we here" is so patently ludicrous on the face of it that I do laugh in sympathy with those who think I'm nuts!
What? that this Diety Who speaks galaxies into existence, chose this tiny speck of dust in the Cosmos to create a unique Garden ? Because He needed a 'Schoolroom' in which to create and grow 'human beings' in His Own 'image and likeness'..? Why ? because, being 'Love' He longed to be loved ? NO! Because He needed a 'Bride' for His Son.....
GIVE ME A BREAK !
(Well, He did....He broke my heart...And made me free).
How about it Pelle ? Why do you think we're here?
62. marjoribanks - 10/20/2000 3:14:08 PM
The fact is, Muslims remind themselves (and everyone else) every day how merciful and compassionate Allah is. Every daily activity is supposed to be prefaced with something like "In the name of Allah, the most merciful, the most compassionate" (or "Bismillahi Rahmani Rahim" in Arabic - my transliteration). It's hard to imagine someone normal who understands this and practices it and still feels frightened and that Allah is vengeful.
But enough on this topic.
63. Jenerator - 10/20/2000 3:15:08 PM
SnowOwl,
"For those who have a very high realisation of the nature of Allah, they do not worship him for the fear of His hell, nor for the want of His paradise but because Allah is worthy of all praise."
Thank you for posting on this. I'd say that in onse sense I agree and in another I can see how we can be overcome with fear. Afterall, how do we know if we have a "high realisation of His nature", even so, how do we know if it's correct? I would say that one of the most ultimate realizations concerning God is when you realize the enormity of God and the smallness of yourself. With that knowledge, wouldn't you want to be worshipping the right way, the way that would appease God? Naturally, if you're not, you might be a little afraid. It is God, afterall. My friend believed in his heart that Allah deserved all praise and that "all good things came from Him", but he also believed that he wasn't capable of worshipping Allah the way he deserved and demanded.
64. mgleason - 10/20/2000 3:15:32 PM
I'm in agreement with the general desirability of presenting balanced viewpoints. It has been my experience, however, that philosophers, like everyone else, always have an axe to grind. I've been trained to incorporate this knowledge into my analysis, and to extract the salient points.
Philosphers write from a certain cultural and/or religious POV, whether in agreement or rebellion. They are beings-in-time, creatures of their historical eras. They have been influenced by earlier thinkers, and either advance past propositions or tear them down to erect their own, usually the latter. What's worse, these are only some of the influences that must be taken into account. It's not easy, but there is no other way to proceed.
I take the same approach to what's written here; bias does not necessarily lead to polemical discourse. It is noted, and the substance distilled.
65. Angel-Five - 10/20/2000 3:15:49 PM
Marj:
I'm holding you responsible to introduce Indian variants into this discussion.
66. Jenerator - 10/20/2000 3:17:57 PM
Marj,
I know that God is good and merciful, slow to anger and infinitely compassionate, but I am afraid of Him at times, too.
67. marjoribanks - 10/20/2000 3:21:26 PM
Eh. I don't know very much, but I was raised in a completely peaceful multireligious atmosphere and am familiar with the ways my friends (Hindu, Muslim, Christian, Parsi, Jain, Sikh) worship and live their lives.
The Church I grew up in (70's, post Vatican II, influenced by liberation theology, quite aggressively Indian) is such an odd variant of the rest of the Catholic church it's almost an aberration.
68. bloodnfire - 10/20/2000 3:23:10 PM
Marjoribanks. You post above..."But, my reason for scorn at that post about Allah the mean God was precisely along the lines of the thoughtful stuff posted here since".
Let's, for a moment, forget the 'supernatural', even the 'metaphysical'. Speaking for myself (of course) I wanted to know why I was here, those first 35 years of my life when I thought everything was just 'by accident of nature'. I stopped wondering "why" around the age of 18 and started concentrating on the facts that I was here and started trying to make the best of it.
Isn't that were most people are ? Dealing with the 'Status Quo' and trying to make the best of it and of themselves ?
69. marjoribanks - 10/20/2000 3:24:14 PM
Jenerator,
So then, instead of highlighting your friends beliefs as some kind of window into the Islamic world, you should have phrased and positioned your point quite differently. Eg, not a representative view of a Muslim but the representative view of a silly crybaby.
70. marjoribanks - 10/20/2000 3:26:20 PM
Blood,
I have no idea why your question in #68 is pointed at me, or even really what it means. If I'm supposed to come up with an answer perhaps you could rephrase the question and provide it with a context.
71. Jenerator - 10/20/2000 3:27:21 PM
Yeah, I guess crying about being under house arrest with fear of decapitation is something. But, to cry about fear over one's fate is pretty weak.
He is no more representative of Islamic thought than you are about Hinduism or Catholicism. Fair enough.
72. JayAckroyd - 10/20/2000 3:27:44 PM
The god of abraham is the god of the prophet is the god of jesus.
Doesn't this bother any of you? Does Allah punish Christians? Does Yahweh punish Muslims? Non-Christians go to hell, right?
Isn't it a little confusing that the same god comes with such a complex and contradictory users' manual?
73. Angel-Five - 10/20/2000 3:27:56 PM
Cultural lenses can be easy or hard to detect, which is why I'd ask everyone take as many pains to step outside them as they can.
By means of illustration, I'd offer this famous anthropological piece. If you're familiar with it, please let others draw their own conclusions.
74. bloodnfire - 10/20/2000 3:27:57 PM
I expect that Jen's Muslim friend is 'afraid' of Allah because he is an honest and forthright man, and knows that as Merciful as Allah is, He must also be 'Righteous' and 'Just'. In order to extend 'Mercy', His 'Righteous Justice must be satisfied.
But that belongs in the other thread because it comes under the heading of 'Religion'.
Let's get back to it. WHY ARE WE HERE ?
75. marjoribanks - 10/20/2000 3:30:16 PM
"Yeah, I guess crying about being under house arrest with fear of decapitation is something. But, to cry about fear over one's fate is pretty weak. "
This, folks, is precisely why I responded strongly to the earlier faux-innocent post. Not only is there an agenda apparent (and not hidden well either I might add) - there is abyssmal ignorance.
76. Jenerator - 10/20/2000 3:30:50 PM
Bloodnfire,
I was posting on the attributes of God. Why are they different among faiths and where do they come from? If we're trying to figure out where the notion of God comes from, it seems natural that His character traits will be discussed as well.
77. bloodnfire - 10/20/2000 3:31:25 PM
Note to myself (most especially) and my fellow Evangelicals in this thread (from Pelle's #1)....
". Please avoid any aggressive pushing of a particular belief system."
". Please avoid any aggressive pushing of a particular belief system."
". Please avoid any aggressive pushing of a particular belief system."
:-)
78. Jenerator - 10/20/2000 3:33:34 PM
Why is God detached for some and intimately concerned for others? Why is God infinitely merciful to some and righteous with vengeance for others. Why is God respected and kept at a respectful distance for some and called "daddy" by others? Why is God perceived as male and not female?
Where do all of these attributes come from?
79. mgleason - 10/20/2000 3:34:18 PM
Jen,
I think it's interesting how different religions perceive God in relation to them. Is He/She/Them approachable? If so, why? If not, why?
Yes, this is exactly what I obtained from your post. What it has spurred me to examine is this peculiarly Christian concept of a 'personal relationship' with God. How did it develop? What influences shaped it? Why in one culture and not another?
It's not a matter of exalting one god at the expense of another, but rather exploring the why in the development of two monotheistic belief systems which seem to participate in the same God, in the case of Islam and Christianity, but 'know' Him in very different ways.
80. Jenerator - 10/20/2000 3:35:28 PM
Bloodnfire,
I'm not pushing any belief system. I'm just talking about differing perceptions about the nature of God. I think it has philosophical importance!
81. JayAckroyd - 10/20/2000 3:40:35 PM
So, to answer Pelle's opening post, no.
There is no supreme being. All the human representations at such a being are feeble, contradictory attempts to limit our freedom of action. Or they are attempts to explain a world that seems arbitrary and unpredictable.
We have a deep necessity to explain causality of events we observe. That led people with a more limited understanding that we have of how the world, and people, arose, to create complex myths with human-like supernatural beings who existed outside the universe to create it.
We know these beings could not have existed. Unless you see evidence of the age of the earth, the universe and the fossil record as a test of faith set up by the creator when he made the universe 6000 years ago, you pretty much have to reject the creation myths of the Yahwist religions.
82. PelleNilsson - 10/20/2000 3:41:50 PM
blood
I have no good answers to your questions. No doubt you have, but they don't interest me.
All
The raison d'etre of creating a separate thread for the subject at hand was that we want to be free from intra-mural Christian discussions. I wish Diva and Maria and all others would respect that. I don't want to move posts but if I have to I will. This thread is for those who are capable of "thinking outside the box", to use a worn-out phrase.
83. Angel-Five - 10/20/2000 3:43:05 PM
It's been brought to my attention that there may be a problem with the linked document. This is a better site.
84. bloodnfire - 10/20/2000 3:46:24 PM
Jen we just cross-posted. I hope you didn't misunderstand me. I understand your point about the attributes of God. I think they are going to come out as we get the various answers to Pelle's questions,
i.e. Why are we here? Is there a Supreme Being which manifests itself in different ways at different times and in different place? Or is religion generated from within ourselves to satisfy essential needs? Which are those needs?
If you or I or Marshame or any of the other 'Babes in Christ' are asked these questions we all give the same answers, right ? I am most interested to hear our fellow Moties' thoughts. And, before Allah, I am NOT in this thread to try and 'Push my own Agenda', 'Grind my own Axe' nor 'Prosletyze'. Period.
Believe it or not, I haven't had that motivation in any other thread in this Forum either. Sure, I'm a Christian Missionary, but as such I am to love and respect everyone. Not to persuade anyone that my views are correct, God forbid. If I can persuade someone of something, some other "Patronizing Old Twit" (I still love you SnowOwl) can come down the Pike and persuade them diffently.
I sincerely want to hear everyone's response to Pelle's questions, especially those who are 'newly come into this Motley Crue' (who incidentally were produced on one of their albums by my only begotten son).
85. mgleason - 10/20/2000 3:48:44 PM
Pelle, that's out of line.
My posts have been limited to either explaining that bias need not be the basis for controversy, or attempting to compare the Christian concept of God against the Muslim vision, in response to Jenerator's original post, in the spirit of inquiry. As I've said before, I am interested in the philosophical underpinnings of religious systems of any kind.
86. PelleNilsson - 10/20/2000 3:50:17 PM
I'll log out very soon. I'm not at all happy with the development of this discussion, being dominated by cheap personal shots, and patently false statements like jen's that she is "not pushing any belief system".
87. bloodnfire - 10/20/2000 3:50:33 PM
Pelle my dear old dour chum..."I have no good answers to your questions. No doubt you have, but they don't interest me.".
They're not my questions, for Pete's sake, they're yourn.
Sure, I've got my answers which interest me and satisfy me, but I am sincerely interested in everyone else's. I hope you are too, otherwise why would you suggest this thread ?
88. Angel-Five - 10/20/2000 3:51:26 PM
The question of why we're here can be broken down into a few distinct answers.
They are in no particular order:
1)We're here because a creator made us, but we do not know why we were made.
1a)Therefore we should try to find out why we were made.
1b)Therefore we should just be ourselves and trust in a creator to have taken this into account.
2)We're here because a creator made us, for a reason, and the reason is X.
3)We're here because the universe contains the possibility for life and sooner or later it came about according to an explainable process.
4)We're here because there is a generative force within the universe.
5)We're here for no reason at all.
6)We aren't here.
Now, applying these (and other) possibilities to a table of what we can infer about the universe (substitute Creation if it's your bent to do so) we end up inevitably coming back to one central theorem -- it's our own musings about what might be greater than us that shape our conception of what that greater power might be, and then our concepts of what that greater power might be shapes our behavior, including our musings.
89. SnowOwl - 10/20/2000 3:52:39 PM
I think a better starting point is why are we asking why? From my perspective, it is the ability to distinguish ourselves from the rest of the universe and our somewhat self-centred tendency to see ourselves as unique that leads to such questions.
90. bloodnfire - 10/20/2000 3:56:57 PM
Do we see ourselves as 'Unique' SnowOwl ? We are spending billions of dollars to try and find others just like us in the cosmos ?
AngelFive. If we actually do not exist I am having an outrageously wonderful time for someone who isn't.....
Huh ?
91. Jenerator - 10/20/2000 3:57:34 PM
Bloodnfire,
No offense taken at all, I knew what you meant.
Maria,
You understand me perfectly. (Did you think you'd ever hear me say that? Pretty cool!);-) But, I'm sure that we'll have to start with some sort of philosophical construct before we even get to the nature of God. I seriously doubt in a metaphysics thread that there will "proof" of its existence, for I suspect that the logical positivists here will essentially claim that any metaphysical propositions made by believers of any faith, are essentially meaningless and assert nothing that can be proved or believed by faith. Afterall, reality isn't even agreed upon.
92. Angel-Five - 10/20/2000 3:58:19 PM
The important point is that this process proceeds independently of whether a creator exists. What ideas, after all, are inherent in any religion which are totally foreign to us -- that do not consist of metaphor relating to our individual culture?
Why is, say, Norse mythology, rooted in a society where Nature is pitiless, much more involved with the concepts of faith and the heroic struggle against overwhelming odds, where modern Christian mythology centering upon free will, exigesis and elevation of the soul is more typically found in cultures where liberal thought pervades?
93. marjoribanks - 10/20/2000 3:59:05 PM
By the way, about this "personal relationship" with God, you should check out Hindus sometime. I don't think theres anything more personal than the relationship many Krishna devotees have with their deity - they even marry him/it in various ceremonies. Krishna is totally real to them.
And I'm not even going to get into lingam-worship.
94. Jenerator - 10/20/2000 3:59:27 PM
Pelle,
I don't appreciate that at all.
95. bloodnfire - 10/20/2000 3:59:42 PM
I agree with your posit #4 that "We're here because there is a generative force within the universe" AngelFive. Now, assuming that we actually are here, do you personally have any take on "why" ?
96. SnowOwl - 10/20/2000 4:09:05 PM
The question 'why' in the sense that bloodnfire asks it implies some purpose in us being here.
97. bloodnfire - 10/20/2000 4:10:28 PM
Marjoribanks. If you have followed any of PhillipDavids many most erudite and (imho) gracious posts, you will know that he sees identical belief systems within the Hindu and Christian persuasions, and I totally agree with him.
It's fun, I'm finding, trying to separate philosophy from religion in our discussion. It's not easy, but it's fun.
Hey Pelle, lighten up. This is a great thread potentially, and you've got AngelFive and me communicating for the first time in over 18 months (for which I am personally very grateful may I say ?), and Jen and Maria are smiling at each other.
I appreciate AngelFive's concern that this just not develop into a
"Big-Happy-Familyism" discussion, but while we are discussing various ideas regarding the answers to Pelle's questions (:-) I also very much appreciate the general absence of hostility.
98. bloodnfire - 10/20/2000 4:13:32 PM
So, SnowOwl, my understanding of your pov is that 'Why' is unnecessary ? If my understanding is correct, I accept your pov completely, and would appreciate your 'take' on why you feel as you do.
99. Angel-Five - 10/20/2000 4:13:53 PM
Snowowl is correct. Simply by asking the question of 'why' we are here Bloodnfire is framing an answer -- that there can be a why. The notion that there is a 'why' to our universe and our human existence presupposes some coherent higher meaning to it all. Therefore, even though it is essentially a logically unanswerable question, it restricts the list of possible answers we can provide. This is the first step towards establishing a theology from nothing -- a loaded question.
100. mgleason - 10/20/2000 4:14:22 PM
Like most philosophical and religious terms, the phrase 'personal relationship with God' has a specific meaning within the Christian (especially Evangelical) context, which, BTW, is not my personal frame of reference.
In order to compare like to like in Hinduism and Christianity, for example, more is needed than a simple remark regarding some customs pertaining to the worship of Krishna, one of the many Hindu Gods (or gods, whatever your preference).
101. JayAckroyd - 10/20/2000 4:21:44 PM
90
SnowOwl--
When you say "ourselves," do you mean each individual, or do you mean people?
Both are true of course. One of the central tenets of religions associated with sedentary agriculture animists is that human beings are unique and special among other animals.
We are individually unique, of course, because our DNA and cultural experiences are unique to each of us.
102. Angel-Five - 10/20/2000 4:22:43 PM
Look, Pelle has a point and he's the thread host. Maria and Jenerator agreeing has nothing to do with the existence of this thread. The thread was started with the notion that we would positively discuss and contrast religious motifs. The first thing out of Jenerator's mouth is a bleak picture of Islam which she first portrayed as a view of a 'different' creator and which she has subsequently admitted isn't representative of Islam. And look where that statement almost took us right off the bat.
Maria's point is of course that we can still find something of value in such a biased viewpoint, and of course she's right, but the price paid might end up being the thread itself. There's already a place to field and interpret overtly biased viewpoints. It's called the Religion thread.
What we need here is a debater's equivalent of German Basic Law, and an entire Marshall Plan's worth of fact and philosophy posting from those able to do so and keep this 'postwar Germany' of ours from collapsing again.
103. bloodnfire - 10/20/2000 4:23:06 PM
WAIT JUST A COTTON-PICKIN MINUTE!! Bloodnfire isn't asking the question WHY ? Pelle our esteemed (and touchy) temporary host is asking the question 'Why?' in the very first post in this fascinating thread. (Over 100 posts in under 12 hours ?! That would have earned a 'hot' under the old system).
Pelle asks the question folks, and so far hasn't proposed an answer.
I truly wish he would, not so that we could argue, but so that we could better understand each other.
104. Angel-Five - 10/20/2000 4:23:31 PM
102 was to Bloodnfire.
105. JayAckroyd - 10/20/2000 4:25:40 PM
Is everyone here familiar with the anthropic principle?
106. Jenerator - 10/20/2000 4:27:13 PM
I wouldn't think that function constitutes higher meaning. In other words, if we put gas in a car in order to get it to drive, how is that a "higher meaning", it's more of a necessity or function. Not something done with a higher purpose.
Assuming there is no God, and we ask why are we here, had amoebas started it all and it was coincidental, isn't that our "why"? I don't see that that consititutes any coherent higher meaning or higher purpose.
107. Angel-Five - 10/20/2000 4:27:50 PM
Bloodnfire: Pelle might have asked it in post number one, but you asked it subsequently, and in a different context, to me. Thus my answer to you.
108. JayAckroyd - 10/20/2000 4:28:47 PM
Here's the weak anthropic principle:
Weak Anthropic Principle (WAP): The observed values of all physical and cosmological quantities are not equally probable but they take on values restricted by the requirement that there exist sites where carbon-based life can evolve and by the requirement that the Universe be old enough for it to have already done so.
and the strong anthropic principle:
Strong Anthropic Principle (SAP): The Universe must have those properties which allow life to develop within it at some stage in its history.
109. JayAckroyd - 10/20/2000 4:28:49 PM
Here's the weak anthropic principle:
Weak Anthropic Principle (WAP): The observed values of all physical and cosmological quantities are not equally probable but they take on values restricted by the requirement that there exist sites where carbon-based life can evolve and by the requirement that the Universe be old enough for it to have already done so.
and the strong anthropic principle:
Strong Anthropic Principle (SAP): The Universe must have those properties which allow life to develop within it at some stage in its history.
110. JayAckroyd - 10/20/2000 4:30:45 PM
"why" in this context is ambiguous, of course. It could mean either "what series of events have occurred to bring us into existence" or it could mean "For what mystical or non-natural reason were those series of events initiated?
111. JayAckroyd - 10/20/2000 4:30:46 PM
"why" in this context is ambiguous, of course. It could mean either "what series of events have occurred to bring us into existence" or it could mean "For what mystical or non-natural reason were those series of events initiated?
112. JayAckroyd - 10/20/2000 4:31:17 PM
I don't think I'm double pumping the button.
113. mgleason - 10/20/2000 4:32:16 PM
To an Existentialist, the question 'Why are we here?' need not have an answer, and even if there is one, it exists in the theoretical realm of metaphysics.
Existentialism is grounded in action, not speculation. We are here because we are, therefore, the first principle is, as Camus would say, acknowledgement of the absurd, the irrational, that which we don't understand and may very well have no meaning, in order to define ourselves and our own existence by struggling against it.
114. bloodnfire - 10/20/2000 4:33:47 PM
I don't mean to put Pelle's question in a different context AngelFive, any of them for that matter. Let's just address his questions, okay ?
"Postwar Germany", I like that....
115. Angel-Five - 10/20/2000 4:35:31 PM
Jenerator:
I think you're confusing two different hierarchies of 'why'. Look at it like this -- If I ask you why we exist, you can answer on at least two different levels. You can answer literally, that according to your own teachings, your god made us. Or you can tackle the much more imposing level of the question and make an argument why your god made us. Right? That's obvious.
If you are to turn the question over to an ardent atheistic evolutionist, they can only answer on one level -- the literal level. Because there is no higher purpose inherent in protobionts forming as inert micelles in the ocean, and then encapsulating crude building amino acids and the like, giving them in effect a stable place to react and react and react until a pattern results that's capable of replicating itself faster than it breaks down. It is because it can be. That is an ultimate dead end to the query of 'why' because it offers no armature to build upon.
And bear in mind that Pelle's question obviously is not meant on a literalist question. The fact that the thread is called Metaphysics rules that out.
Hence, my answer.
116. JayAckroyd - 10/20/2000 4:35:49 PM
Lee Smolin's Life of the Cosmos argues that we can use evolutionary arguments to defuse the inference that the strong anthropic principle implies the existence of a creator.
He uses the supposition of multiple universes, created by black holes, subject to natural selection-like processes to describe a mechanism that could generate this universe.
smolin review
discusses the book in more detail.
117. Jenerator - 10/20/2000 4:35:58 PM
a5,
This is all I'll say on the matter. I posted on a friend's experience with Islam. Given that he comes from a wealthy and prominent family, not some psycho next door, I thought that his insight would be important. When I share any anecdote, I never preface it by saying, "THE STORY YOU ARE ABOUT TO READ IS TYPICAL OF ALL BELIEVERS!" It wasn't hostile nor was it intended to downplay Muslims or Islam. I did say that the guy is one of my closest male friends and he was as such before he even changed his faith.
You have your reasons for not liking me and I have mine for not liking you, but what you must realize is that I don't have a secret agenda with my posts.
What fascinates me about this man's experience was the amount of fear (reverence?) he had concerning Allah. And, as I explained repeatedly, I think it is interesting how we attribute certain characteristics to God. Why do some cultures see God as loving and others see Him as more of an authority figure and so on. Searching deeper, is it the culture that attributes these characteristics, historical events that shaped the tradition, or do we misunderstand the literature, etc. The philosophical implications are many.
118. bloodnfire - 10/20/2000 4:36:35 PM
DanDillon. Your Message # 16 ". You've reached a great and immeasurable impasse here. But don't let me discourage you from asking. Over and over and over again. That's all the fun. And yes, it passes the time.".
You might be right, but are you saying that you personally have no answers to Pelle's questions ?
119. Jenerator - 10/20/2000 4:40:45 PM
Angel,
Re Message # 115
I completely agree with this. If we dig even deeper into the literal view of the evolutionsist, we will continue to uncover the whys until we are at the same dead-end as the theist. That is we don't know why.
120. JayAckroyd - 10/20/2000 4:42:34 PM
A-5
"If you are to turn the question over to an ardent atheistic evolutionist, they can only answer on one level -- the literal level. Because there is no higher purpose inherent .... It is because it can be. That is an ultimate dead end to the query of 'why' because it offers no armature to build upon. "
We assert something more strongly than that. We claim, as mg says the existentialists do, that the "higher purpose" question is ill-formed. People are no different from lemurs or rats or cockroaches in any supernatural sense. We are equally subject to the laws of nature as any other species. Likewise, we are equally subject to the laws of nature as individuals. When we die, we die. We have a general urge to engage in activity that keeps us alive and procreating. That urge by all the life forms that have ever been or will ever be.
121. Angel-Five - 10/20/2000 4:46:31 PM
Jay: Eggs-actly.
Jenerator:
Sorry, no, you missed my point. The theist retains the notion that 'why' is a valid concept to apply to the question of existence. The atheist does not. The atheist claims that this whole 'why' construction is false, an artifact of religious belief.
122. mgleason - 10/20/2000 4:48:01 PM
The fatal flaw in Existentialism is the moral imperative to struggle against the absurd, to acknowledge that there are no absolutes (or that they are not within our grasp even if they do exist), but behave as though did exist.
The question 'why' cannot be answered. We stand naked before the absurd, prisoners of our own free will, unwitting and unwilling captains of our fate. It's a terrifying world when there is no authority but your own.
123. Angel-Five - 10/20/2000 4:48:15 PM
To quote a modern metaphysicist... 'Why does it happen? Because it happens. Roll the bones.'
124. mgleason - 10/20/2000 4:49:58 PM
Sorry, that should be 'behave as though they did exist' in the first paragraph of my previous post.
125. JayAckroyd - 10/20/2000 4:52:09 PM
Here's another problem with the why question.
The universe has existed for 12 billion years, or so. Life has existed for three and half billion years, or so. Mammals have been around a quarter million years.
Lucy showed up six million years ago. There were various homos, but sapiens have been around for more than 600,000 years. Agriculture was developed about 10,000 years ago, and they spawned the flawed people religions that dominate the world today.
Now lemme get this straight. There is a reason around all this tied to people?!?! The culture that introduced these religions, purported to answer the why question with "So man could conquer the earth." The universe exists so that man could discover this kind of God? Does anyone believe that people will be living, as they currently live, for 600,000 more years? If there is a reason for the universe tied to life, the cockroach makes a stronger case.
There is no meaningful "why" here.
126. SnowOwl - 10/20/2000 4:52:17 PM
Jay
We assert something more strongly than that. We claim, as mg says the existentialists do, that the "higher purpose" question is ill-formed. People are no different from lemurs or rats or cockroaches in any supernatural sense. We are equally subject to the laws of nature as any other species. Likewise, we are equally subject to the laws of nature as individuals. When we die, we die. We have a general urge to engage in activity that keeps us alive and procreating. That urge by all the life forms that have ever been or will ever be.
That about sums up my beliefs. If there is a "why" for me as an individual the answer is that I am here to pass on my genes.
127. SnowOwl - 10/20/2000 4:53:08 PM
toys?
128. Angel-Five - 10/20/2000 4:55:19 PM
You're here to also pass on italics, apparently.
129. bloodnfire - 10/20/2000 4:58:55 PM
Which apparently you are doing admirably well SnowOwl, with at least two professional children (he said without in any way meaning to be patronizing).
130. Jenerator - 10/20/2000 5:01:39 PM
Angel,
"The theist retains the notion that 'why' is a valid concept to apply to the question of existence. The atheist does not. The atheist claims that this whole 'why' construction is false, an artifact of religious belief."
Well, maybe I should have said that with the theist's "Why are we here?" and the atheist's "How did we get here?", the answer will be the same. We don't know.
131. bloodnfire - 10/20/2000 5:04:37 PM
Jen. I'm not sure I understand you. You certainly know why we're here do you not ?
132. JayAckroyd - 10/20/2000 5:04:44 PM
So you have the difficulty that the religions you assert as universal, with a monotheistic, perhaps multi-aspected Creator, only having been part of human life for less than one percent of the time that there have been humans.
Now you have the difficulty of all those other homos: erectus, robustus, neanderthalis and so forth.
You got the upright, bipedal, pre-homo primates.
Did this god exist for all the homo sapiens? Did they ask--and they did converse and have social interactions just like we did--these questions about deep faith in a single god? Probably not--we know animists today, and they don't ask those questions. The precursors to the Yahwist god we see in the pentateuch don't seem to have asked those questions. The egyptians covered their bets. And then you gotta worry about when humans acquired souls, and the purpose of the universe (creating man to conquer the earth) was complete. Was God's purpose fulfilled when erectus showed up? Or lucy? Or maybe the first chimp? Why (here's that why again) would God pick a particular species of the homo genus?
IAC, in this little 6000 year time slice, we know "why." If you're a Christian, it's a 2000 year slice, a Muslim 1300 or so. A Mormon, less that 200. It shows real faith for a Mormon to put 200 years worth of wisdom up against 600,000 plus.
133. Jenerator - 10/20/2000 5:06:55 PM
[Bloodnfire, not completely, there's always a "why" to come back to. I believe that God created us because it was in His pleasure to do so- but why?]
134. Raskolnikov - 10/20/2000 5:07:18 PM
Didn't Douglas Adams conceive of something called the infinite perspective vortex, which showed you just how insignificant you were by putting the entire universe in a box with you?
The idea that the Andromeda Galaxy, or some quasars 10 billion light years away, are here for our purposes is just... odd.
135. JayAckroyd - 10/20/2000 5:07:51 PM
Jen--
The atheist knows as well as can be currently known how we got here. He rejects the theist's question as as meaningless as "Why are there marsupial grazers in Australia and placental grazers in Europe?"
It just happened that way. There are, of course, proximate causes we can talk about, but there is no prime cause that says "Here there will be placental mammals. Here there will be marsupials."
Likewise, people.
136. bloodnfire - 10/20/2000 5:09:10 PM
Maria. your Message # 32. "I can understand the estrangement felt by your friend, because even from the POV of a staunch believer, Allah seems to be a very distant figure, and salvation a very chancy matter:".
Would you be willing to discuss this briefly in the Religion thread ?
I'll wait over there...
137. mgleason - 10/20/2000 5:09:30 PM
From a philosophical perspective, the problem with Existentialism is that it attempts to construct a rational framework around the irrational. We may not ask the question 'why?' but are impelled to act, regardless, with no authority but our own upon which to rely. Much as I admire Existentialism and its basic premises, to me this moral imperative is a cheap way of getting around the only logical outcome for beings-in-the-absurd: suicide.
Since 'essence' is unknowable, 'existence' becomes the sole focus. The attempt to create a moral framework from which to operate in the face of the absurd is doomed to failure.
138. JayAckroyd - 10/20/2000 5:15:14 PM
134
Right ho, rask. Now, of course, the Yahwist religions (and the agriculturalist eastern religions) were developed in the context of a world that BEGAN with agriculture. So the entire history of the universe, to the people who wrote the pentateuch was conflicts between expanding societies, made possible by pastoralism and cultivation. In that context, this god made sense. There was nothing before.
Now that know how much human history was before, and how old and enormous the universe is, the idea that the God created the world for man using this particular technique is decidedly odd.
139. Angel-Five - 10/20/2000 5:16:59 PM
I disagree that the only logical outcome for a rational being in an irrational world is to kill him/herself. We're able to enjoy the world regardless of whether we feel we can understand how it works.
140. JayAckroyd - 10/20/2000 5:20:36 PM
137
No, the fact that there is reason for existence deeper than a desire for life and procreation is not a reason for suicide. My dog has no deeper reason for living than dinner and companionship. She's not suicidal.
The idea that your consciousness may end has filled some people with despair. It has led some people to conclude that it just can't be so.
But the evidence that it is so is so (I like that)wide and so deep that you have adopt very powerful blinders (like the creationists), or assert that evidence is irrelevant. You have your faith (like more liberal theologians). The latter is a consistent, coherent argument. It's just a little thin, and relies entirely on either introspection(if you have a personal spirtual revelation) or on authority.
141. bloodnfire - 10/20/2000 5:21:11 PM
I agree AngelFive. One issue I think is how we learn to deal with the pain. Whether that's why, in dispair, we turn to the metaphysical or conversely why the Metaphysical revealed Himself (or Itself) to us, is a matter of personal persuasion, would you agree ?
142. JayAckroyd - 10/20/2000 5:22:49 PM
141
is right.
But what is the source of the pain? Have people always suffered it?
143. Jenerator - 10/20/2000 5:24:15 PM
One book I'm reading states that since God has been replaced with a secular desire for fulfillment, people are increasingly unsure as to who they are and their reason for being. Therefore, the drive for self-knowledge has increased and the actually understanding of identity has decreased.
144. Jenerator - 10/20/2000 5:25:02 PM
actual understanding
145. Angel-Five - 10/20/2000 5:26:49 PM
Not at all. It's a product of your environment as much as your own 'personal persuasion'.
146. JayAckroyd - 10/20/2000 5:28:37 PM
Jen-
You're saying that people are feeling lost without boundaries. As in the Grand Inquisitor section of the Brothers Karamazov (where the GI tells Christ that people don't want truth and freedom. They want bread.), you see the role of religion in, at least for these people, as defining the space of their lives.
147. JayAckroyd - 10/20/2000 5:29:14 PM
Forgot to add, "Is that right?"
Is that right?
148. Jenerator - 10/20/2000 5:30:23 PM
That's another book I need to read Jay!
149. Angel-Five - 10/20/2000 5:35:41 PM
It's important to realize something here, in a manner that will likely seem so evident at first to be silly, but nevertheless bears deeply on the subject at hand.
There are five major world religions -- Buddhism, Christianity, Islam, Hinduism and arguably Judaism. If these are all religions that one's personal persuasion and personal preference of logic can lead them to, you would expect to find a heterogeneous mix everywhere you go. But religions inevitably cluster in pockets where they are commingled with one another and tend toward greater and greater homogeneity as you move away from the lines where cultures intersect.
Although one can convincingly argue that the genesis of a religion and its basic theology will be heavily influenced by the environment in which the religions' founders and first thinkers find themselves, and moreover that the clime of a region will somewhat influence the style of religion they adopt, still a careful examination of the geography and demography of religion shows us that you can't attribute religion to clime alone.
Clearly, then, there are other pressing reasons why people adopt their beliefs.
150. JayAckroyd - 10/20/2000 5:37:31 PM
It's a great book. But that scene stands alone very nicely. Alyosha is the sweet, pious brother. Ivan is a rationalist. (The third brother, Dmitri, is a hedonist.) The GI is Ivan's story.
151. mgleason - 10/20/2000 5:47:56 PM
Acknowledgement of the absurd, the irrational, logically involves the cessation of a search for meaning of any kind. If there is no point to life, why continue?
Existentialism tries to get around this by the creation of its moral imperative to struggle against the absurd, and in so doing define our own existence. There is absolutely no logical foundation for this.
152. Angel-Five - 10/20/2000 5:48:55 PM
You can sum up those other pressing reasons succinctly; ignorance of other creeds, societal pressure, and above all else the fact that they were indoctrinated into the faith by their family or friends. This is exactly why you find Christians who follow a god that's much closer to a Buddhist ideal or a Hindu or Islamic ideal than to the Christian ideal, and vice versa. Their own temperments, beliefs, and so on are much more fitting for other creeds but because they're set in one path they rarely leave it and instead sort of shoehorn it and size it to fit what they need.
153. Angel-Five - 10/20/2000 5:49:27 PM
Why not continue?
154. Angel-Five - 10/20/2000 5:50:40 PM
I mean, in existentialist thought, it's not as though we have something else we can go do.
155. mgleason - 10/20/2000 5:53:30 PM
If there is no ultimate meaning, why should there even be any type of moral imperative? If our sole purpose is defining our own existence against the eternal absurd, why bother?
156. JayAckroyd - 10/20/2000 5:55:28 PM
"I can't go on like this."
"That's what you think."
--Samuel Beckett
157. Jenerator - 10/20/2000 5:56:27 PM
Don't forget the pressing need of inner-conviction that typifies so many people's reason for conversion.
158. mgleason - 10/20/2000 5:56:34 PM
Bravo, Jay!
159. JayAckroyd - 10/20/2000 5:59:05 PM
"If there is no ultimate meaning, why should there even be any type of moral imperative."
There is no moral imperative. I've been in places shortly after a lenghty period of civil disorder. At such times, it becomes clear to a large segment of the population that there really are no rules. It takes a while for social sanctions to get sufficiently well reestablished that order returns.
Religion helps preserve moral behavior because it offers another venue for social sanction, and also delivers spiritual sanctions directly at the believer. And, of course, counsels, and supports, and strengthens the sense of community that allows secular social sanctions to be effective.
160. Jamie R - 10/20/2000 5:59:47 PM
mgleason, why bother with what? I'm not sure I could point to any part of my life that would be worthwhile on the assumption that it is approved by some mysterious god somewhere, but absolutely falls into meaninglessness without that sanction. What does "ultimate meaning" even mean?
161. mgleason - 10/20/2000 6:01:07 PM
I know, Jay. That's why I consider Existentialism's moral imperative an artificial construct which goes against the core system.
162. mgleason - 10/20/2000 6:03:04 PM
Jamie R,
I'm speaking WRT Existentialist thought. 'Ultimate meaning' is defined as a rational plan for human existence.
163. Angel-Five - 10/20/2000 6:03:40 PM
The existence of memes like 'ultimate meaning' is an artifact that carries over from the original loaded question 'why are we here'. Thus, to apply ultimate meaning to an atheistic perspective is sort of like multiplying apples by altarboys. The fact that people would find it necessary to judge their lives by the presence or absence of ultimate meaning is just one more holdover from a theology they have, if they're acknowledging the absence, forsworn.
164. Angel-Five - 10/20/2000 6:05:55 PM
I always thought of Existentialism as, in essence, giving an irrational world the double bird and doing as you will despite its absurdity. The morality of that act, an inner morality derived from a rationalist perspective, doesn't necessarily lend itself to comparison with the lack of that rationality in the outer world.
165. Angel-Five - 10/20/2000 6:06:33 PM
It is, in essence, doing as you Will.
166. mgleason - 10/20/2000 6:18:06 PM
No, Existentialism isn't that at all, due to the artificial construct.
167. Angel-Five - 10/20/2000 6:19:49 PM
Why is the construct artificial?
168. mgleason - 10/20/2000 6:23:09 PM
The creation of a moral imperative in the face of the absurd is the ultimate artificial construct.
169. Angel-Five - 10/20/2000 6:23:54 PM
We may not ask the question 'why?' but are impelled to act, regardless, with no authority but our own upon which to rely.
This is what I'm getting at. The construct never leaves your mind. If you act rationally and if you derive the 'authority' from your own being, I don't see how it can be imputed to be an artificial construct.
170. Jamie R - 10/20/2000 6:25:33 PM
I was just reading soem Sartre from my little Kaufman existentialist reader the other day (I have no life whatsoever, ya see.) I believe it was a snippet from "Existentialism is a humanism" and he was explaining how when an individual chooses he necessarily and inescapably chooses for all people. I didn't much get the justification for that. It seems like on the one hand they reject any "ultimate" ground for meaning, but on the other hand they suppose that no meaningful action is possible without such a ground, so any choice must carry with it some hypothetical ground to justify it, which must be binding on everyone. It seems like a giant non-sequitur to me.
171. mgleason - 10/20/2000 6:30:35 PM
But why are we impelled to act, to struggle against the absurd? There is no reason to impose rationality on an irrational world, save this made-out-of-whole-cloth imperative.
Existentialism tells us that there is no limit to our free will, yet we must struggle against irrationality to define ourselves. I don't think so. I respect the nihilistic acceptance of the absurd, but not the contrived way around it.
172. mgleason - 10/20/2000 6:31:47 PM
Yes, exactly, Jamie R. It is a contrived system of ethics which has no foundation in anything.
173. Angel-Five - 10/20/2000 6:34:45 PM
But why are we impelled to act, to struggle against the absurd? There is no reason to impose rationality on an irrational world, save this made-out-of-whole-cloth imperative.
What, exactly, are we doing right now?
174. Angel-Five - 10/20/2000 6:36:14 PM
It seems that there is an imperative of some sorts at work. Doesn't it.
175. mgleason - 10/20/2000 6:39:15 PM
We're doing it for the hell of it, not because we must. How can one accept the absurd, yet also accept that one must struggle against it to define oneself? Whatever for?
Embracing the absurd logically leads to total rejection of any imperatives, of any kind.
176. mgleason - 10/20/2000 6:40:42 PM
Speaking existentially, of course.
177. Jenerator - 10/20/2000 6:42:36 PM
The imperative of pleasure, I'd say.
178. Raskolnikov - 10/20/2000 6:43:59 PM
" How can one accept the absurd, yet also accept that one must struggle against it to define oneself?"
Well, for one, I don't accept that life is meaningless. My biological and emotional drives are good enough for me. And why would you choose to define yourself by a struggle against absurdity any more than you would define yourself by a struggle against belly button lint?
179. Raskolnikov - 10/20/2000 6:46:11 PM
Basically, I guess this shows that I just tend to get puzzled by existentialist nihilism, and wonder why they just don't get laid, watch a movie, catch a football game, or post in online discussion forums.
180. Angel-Five - 10/20/2000 6:46:17 PM
Nononono. What drives the Existentialists to their philosophy? What drives us to, even though we have strong philosophical reasons to doubt the existence of things as we know them, go on naming and classifying and describing interactions? Even though we know that we're just coming up with more and more rarefied self-referential systems and getting farther and farther away from the real world? Why is it that all philosophy didn't grind to a shrieking halt the very instant that Hume showed us that it's all just our perceptions and not the real world?
181. Jenerator - 10/20/2000 6:47:31 PM
yeah, why?
182. Angel-Five - 10/20/2000 6:49:26 PM
The answer's simple -- there is something in us which demands that we frame the environment in a rational means. And it is entirely bound up with our concept of right and wrong. The fact that you'd speak of suicide being the only sensible alternative to a totally absurd world just illustrates the work of that imperative in you.
183. Angel-Five - 10/20/2000 6:50:21 PM
Rask:
Existentialists, if they got laid more often, would agonize a good bit less.
184. Angel-Five - 10/20/2000 6:51:20 PM
rational means = rational way.
185. Jenerator - 10/20/2000 6:53:31 PM
It's all about our pursuit of pleasure.
186. Angel-Five - 10/20/2000 6:54:12 PM
Anyway, this is why I spoke of the existentialist who has come into the requisite crisis between rationality and an absurd world, and manages to get through it, as one who does as they Will.
187. mgleason - 10/20/2000 6:54:20 PM
Exactly! Existentialists recognized the human drive to create order out of disorder, patterns where there are none, and they turned it into a moral imperative so as to derail the logical consequences of embracing the absurd.
There can be no morality in the face of the absurd!
188. Angel-Five - 10/20/2000 6:55:30 PM
Jenerator: Is that why you wear that dress? An illustration of the principle, perhaps?
IAC that's an interesting statement. Would you equate pleasure with, say, Hobbesian felicity?
189. mgleason - 10/20/2000 6:58:40 PM
Anyway, this is why I spoke of the existentialist who has come into the requisite crisis between rationality and an absurd world, and manages to get through it, as one who does as they Will.
That's not Existentialism. It is to Existentialist thought what polytheism is to Islam.
190. Jamie R - 10/20/2000 7:00:46 PM
I'm sure evpsych will have something to say about why our minds are geared towards rationalizing, but on a conscious level we do all that classifying etc. because Hume was basically wrong. The universe certainly does have a logical structure, which we can describe with stunning accuracy mathematically and otherwise, and doing so helps us achieve our own goals. Linguistic analytic games aside, the reason it's brown bears and not bearish browns is 'cause bears can kill you if you take too long to recognize them. Bears even kill causality denying philosophers.
191. Angel-Five - 10/20/2000 7:01:24 PM
Ok, both are imperatives. What could qualify them as moral imperatives? An internally realized morality based upon the notion that the world is full of rational actors. I think the Existentialists made the jump to saying that if it made it easier on everyone else, it was moral. Maybe I'm wrong about that. But they also realized that no man was an island.
192. Angel-Five - 10/20/2000 7:02:31 PM
Maria: Please explain that last.
193. mgleason - 10/20/2000 7:05:36 PM
That's a long way away from the cognitive dissonance of embracing the absurd and declaring it morally imperative to struggle against it. Remember, even if there are no absolutes, we are to act as if there were.
194. mgleason - 10/20/2000 7:08:47 PM
Doing as one 'Will' without the Sartrian caveat of acting as though one were acting for all of mankind (the moral imperative of struggling against the absurd, of acting as if absolutes existed) is not Existentialism at all.
It is the same as saying that one can be a polytheistic Muslim - it turns the entire moral framework on its head.
195. Angel-Five - 10/20/2000 7:10:43 PM
Ah, ok. What if the simple act as doing as you Will is to struggle for all mankind?
196. mgleason - 10/20/2000 7:16:47 PM
Ah, but you must do it, you see. Morally speaking, you must act as though there were absolutes. It is not what you Will, but what you Must.
And I say to hell with alla that. If I'm going to embrace the absurd, I'm not going to free myself from one set of shackles only to put on another. What the hell good is it to deny the existence of absolutes only to act as if they existed after all?
197. mgleason - 10/20/2000 7:18:32 PM
I'm off to the flicks, boys and girls. Embrace the absurd!
198. Angel-Five - 10/20/2000 7:22:34 PM
Let me rephrase: What if the simple act of recognizing that you must means that you are doing as you Will? Imagine it as the command that you must act in such a way is that you constantly speak, and the way of your Will is to speak rapid-fire Castilian. You can do both without contradiction.
199. Jenerator - 10/20/2000 7:24:18 PM
Re my red dress.
Yes, it brought me pleasure to wear the dress picked out for me to be in my friend's wedding. I'm glad it brought you pleasure, too.
200. Angel-Five - 10/20/2000 7:24:40 PM
I've really got to start editing.
Imagine the command that you must act as thought it were a command that you constantly speak...
201. Angel-Five - 10/20/2000 7:28:18 PM
Not just me, Jenerator. I'm reliably informed that the picture is used as currency in prison.
Anyway, Hobbesian felicity, yes or no.
202. Jenerator - 10/20/2000 7:35:31 PM
Well, I don't know that all desires are egoistic, but even altruistic intentions have some form of personal reward.
203. Jenerator - 10/20/2000 7:39:21 PM
By the way, why am I not surprised that you have friends in prison?
204. Angel-Five - 10/20/2000 8:11:58 PM
I think you're mistaken about the object of their affection.
205. Angel-Five - 10/20/2000 11:48:18 PM
IAC I'm generally in agreement as far as the Existentialists: I don't buy the 'must', I just see how it might be the case. To me, I think it's a lot more interesting that the Existentialists would be compelled to believe in two opposing viewpoints -- that external reality isn't rational, and that inner rationality must not only exist but come to take its place as a surrogate.
206. JRoth - 10/21/2000 12:09:33 AM
Angel-five read the NYT series on 'buying behavior' which included a piece on the prison economy.
207. bloodnfire - 10/21/2000 6:16:09 AM
JRoth. Could you please provide a 'link' to that series ?
208. theDiva - 10/21/2000 7:01:38 AM
Pelle, #82
How were all of my two posts (which I thought were completely respectful in every sense) on this topic 'intramural Christian'? I was talking about human perception of God. Isn't that the topic? But fine, I'll clam up.
209. JayAckroyd - 10/21/2000 9:51:44 AM
I want to take one more crack at the ill-formed nature of Pelle's question to an atheist.
Asking "why are we here?" is like asking "why is the speed of light 186,000 miles per second?" or "why does the proton weigh what it does?"
In the standard model of quantum mechanics, there are a lot of numbers like this, parameters of the model that are obtained empirically. They could, in principle, have other values. In Smolin's book, he calculates (pages 324 and 325) the odds of the parameters taking on values that would create a universe that would allow people to exist to be 1 in 10^229.
These kinds of calculations were first done by the anthropic principle folks (a good reference is The Anthropic Principle by Barrow and Tipler). In variants of the strong form version of the principle, the answer to the question "why are we here?" is that some entity had to set this up. It's too improbable otherwise.
In the weak form version, the answer is "because we're here." The universe has to be in this improbable state because this highly improbable state is the only one that gives rise to observers. Regardless of the universe creating mechanism, we have to live in a universe like this one because we can only live in a universe like this one.
The first response ultimately begs the question. Especially given the enormity of the universe, the length of time it took for us to show up and the short lifespan of the human species will have wrt to the life span of the universe, the question becomes, very quickly, "why would God do this?" You can of course say "It's mystery." but that just leaves the question open. You can cite scripture, pointing to the special place man has in God's heart, but these anthropomorphic god descriptions seem terribly weak in the face of the complexity and beauty of the purported creation.
210. altitude /w attitude - 10/21/2000 11:30:47 AM
Careful J, you may be breaking the rules for this thread (but I agree with you).
211. altitude /w attitude - 10/21/2000 11:38:44 AM
Consider the absurdity of it. God, who was before the man that is not as old as the world thinks, created it? It is much too improbable. Forget statistics. Forget probability. I am asked to believe there was nothing? God just .... did it? And we got this? A natural world (nature) that has structure, purpose and form, and people with structure and purpose and bad form. From that where did the other gods come from? Did God create them or did people create them to meet there needs?
212. altitude /w attitude - 10/21/2000 11:39:27 AM
Is there any religion without a "god?"
213. Jenerator - 10/21/2000 1:31:48 PM
Buddhism, sometimes.
214. altitude /w attitude - 10/21/2000 1:40:49 PM
If no god, then why buddha?
215. Jenerator - 10/21/2000 1:49:53 PM
For some it's more about getting to know one's self through meditation and a different thought pattern, Buddha being more of a leader than a deity. For others, Buddha is a god.
216. JayAckroyd - 10/21/2000 1:52:48 PM
There are plenty of animist religions. When I was living among the Dinka of the Sudan, there was a guy in the cluster who was called Dak Jur. Jur are spirits, and dak means birds. He was the guy who had some spiritual powers in keeping birds out of the fields.
They had something sorta like a central deity, Nhialic, but the common phrase they used in referring it was "Nhialic ato thin" "X is there." "X" was translated by the italian missionaries who wrote the language text I had as "God." But it could as easily have been a statement about the natural world--a statement of praise for a world where cows exist. (They love their cattle).
Egyptians were polytheistic. The story of Moses is one of casting out totemic, multi-deity systems to replace them with the Yahwist deity.
It's common for the our contemporary flawed-human religions, the ones associated with sedentary agricultural societies, to dismiss these spiritual beliefs as not really counting as religion. I don't see why that would be so.
217. Jenerator - 10/21/2000 1:56:57 PM
Who says they're not religions?
218. JayAckroyd - 10/21/2000 1:57:50 PM
I don't know enough about Zen as it is actually practiced in the east to know whether you're right, Jen. Certainly the material in Zen Flesh, Zen Bones would lead to the conclusion that Zen is a godless religion.
Is samadhi a religious experience? A spritual experience? Is there an underlying belief system you must uphold to attain samadhi that involves something other than your and your apprehension of the world?
If so, and some people can get a similar experience with peyote (note that you can practice zen and never acheive samadhi), does that make taking peyote a religious activity?
219. JayAckroyd - 10/21/2000 1:58:53 PM
awa in 112 said:
'Is there any religion without a "god?"'
220. SnowOwl - 10/21/2000 2:04:42 PM
a/wa
A natural world (nature) that has structure, purpose and form...
What purpose does the natural world have?
221. Angel-Five - 10/21/2000 2:12:18 PM
Zen Buddhism is indeed a religion without a god. Regular Buddhism would have been too if the people had listened to Buddha. I'm not sure if Scientology has a god. There are mystical interpretations of Christianity -- and, for that matter, Satanism -- that hold that there is no god, at least that there is no being that humans cannot equal if they're properly trained in all their abilities and become as gods.
222. JayAckroyd - 10/21/2000 2:15:23 PM
190--Jamie
"I'm sure evpsych will have something to say about why our minds are geared towards rationalizing."
We are obsessed with cause and effect. We impose cause and effect when there clearly is none, as with gambling "systems." We act constantly to influence the outcome of events around us, often in ways that we know to be completely irrational, like Wade Boggs eating chicken on game days, or friends of mine who get honestly upset that I'm putting the hex by predicting that something will go well.
One evopsych explanation I've read is tracking game. People are cursorial hunters, running game down in cooperating packs, rather than screaming and leaping or sprinting and catching. Tracking game requires making complicated inferences from muddled data. Someone who could figure out from looking at the pattern of tracks and debris on a trail how old it was, how large the animal was, its state of health, and so forth, would have a competitive advantage.
Alternatively, chimps and hunter gatherer humans have a complex catalogue of what is good to eat, and when it is good to eat. You need to be able to infer from another fairly complex data stream when it is time to go visit the tree with the pawpaws.
223. altitude /w attitude - 10/21/2000 3:41:12 PM
SnowOwl
I consider the natural world what is there without human intervention. The weather. The forests. The ocean. The rain forests. The deserts. Mountains. Flowers and trees. Animals. That sort of thing. Can you imagine what the earth would look like without people? Provides soil for growth of vegetation, oxygen for life, water to sustain life. It seems the purpose of the natural world is to sustain all life. Raises questions about what the world would be like without human intervention.
224. altitude /w attitude - 10/21/2000 3:44:49 PM
a-5
why aspire to become as gods, or strive to equal something that does not exist?
How is zen buddhism different than buddhism?
225. altitude /w attitude - 10/21/2000 3:59:32 PM
J
I think we are all hunter gatherers. Some track sales to hunt and gather. Some know where all the car junk yards are. Some do yard sales. Some frequent thrift stores. Some know where to scavenge beech nuts, cranberry bogs, or wild raspberries, dandelions for wine and greens, etc. Many are considered pack rats well past the time that it can be blamed on the great depression. Are these behaviours genetically encoded? Is there something at the core of our being that is constantly striving for something?
226. PelleNilsson - 10/21/2000 4:38:02 PM
Jay
< Digresssion>The great traveller Wilfred Thesiger spent a lot of the time with them. His Arabian Sands is unparelleled for an insight into Beduin lifer and ethics. But I suppose you know that< /Digression>.
227. PelleNilsson - 10/21/2000 4:46:53 PM
Them = the Dinkas, lifer = life
228. PelleNilsson - 10/21/2000 4:56:56 PM
As an atheist it is easy to take the high ground and dismiss religion as irrational nonsense. I think that is wrong. We don't know of any culture, past or present, without religion. We know that Man is a rational animal. Hence, religion must have an important function in human society. Or rather "have had". Compared to 200-300 years ago we are clearly in a post-religious era. But still our culture is pervaded by mores emanating from religion. Or are they universal, human mores which can now be expressed in non-religious language?
229. DanDillon - 10/21/2000 6:17:00 PM
[R]eligion must have an important function in human society....
Clearly. To supress, subordinate, and strike fear into masses of otherwise "individuals" with the purpose of controlling, dominating, and directing them toward some unknown, unproven, and intangible "purpose."
Likewise, simony has an important purpose in human society.
230. DanDillon - 10/21/2000 6:18:04 PM
(I trust we share the same definition of "religion" here.)
231. JRoth - 10/21/2000 6:32:26 PM
I've spent some time with Reconstructionist Jews and reading a book by a former Jesuit, Miller, "A Biography of Goad". What I got out of these influences is the possibility that God and Man have each evolved and changed as a result of interactions with each other. This makes sense to me; and I believe it ties out to modern theologies which claim that God needs Man. I'm not sure of the latter point since I think it completely possible that God has given us the instruction manual and we are now left to figure out our mess ourselves. Not even an 800 number.
232. JRoth - 10/21/2000 6:37:59 PM
Sorry, That should be "God, A Biography".
233. JRoth - 10/21/2000 6:47:45 PM
Dan Dillon;
What you describe so blithely may indeed occur. But to admit that our glandular nature occasionally corrupts our religious practices is NOT to say that the original- and widespread- religious impulse is all about power and control. To take an example from the world of mass culture: I recently saw a documentary on Sundance entitled "Better living through Circuitry", which is about elctronic music and the trance episodes its devotees practice. The practices of rhythmic motion and repetition are indistinguishable from Sufi and other mystic practices. This tells me the spiritual impulse, however unaware they might be of its provenance, is alive among adolescent ravers.
234. JayAckroyd - 10/21/2000 7:00:01 PM
Pelle--
That's true if you think that religious belief has nothing to do with trying to understand how the universe works.
IMO, religion has generally been an attempt to explain and understand how the universe works. Newton was a very devout fellow.
You could argue as some creationists have argued, that belief in scientific explanations is itself an expression of faith. That's not an argument without merit (although I don't buy it). In Feyerabend's About Method, he explores in detail the ways in which normal scientific practice violates the precepts that science says it lives by.
However, I really do believe that actually understanding how things work will have the net effect of reducing the importance of the Yahwist and Confucionist authoritarian religions, that they are clearly wrong, that there is no paternal god making rules for us to follow.
There is, at the same time, some kind of spiritual center within many people demand a sense of meaning or place in the world, or the universe. Richard Feynmann (or pretty much any physicist) expresses awe and a deep personal respect for the miraculously complex, beautiful and simple (in terms of the underlying equations) way the universe works.
It's even more moving to have it work without an intelligent agent behind it.
235. DanDillon - 10/21/2000 7:45:49 PM
JRoth,
I find it rather astute of you to pinpoint the primal implulse toward emotional and/or spiritual glee (euphoria?) through electronica. If you want to get right down to it, we might find that newborns are vulnerable to increased heartrates, sweaty brows, and rapid breathing if offered the right stimuli. Your analogy with the sufi dervishes, though, provides a tenuous link to religion, at best. Trances, speaking in tongues, altered states, and the like are best considered fringe elements of some "religious experience," hardly mainstream holy holy holy down boy down.
236. JRoth - 10/22/2000 9:26:27 PM
Jay Ackroyd posts: "IMO, religion has generally been an attempt to explain and understand how the universe works. Newton was a very devout fellow"
Newton was also a devotee of astrology, but I won't hold that against him. But I do differ with your main point: Judaism spends very little time on cosmology, just a few terse sentences in Genesis 1. The rest of Tanakh is spent developing ethical monotheism- more precisely the relations between Man and his fellows and between God and Man.
I accept that medieval Christianity got all mixed up in a dubious cosmology that did great harm to both science and religion. That was the result, of course, of the flawed attempt by Aquinas and others to reconcile Christianity and the Greco-Roman heritage.
237. JRoth - 10/22/2000 9:44:47 PM
Dillon,
I doubt the Sufis are an exception. The major religions with which I am familiar all have aspects or traditions which can be judged mystic or estatic. The range of such expressions in Christianity is well known and spans the snake handling of Appalachian sects to the Flagellants. Judaism has Kabbalah (a scholarly expression) and the ecstatic practices of certain Hasidim. In the East there are the world-obliterating ecstasies of the Hinayanist Sravaka-opposed to the serene contemplation of Bodhisvatta.
This is a large subject. Perhaps I'll summarise by saying that the religious impulse- found across cultures and capable of many manifestations- must be distinguished from the admittedly flawed admisitration by professional religious bureaucrats, many of whom are motivated by glandular aspirations to glory and power.
This religious impulse is, on the levels of practice and motivation, closely allied with other 'spiritual' belief systems.
238. JayAckroyd - 10/22/2000 10:03:15 PM
Jroth,
I agree that religions are often more about governing human behavior than they are about understanding the universe. I hadn't thought of it that way, but I think you're right when you (implicitly) accuse me of being too eurochristiancentric in making my claim.
It is nonetheless true that the Yahwist religions do assert that God created the universe. But, how else? is your point. It is true, a Jew might say, but it's not nearly as important as taking no more than an eye for an eye.
I could quibble here, and say that the topic is metaphysics, which is about understanding the mystical underpinnings of our world, but having done so by saying I wouldn't I'll stop.
So I will face directly the point you raise. What does it mean to say that we need to work out our relationship with God? If God doesn't exist, it's a shuck by the priests to rule us. If God does, why do we need to work out rules that he accepts? Why should rules about human behavior, worked out in a community, need to depend on an outside authority? Why can't people work out rules of ethical behavior without introducing a trump card--"I'm enlightened and God told me so." Is this not a dimunition of human capability?
I guess in some ways I'm harking back to the grand inquisitor passage from the Brothers K. Do we really need stern threats from an omnipotent superdad to treat each other decently? Do our flaws run that deeply?
239. DanDillon - 10/22/2000 10:41:31 PM
JRoth,
I can't help but notice that you've made no real claim to mysticism's mainstreamness. Even William Blake is considered a bit of an eccentric, and shit, co-eds across the country read his verse and study his wood carvings.
240. JRoth - 10/23/2000 12:10:12 AM
J A,
There is a long Jewish tradition of arguing with God and making a case aginst his dictates. The two instances I'll cite are Abraham's negotiations against the destruction of Sodom and Job's insistence that God must be bound by HIS OWN rules of justice. Of course God doesn't agree.... The real point is that humans can have a voice in the actions of God (and hence in the manner and means of the universe). My understanding of Christianity is that it is closer to Islam on this point; subjection to the 'Will of God' Deus Lo Vult?
We need the relationship with God to provide an evolving framework for our relationship with one another. Arguably, the Judeo-Christian history is that of ever larger circles of ethical responsibility. What began as concrete regulations for a desert tribe now encompass ethical responsibilities for 'all people'. Our success in this broadening of ethical reponsibility is uneven but overall it has moved forward. Slavery is passe and we are beginning to extend responsibility to animals. Of course the Buddhists are already there.
I suppose this last, murderous century is indication that we still need some help and encouragement.
241. JRoth - 10/23/2000 12:17:59 AM
Dillon,
Good old Blake. There is a guy who saw things quite intuitively and had the talent to communicate his insights for our edification. But the real point is that every religion has a mystic tradition. In some cases the mystic tradition is repressed by religious administrators (Papacy vs. contemplatives and Cathars). In others the mystic tradition is acknowledged as one of the paths to enlightment (samadhi?)
I harp on this point because the mystic tradition is such a vivid demonstration of a religious/spiritual impulse that practically all of us feel- however dimly and fleetingly.
Were this impulse not to exist I doubt the evil religious administrators could have continued the various con games they have done.
242. Angel-Five - 10/23/2000 4:17:31 PM
I'm rather surprised no one's mentioned the Miner paper. Either you all don't read links or else you're all so fantastically bright that the point's obvious enough to not require any commentary.
I should tell you that that paper had an enormous effect, and then a completely separate enormous and outraged effect, upon the field of anthropology. A lot of scientists misapprehended what Miner was saying.
243. mgleason - 10/23/2000 4:33:28 PM
I thought I'd bookmarked the link for future reading, but I can't find it. Would you post it again, please?
244. Angel-Five - 10/23/2000 4:36:04 PM
Horace Miner's 'Body Ritual Among the Nacirema'
245. mgleason - 10/23/2000 4:56:25 PM
My word! I'm thankful to be Nabuc.
246. PelleNilsson - 10/23/2000 5:01:32 PM
Surely that link must be a send-up of modern body worship?
247. SnowOwl - 10/23/2000 5:21:18 PM
Hahaha!
248. Angel-Five - 10/23/2000 5:59:54 PM
Pelle:
Spell 'Nacirema' backwards. It's not a send up at all, it's an anthropological discussion of NorAm behavior using the sort of terminology and tone that Miner's contemporaries commonly used to describe other societies. What's even more priceless is that when he published his paper, people didn't get it -- and by this I mean anthropologists didn't get it. They were scrambling all over themselves to learn more about Miner, Linton and this tribe of ass-backwards people who apparently lived in their own cultural backyards. When the community abruptly figured out just who Miner was discussing (Linton either wasn't real at all or was some prof that Miner had had in school) there was quite literally hell to pay. What's even better is the reaction you get when you have American college students read this paper. You invariably get some clever sort who even if he doesn't know where the Cree the Arawak and so on ranged, and doesn't see anything suspicious about the name Nacirema, still can recognize satire when he sees it. You also end up getting a bunch of people who are just struck with horror that people live lives of such unscientific stupidity as the Naciremans do. Mind you, there's always types that don't get it at all and then pretend later that they did once it's all 'splained to them. The point was of course that cultural lenses can be a tricky thing to remove.
249. Angel-Five - 10/23/2000 6:35:04 PM
There was an... interesting... craze that caught Americans' fancy not all that long ago. It was the Macarena. Everywhere you looked you saw these whitebread overfed Americans doing this ridiculous dance. The fact that you can substitute 'Nacirema' for 'Macarena' in the song that gave birth to the craze is something that still occasionally causes me to chuckle out loud, which probably says much more about me than the Naciremans which I chuckle at.
250. bloodnfire - 10/23/2000 6:36:36 PM
JRoth. Your Message # 240 "We need the relationship with God to provide an evolving framework for our relationship with one another.
I respectfully agree.
251. altitude /w attitude - 10/24/2000 10:51:27 AM
a-5
Are you (*)?
please speak up.
Or is that the point that this is all so pointless?
252. Angel-Five - 10/24/2000 11:16:38 AM
What on earth does your little symbol mean?
253. altitude /w attitude - 10/24/2000 11:24:23 AM
I was told it means 'speechless.' Any other interpretations?
254. Angel-Five - 10/24/2000 11:30:35 AM
Ah, I think I understand.
Aw/A: Lots of times when people don't want to give something away they put an answer in white font. I put in a link earlier. My white font posts reference that link.
I imagine life in the Mote's been pretty confusing for you if you didn't get the bit about white font. It's there, you just have to actively choose to read it.
255. Angel-Five - 10/24/2000 11:32:51 AM
And, no, I've no other interpretations of your little symbol. Never seen it before but AOL chatroom emoticons never were common in my chosen haunts.
256. Angel-Five - 10/24/2000 11:33:54 AM
And, no, I've no other interpretations of your little symbol. Never seen it before but AOL chatroom emoticons never were common in my chosen haunts.
257. Angel-Five - 10/24/2000 11:36:02 AM
And, no, I've no other interpretations of your little symbol. Never seen it before but AOL chatroom emoticons never were common in my chosen haunts.
258. anomieme - 10/25/2000 8:47:34 PM
Great discussion here. I hope it continues.
Does anyone know anything about "immanation"? I think this is an idea that God pervades the entire universe.
I'm wondering if we start with a supreme creator premise, God (the supreme creator) must first create space and then time, and then fill it with something - himself? Us? Creation must then be an ongoing thing since the next instant in time must be created. This has other implications too, but I'll float this to see if it gains any interest.
259. anomieme - 10/25/2000 9:00:31 PM
"Why is there something instead of nothing?"
The really hard part is to conceive of what "nothing" might be - or might not be. We have absolutely no experience with "nothing".
Nothing may be that than which nothing less can be conceived. Which proves god is nothing since nothing less can be conceived, which would be an inconceiveable and absurd idea to most people.
Okay, I'm embarrassing myself now.....
260. Angel-Five - 10/25/2000 10:22:00 PM
I agree that 'something' and 'nothing' is possibly not the best way to look at it. 'Nothing' as we understand it is a concept limited to space-time. What's on the other side of the Big Bang, or whatever you wish, is unlikely to fit the requisite criteria.
261. anomieme - 10/25/2000 10:34:06 PM
A5: What do you mean...limited to space/time? I ask because I'm not sure if we should include space/time in the creation scenario. If we do, then I have to conclude that we are forever part of the creator and no separation (from the creator) can possibly occur. We are part of the eternal immanation. I'm not assuming big bang or singularities, just whether space/time is a created thing and what the consequences are of that idea.
262. altitude /w attitude - 10/25/2000 10:39:11 PM
a-5
The 'emoticon' as you call it-(*) came out of the mote. I've never been in any other chat room or forum. AOL or otherwise. My experience is limited to being crucified in the mote. 8-D
263. Angel-Five - 10/25/2000 11:19:28 PM
Anomieme:
The concept of 'Nothing' is only understood by humans in the context of spacetime where things occupy discrete locations. 'Nothing' is something that 'Something' can move across and occupy; it is space absent of matter.
This 'Nothing' might be -- and ought to be once you think about it -- totally different from what existed before the Big Bang or Creation.
264. anomieme - 10/26/2000 12:48:59 AM
"This 'Nothing' might be -- and ought to be once you think about it --totally different from what existed before the Big Bang or Creation."
A5: Took me a minute, but I do see what you mean. And if "nothing" is totally different after the creation and is now empty space, you are saying, in effect, that empty space is created. I don't mean you're asserting this as truth, only describing the outcome of the proposition that "nothing" would be totally different.
Okay, so then. I would conclude that if the creator creates the empty space (or any of innumerable possible dimensions, whatever that may mean) in which to place things, it would be impossible for the creator to ever separate itself from the created, since all that is created exists within created space. Therefore, the creator is simply expanding various properties of itself (empty space being one such property), and chooses to do so continually. The "continually" part of this idea, looks to us like "time". Is this making any sense to you at all. I'd really appreciate some validation of the thought process, screwy as the idea may be.
265. Angel-Five - 10/26/2000 12:51:12 AM
Don't see why that has to be the case. Why does a creator have to be bound within the universe?
266. Angel-Five - 10/26/2000 12:52:46 AM
To rephrase: why does a creator have to be a spatial being?
267. cmboyce - 10/26/2000 1:11:08 AM
"This 'Nothing' might be -- and ought to be once you think about it --totally different from what existed before the Big Bang or Creation."
A5, I don't see why this should be; why should not the Big Bang simply be a diastolic action in an expansion-contraction cycle? Space-time, and with it "nothing", as you defined it, would exist before and after, awaiting its fate, which would be to be compressed to the requisite "critical mass" for the next Bang.
And that astrophysicists currently think the universe will perpetually expand means almost nothing [fig.], imo; they change their minds about one thing and another all the time, and one shouldn't be surprised. As Einstein observed, "We know less than one-millionth of everything". The physicist's "singularity" corresponds exactly to the believer's "miracle".
The question "why is there something rather nothing" (where "nothing" means the absence of any "something") is, imo, unanswerable and thus not a legitimate question. All we can know is that the universe is, and proceed from there. The first question then may be epistemological, something on the order of "how much can we know about the universe"?
And I'd like to ask, can we know whether the universe is or is not created? (I'd hold for not, but the only "evidence" I can proffer is eternity, whose reality is (I think) only surmisable.)
268. cmboyce - 10/26/2000 1:13:15 AM
rather than something
269. bloodnfire - 10/26/2000 5:08:07 AM
In fact, AngelFive regarding your #265, "Don't see why that has to be the case. Why does a creator have to be bound within the universe?" In fact, The Book describes Him as "The High and Holy One Who inhabits Eternity", which sounds like a dimension outside of 'Time and Space' to me.
270. PelleNilsson - 10/26/2000 5:42:49 AM
St Augustine and the Big Bangers hold the view that space and time are not eternal qualities but part of the creation. Kant, on the other hand, says that they are congenital concepts of the mind that give us the possibility to create order out of our sensual impressions of reality. Now, if you were a neo-Kantian post-structuralist (such creatures exist) you would say that time and space are constructs of the mind.
271. anomieme - 10/26/2000 9:24:37 AM
A5: Your 265 and 266...
If the creator does not occupy some spatial dimension, then I can't possibly conceive of what properties it might have. I also couldn't possibly conceive of how it would begin the process of creation. This may, of course, say more about my limited ability to concieve than it says about the creator. If a non-spatial creator created something separate from itself, how could we possibly conceive of the properties of the thing, (space, time, or whatever) that separates it?
272. anomieme - 10/26/2000 9:34:39 AM
cmboyce: BTW. I pretty much agree with everything you're saying here and at the beginning of the thread. I'm basically just going through a weird thought process going from the known (being) to see if I can deduce any necessary properties a creator must have - starting with a proposition that things are created, which may be entirely false.
So far, two things occur to me. The creator can not separate itself from what it creates since space is also created. And this lack of separation implies that all things are a part of the creator. Actually 3 things. The third is that time is our perception of the on-going creation since each instant of time is also created.
Gotta get to work.....
273.