The God Beyond Fiction
Some thoughts.
Religion is commonly based on some sacred writings, sacred because the writings are said to contain the wisdom of wise men/women, saints, prophets, and/or God-men. Therefore, religions do not, and cannot, agree. If the Bible says Jesus is the only begotten Son of God, but the Quran says God neither begets nor is begotten, then, at best, followers have no choice but to agree to disagree. At worse, they can have a war to decide who is right.
Religions epistemological method is childish. Mommy or Daddy is the way children decide what is true and what is not. If my Mommy says a politician is golden but your Mommy says the same politician is human crud, then we have no choice but to agree to disagree. At worse, we can have a playground fight to decide who is right. Religions epistemological method is fundamentally the same as the childs epistemological method.
This is the situation we should expect if God does not really exist: different civilizations making up different stories about God. But its also the situation we should expect if God wants to be discovered fresh, by each person: religion gets us started on the path, but eventually we realize its fictional. At that point, we arrive at a fork in the road: atheism lies on one side, a personal search for genuine knowledge and experience of God lies on the other.
Religion is commonly based on some sacred writings, sacred because the writings are said to contain the wisdom of wise men/women, saints, prophets, and/or God-men. Therefore, religions do not, and cannot, agree. If the Bible says Jesus is the only begotten Son of God, but the Quran says God neither begets nor is begotten, then, at best, followers have no choice but to agree to disagree. At worse, they can have a war to decide who is right.
Religions epistemological method is childish. Mommy or Daddy is the way children decide what is true and what is not. If my Mommy says a politician is golden but your Mommy says the same politician is human crud, then we have no choice but to agree to disagree. At worse, we can have a playground fight to decide who is right. Religions epistemological method is fundamentally the same as the childs epistemological method.
This is the situation we should expect if God does not really exist: different civilizations making up different stories about God. But its also the situation we should expect if God wants to be discovered fresh, by each person: religion gets us started on the path, but eventually we realize its fictional. At that point, we arrive at a fork in the road: atheism lies on one side, a personal search for genuine knowledge and experience of God lies on the other.
Comments (127)
Religions do not agree but their prophets do.
If you understand their context and the implicit in their words you'll find only superficial, temporal and cultural differences.
Not really. Religion predates the invention of writing by about 30,000 years. Before writing were oral traditions - stories of origin, stories of heroes, stories of the history of a people and stories of supernatural beings and of life beyond death. In several cultures that could not possibly have had physical contact, there are similar stories of a fall from grace, a loss of innocence and why it all went wrong. There were drawings in caves and on rock-faces. There were dances and ceremonies and offerings of food - or living creatures - to the ancestors, to demons and gods and nature spirits. There were sacred places and places of dread, observances and taboos.
Quoting Art48
The unigod idea is a recent one; the first mention we have of it was floated in Egypt less than 4000 years ago, by Akhenaten - but didn't catch on with anybody much, except the Jews, who spent a few centuries in Egypt and already had a tribal god of their own to identify with Aten.
Quoting Art48
I wish that were true for the majority of religious people.
Was Utu (sumerian sun god) who became Shamesh (Akkadian) not suggested around 6000 BCE. Was Utu not the first ever recorded sungod?
Akhenaten pushed for Aten around 1350 BCE, according to some online stuff.
Although I think you might be right that Akhenaten was the first to push for a sun god as the most powerful god but did he also suggest Aten was the ONLY god that existed, as in monotheism?
Sungod, yes - or probably. Only god, no. He had parents, a wife and kids, as well as colleagues.
Quoting universeness
As far as I recall, yes. With Akhenaten as the only mortal he talked to. You can see why that wouldn't be madly popular with the prisetly caste.
:lol: How human these early gods were! I wonder why? :halo:
Everything you've written here could be said of any philosophy.
What God? You yourself said, correctly, that "religions do not, and cannot, agree", which means that the concept of "God" differs among them. And you confirm this later, by saying "different civilizations making up different stories about God."
We are used, unfortunately, to say "God is or does this and that", "the God", etc., as something (the existence of which is) given or absolute and/or without any reference. (That's why when I bring up the term "God", I use it in one of the following manners: "the Christian God", "the God of the Bible", "a God", "a god", "gods", "a God or Supreme Being", etc.)
Then, I guess you kind of "prove" that God --any kind of God-- doesn't really exist by reductio ad absurdum, i.e. this situation, with all these differences, etc. are a proof or indication that none of these Gods exists. Right, it is the only way to prove that something does not exist when there are no and cannot be proofs that it exists. However, this is a generalization that may not stand for all religions or, more specifically, all the kinds of descriptions of a God. One has to examine all these descriptions and prove them fallacious, imaginary, etc. Yet, one needs not even do that. The proof of the existence of something lies with the one who claims its existence. There's no meaning for me to try prove that there is no angel standing at the top of the church if I don't see any and do not believe that there can be any. Whoever sees that angel is responsible for proving it.
And such a proof --a generally accepted proof, independent of religion-- remains to be given! :smile:
***
Addednum:
Re: "Whoever sees that angel is responsible for proving it." For proving that there is indeed an angel standing there.
Of course they were human. They were characters in the stories told by humans. The gods of giraffes would have long necks and, if Montesquieu was any judge, the gods of triangles would have three sides. However, the earliest supernatural entities in folklore are nature spirits - weather phenomena, bodies of water, trees and animals.
Don't blink!
:up:
I can do that. I have practiced it a lot!
There are more roads at that intersection than just those two. There's also "I'm tired of all this, let's do something else". Possibly others as well.
The idea is that there is a reality that deserves to be called "God" and the human civilizations have made several childish, erroneous attempts to describe that reality.
Wishful thinking. Joseph Smith and The Buddha had little in common.
Don't even mate. Com' on
The idea that prophets agreed on some underlying truth works right up until you look at what they actually said. The idea comes, I suppose, from James' Varieties of religious experience, which ends in aporia rather than agreement.
Any agreement amongst the prophets is found only in their silence.
:smirk:
Yes, Philosophy can be done badly. Some folk do treat the texts as "sacred" writings. Some of philosophy is tribal.
Is that the only way to do philosophy? Is it the right way? Are there alternatives?
Childish
Quoting Banno
The other way around is the truth. When you actually learn what they said, you understand they were saying the same thing.
Then you will have no trouble setting out what it is they say, that is shared.
Go one, then.
Are you into interfaith?
It is childish to put Smith and Buddha on the same category.
Yes, pretty much:
"Guilty, guilty, guilty! It's all your fault!"
Im not sure what that means.
Interfaith is a progressive form of religion where the differences between Christianity (including all it's sects), Judaism, and Islam are downplayed to focus instead in their similarities. I guess in principle it would extend to other religions. Those are just the ones that show up most significantly for Americans.
Who counts as a legitimate prophet and how do we tell the difference?
I see. How did you come to be awakened?
Seems unlikely to work. How do we test that people share the same sense of rationality, insight and experience? We can find people who attest to the work of Joseph Smith and Bahá?u'lláh, with equal dedication, sincerity, reasoning, experience. Or Mohammad and Guru Nanak, or... And then there's the issue of how these prophets are interpreted. How do we ascertain what understanding is reasonable and makes use of the right insight and experiences?
Right, but it takes one to know one.
Fair enough. I will not say that I have gnosis of them but only intuition and the extent of my current understanding.
I see. :smile:
I agree.
Hence
Quoting TheMadMan
is problematic.
Worshiping takes on a whole new dimension.
The message of biblical prophets. Their god can do no wrong, so if something is wrong, it must be down to the sinners. The god listens to prayers, so if you suffer unjustly, it must be because the petitioner's faith failed a test.
Other kinds of prophet may have had different messages - but then the "underlying truth" is obscure.
I personally would disregard most so-called prophet. But that's just my take on them.
Hmm. So, the situation we should expect if God does not exist is, also, the situation we should expect if God does exist? He would have to exist, I suppose, if he "wants to be discovered." Odd how the failure of religion to convince us God exists somehow establishes that he not only exists, but wants us to believe he does.
Many people wonder what happens after death.
If prophets agree about what happens after death, please enlighten us as to what they agree on.
(You can't do it.)
This is a very slow conversation.
No, I'm saying that they do not say the same thing.
Quoting TheMadMan
Ah, only the True Scots prophets?
Would a genuine search exclude atheism from the very beginning?
Or better, why is the fork here constructed as between atheism and a personal god with wants and needs? What about agnosticism, pantheism, animism, paganism and so on? It's more like, on comming out from under the guidance of mummy and daddy, one beholds a vast open vista rather than a fork in the road.
I solve that problem by disregarding all of them, without fear or favour.
That's a good point. Maybe if it is a fork, it's one with multiple prongs - a veritable junction of possibilities rather than a banal bifurcation....
Quoting TheMadMan
All religions canonize the same superstition.
This is certainly more plausible. But again, I wll have to ask "What reality?"
It looks like we have here another assumption, taking as given that there is such a reality. Yet, this has never been proven to be true. At best, one can consider it as something logical. Which means, probable. But not a fact.
There's of course the case of the Higgs boson which somethimes is called "God particle". I don't know though if it qualifies for what people have in mind when they think about "God". :smile:
You ask me to show you something and then you say "(You can't do it.)".
I'll not bother arguing with someone who has completely made up their mind.
I'm not talking about religions.
Why not do it for the benefit of others who will read your post?
You can't do it because "prophets" disagree, about what happens after death and other things.
I've seen the idea that all religions (if followed far enough) eventually lead to the same place (God) because at some point, the person begins to follow God, not the religion. This is the "personal search for genuine knowledge and experience of God" referenced in the original post.
In this sense, it can be said that all religions ultimately agree, or ultimately lead to the same place.
But that's quite different than saying all prophets agree.
Another view, would be all "genuine" prophets experience the same Reality, but they express their experience differently, and so sometimes may disagree. However, "genuine" makes this statement tautological.
Those poor ancients. They just didn't understand the lights in the sky or why fire, flood, pestilence and almost every creature outside the caves that made really scary growl and hssssss noises in the night, seemed to want to kill them. :scream: Inventing some superhero protectors seems logical but for such notions to still be flourishing now is rather embarrassing, for the human race.
Carl Sagan in his book 'The Dragons of Eden,' wrote that babies instinctively react to sounds such as 'shhhhhhh' and 'psssssssssssst,' and can become quiet, as these sounds were used by early humans to warn their fellows that danger was nearby!
But why do you call it disagreement when they experience the same reality? Their agreement is beyond the words and that's what agreement is. I always surprised how much people cling to words.
I took that to mean that the sayings and/or writings of prophets agree with each other, which I don't believe.
But if you mean they experience the same reality, that's a different issue.
So, maybe you and I can agree that all "genuine" prophets experience the same Reality, but they express their experience differently, and so sometimes may disagree.
There is some distinction between 'ancient civilizations' and 'tribal cultures', and again between 'prehistoric humans' and 'transitional hominids'. They were never so simple and ignorant as the standard depiction.
As to babies, the instinct to obey their species "quiet!" command goes way back before humans. Quail chicks huddle down in silence while their mother distracts a predator; fawns know to do the same; feral kittens, as soon as they can walk, scatter and hide under something on their mother's command - two weeks later, they do it on their own, when they identify a potential danger.
Natural phenomena, weather, hazards to health and safety didn't suddenly materialize in the world with the advent of H sapiens. We evolved in this world, surrounded by these dangers, adapted over 3 billion years to coping with them.
Quoting TheMadMan
I didn't have a problem to solve - at least, no problem in my life has ever involved prophets or prophecy.
Quoting Art48
I have yet to see this demonstrated. What is that "place" the back-tracker finds? The source of all religion? I have heard "God" - with a big G, as if it were a name - touted as the fount of supernatural belief, but all the early religions I know of had multiple deities and otherworldly beings. The only common - only common, not universal - threads I'm aware of are origin stories, hero quest and redemption stories and stories about the loss of innocence. Before that, there may have been a uniquely human sentiments of loss, wishful thinking, awe and wonder that come with the big brain, but that's untraceable, as it predates rock art.
Quoting Art48
Then, how can you know what reality - or even Reality, though I don't understand the need for a capital - they experience.... assuming you can identify genuine prophets in the first place.
Ofc that's what I mean.
It is silly saying that they agree merely verbally.
Clear example Buddha says no-god, Jesus says God.
Buddha says no self, Hinduism says Atman.
When it comes to the ultimate one should attend to the implicit.
We are all prophets, then, partaking of the same reality, describing it each in a different way.
The most genuine prophets don't communicate ta all: they have pure, direct, inexplicable experience.
Why is their disagreement cause for such alarm? The pages of this forum are filled with disagreement.
Quoting Art48
You might say there is a foundational belief the faithful adhere to that the unfaithful do not, but you can't then say that the theology that follows is not subject to criticism and debate within the particular ideology. While you may find some particularly fundamentalist belief system that relies upon one or a small number of prophets to decree what is right and wrong, that doesn't describe religion generally, but just some particular ones.
The point being that you're rejecting religions that insist there is one simple reading of a particular sacred work and that it is not subject to debate or interpretation, but that criticism only works insofar as you choose your religions to criticize.
What epistemology do you use to determine morality? I would suspect it is not the scientific method. I ask because it is very likely that the method you use varies little from the ones used by religious systems, which, as you note, is reliance upon historical wisdom.
Quoting Art48
The other option is to acknowledge that you're not the first to realize this and try to figure out how a rational, non-deluded person could resolve this. Otherwise, you posit yourself as a special someone who was able to see the emperor wears no clothes where others could not.
So, if I'm Christian (and I'm not), I would have to admit it seems that my belief did not come from an exploration of all religions, and by the force of logic, I fell upon Christianity. I would have to acknowledge the incredibly strong correlation between the belief of my family, my community, and my larger society and my beliefs. That is, is seems Christians beget Christians and Muslims beget Muslims. So, if I'm that honest, I must take the next step and ask why I insist upon Christianity's myths and not Islam's. The reason is likely that it comes to me with a certain credibility that I am willing to take seriously (where I am not willing to take others so seriously), and from that, more significant truths can be found. Will all the truths found from Christianity ultimately mirror those of Islam? Doubtful. The question though isn't whether I'm exploring trying to convince others who disbelieve, but it's whether I'm exploring trying to find what resonates with me, which then must allow me the ability to reject those conclusions in conflict with my other beliefs.
What is going here is not a whole lot different than what you probably do when reading one philosopher or another. Maybe your views are closely aligned with Kant's, so much so that you declare yourself a Kantian, read Kant's works closely, debate Kant, find subtleties within his writings that you insist you better understand than others, etc. And, occasionally you realize that what he just said was bullshit, so you reject it, but you're still a Kantian.
And what makes Kant so believable and credible? It's not the scientific method to be sure, but it's some other epistemological method being employed, but it's not the sort of epistemology you described in your OP, which is that you see Kant as your parent who tells you what to do. Maybe there is someone who actually uncritically accepts everything Kant says, but that's not an interesting person to speak to Kant about, and it doesn't give rise to a reasonable argument that Kantians are like uncritical children. In fact, I would suspect a Kantian to be the opposite of uncritical, but to be of a philosophical mindset, else he'd be doing something other than reading Kant..
Quoting Art48
You miss a key distinction between fiction and fraud. If you read A Christmas Carol and your primary criticism is that you've searched the world over and could find no Ebenezer Scrooge or Tiny Tim, I don't think you followed the purpose of the story. It is no doubt fiction. That you decided to treat it as a non-fiction narrative is your misstep. It can only be considered a fraud if you personally start with the notion that it attempted to take itself literally.
If you want to criticize those religions that do that, have at it, but that would be a criticism of certain religions and not of religion generally. That leaves open the possibility of accepting religion, but denying the very simple criticisms you assert in the OP.
The words don't make a prophet so not all are prophets, that's obvious.
Quoting Vera Mont
Those are the only prophets, not just most genuine.
Direct experience comes first, then they attempt to express the inexpressible and because of the differences of time and space they seem to disagree to the casual.
Good. That means nobody needs to listen to anybody, because only those who do not speak speak truth; truth is silence.
Yes, I like that! It's just mystical enough to be spiritual.
Of course not. Of course not. Of course.
I would say my characterization applies to the edifice of philosophy as a whole, especially as practiced here on the forum.
I really like the word "edifice" especially when used in this context.
You write: Why is their disagreement cause for such alarm?
You write: you can't then say that the theology that follows is not subject to criticism and debate within the particular ideology.
You write: you're rejecting religions that insist there is one simple reading of a particular sacred work and that it is not subject to debate or interpretation
I never said any of those things. Try re-reading the original post.
You write: If you want to criticize those religions that do that, have at it, but that would be a criticism of certain religions and not of religion generally. That leaves open the possibility of accepting religion, but denying the very simple criticisms you assert in the OP.
The fundamental criticism of the OP is religions faulty, childish epistemological method. If you know of a religion which is not based on purported sacred writings, then let me know what it is. Its certainly not Judaism, Christianity, Islam, Buddhism, or the various Hindu religions.
(John Hick (1922-2012) was an influential philosopher of religion and theologian.)
+1
... just the same old superstition.
You need to learn to use the quote function and the tag function.
Basing a religion upon a writing does not suggest the writing has a divine origin, which means it is not inerrant and can be held to criticism, which makes it subject to the same epistemological standards in terms of deriving meaning as would any highly regarded writing.
My epistemology when searching for meaning, morality or really most of anything is whether I have justified belief of it, and it will be considered knowledge if it is true. As I noted, my justification is not that I was told it and therefore I believe it uncritically. As my post indicated, unless one were to adhere to a religion that demanded uncritical acceptance of rules from a divine origin, then they would not be adhering to your strawman created religion.
As I noted, if you want to attack the fundamentalists, you may, but that's an attack on fundamentalism and not on religion. Telling me you don't agree with the Pentecostals is a very different claim than that you don't agree with religion.
If you want to shift the focus to itemizing those religions you find childish, you can provide us that list and we can sort through it, but your approach wasn't intended as that, but it was intended as an attack on religion per se.
And you need to learn how to read a post and respond to what the post actually says.
Secondly, it's worth knowing something about Wilfred Cantwell Smith, who maintained in The Meaning and End of Religion that Westerners have misperceived religious life by making "religion" into one thing. He shows the inadequacy of "religion" to capture the living, endlessly variable ways and traditions in which religious faith presents itself in the world - indeed that it is so hugely diverse that the term 'religion' itself ought to be retired as it is mainly used in the service of stereotyping:
[quote=Wikipedia;https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wilfred_Cantwell_Smith#:~:text=Smith%20examines%20the%20concept] Smith examines the concept of "religion" in the sense of "a systematic religious entity, conceptually identifiable and characterizing a distinct community". He concludes that it is a misleading term for both the practitioners and observers and it should be abandoned in favour of other concepts. The reasons for the objection are that the word 'religion' is "not definable" and its noun form ('religion' as opposed to the adjectival form 'religious') "distorts reality". Moreover, the term is unique to the Western civilization; there are no terms in the languages of other civilizations that correspond to it. Smith also notes that it "begets bigotry" and can "kill piety". He regards the term as having outlived its purpose[/quote]
Finally a non-academic essay Dharma and Religion on how these are fundamentally different (although with some overlaps.)
I have no problem with the idea they are descriptions of different manifestations of the Ultimate. But and as such they do not conflict with one another is obviously wrong. Either Jesus is God or he isnt. Either heaven/hell awaits us, or reincarnation. Etc.
But this is all besides the point, which is that once a religion accepts certain writings as scripture, then the writings cannot be repudiated. For centuries, physicists believed Newtonian Mechanics was accurate and true. But sciences epistemological method allowed them to change their minds and accept Einsteins theories. Have any Christians repudiated any teachings of Jesus as wrong? Not likely. Why? Because religion uses a childish a special person said/wrote this so it must be true" epistemology.
Google child dies because parents religious beliefs Even today, Jesus nonsense description of disease as caused by sin and demons, and his cure of prayer and fasting, is still accepted by Christians. Can any of them say Jesus was wrong? It would save the lives of children. But they cant say it and remain a Christian.
The writings themselves have been understood in many conflicting ways. Unfortunately, many violent struggles have been involved with such differences.
In addition, many writings do not agree with each other in an accepted tradition. There have been convergences through dogma. There have been many divergences as well.
In the distant past, I was employed as a wardsman in the casuality department of a Catholic Hospital, at which my wife was to have life-saving surgery some 30 years later, with extraordinarily skilled surgeons and dedicated nursing staff. According to your argument, that hospital ought not to exist, and nobody working there could describe themselves as Christian, yet it does, and they do.
Quoting Art48
Don't you think that's just the kind of argument that fundamentalism makes?
What you're providing an argument for is your beliefs.
According to your straw-manning of my argument.
My argument is that religions cannot repudiate their sacred texts because of their childish epistemological method. But then can, and do, in cases ignore the writings. That's why the hospital treated your wife with skilled surgeons and nurses, not casting out demons and forgiving her sins.
Here's another case in point. The first page of Revelation describes things which must "soon come too pass". It then describes the Second Coming.
The Second Coming has not come "soon". Revelation is wrong.
But what Christian preacher can admit that simple, obvious fact?
It really doesn't seem fair to judge either of those religions by what we currently read in that much-translated, -edited and -tampered-with book.
Quoting Vera Mont
Well, that made me smile.
Quoting Vera Mont
The supposed words we can't trust.
Seems we's stuck.
You trust whom you choose to trust. It doesn't need to be prophet, verbose or taciturn; it can be a mentor, a guru, bumper-sticker, life-coach, scoutmaster or the woman who taught you to love.
I was simply suggesting reasons why god posits were invented by humans whilst experiencing or just emerging from the wilds. The ancient humans were every bit as smart as we are now but they just didn't have the legacy from science that we do.
It's simply embarrassing to me, that despite the fact that humans are smart and now have a mountain of scientific data, some of the people can still be fooled by theism and/or theosophism, all of the time!
This is just false. It assumes literalism, divine creation of the text, inerrancy in interpretation, and the actual history of change within many religions.
You act as if all Abrahamic religions truly believe the 5 books of Moses were handed down literally at Mt. Sinai by God, written exactly as God said, and the same Iron Age beliefs and rituals exist today.
You also ignore that within even very traditiona theyl often provide a means to reconsider text through their leadership.
You also treat religion as this single unified belief system, as if the Mormons, Unitarians, Orthodox Jews, Catholics, Quakers, Reform Jews, Episcopalians all have consistent methods of interpretation and belief.
Physicists can say Newton was wrong. Can you cite a similar instance in religion?
Of course, religions change. But do they ever repudiate scriptural teachings? No.
Christianity no longer kills "witches". But has it ever said "Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live" (Ex 22:18) is wrong and not of God? Of course, not. It can't because of its epistemological method.
Has it repudiated the chapters of Exodus which give rules for enslaving? No.
Revelation's first chapter (as I noted above) has a false prophecy. Can Christianity acknowledge that? No.
Some Christians take Genesis literally. Others in interpret it metaphorically. None that I'm aware of reject it.
I once made a list of some of the ways scripture is massaged to make it say what is desired. Here it is.
To properly understand the Bible, one must: 1) not read too superficially 2) not read too literally, 3) understand the overall context, 4) refer to the meaning of the original ancient Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek words, 5) understand the meaning of the words in their ancient linguistic/grammatical context, i.e., proper exegesis, 6) understand verses in their larger historical and literary context, i.e., proper hermeneutics, 7) be led by spirit not by mere words (for the letter killeth, but the spirit giveth life 2 Corinthians 3:6)
But saying scripture is just plain wrong is not in the list.
My previous comment regarding your using the functionality of this website was not meant as an insult, but it was so that I would properly be flagged to know you had responded to my post. Take a look at @Wayfarer's recent thread in that regard.
Quoting Art48
Of course they do, and they do it often. Take, for example, the Protestant church, which dramatically changed scriptural interpretation compared to its Catholic predecessor. Reformations are common as are new denominations.
As I've acknowledged, the scientific method is not used to form moral beliefs, religious or otherwise, so the analogy to science is not apt. To the extent we agree that the epistemological definition is that knowledge is a justified true belief, I do think that we alter our religious and moral views and our scientifically held views consistent with the same epistemological definition, meaning that new justifications result in new beliefs.
Quoting Art48
Of course religions can deny claims made in their scripture.
Your comments only point to your lack of knowledge of those denominations that do allow for the complete rejection of certain religious tenants. It is very clear that the Bible has nothing kind to say about homosexuality, yet there are many biblically based religions that are fully embracing of homosexuality, and they have no qualms about admitting that such primitive morals have no place in today's society. The idea that morality evolves and that the Bible can still hold relevance is a view that is consistent with more liberal religions, but they remain religions just as well. This means, as I've noted, that your objections are to certain religions, but not as to religion per se.
You are arguing an immutability of religious views, and, while that is a stated standard that some religions claim to have, a historical analysis usually defeats those claims when you actually see that the religions actually have changed and evolved, even the most orthodox ones.
You are also arguing that there is this monolithic structure called "Religion" that each and every organization under that category must meet in order for it to be a religion. This leads to an impossible effort on your part to explain how Fundamentalist Baptists, for example, are similar to Reform Jews to the extent they both hold to the same interpretative systems.
I know, and it's a natural impulse exercised by many modern people who are familiar with the gods of current institutional religions but unfamiliar with early folklore. The concept of "gods" - the deities we know from Greek and Mesopotamian mythology - comes with civilization, quite late in human social development.
Primitive peoples were surrounded by spirits - the spirits of lake, river, cloud, wind, trees, birds and animals and their own ancestors. Some humans characters became archetypes in the stories: the wise grandmother, the heroic young man, the wanderer, the shaman, the bringer of corn or some other staple crop of a region. Some known human attributes also tended to become personalized: deception, conceit, vanity, gluttony, etc. turned into caricatures embodied in the form of an animal or a named person. These stories were told over and over, passed from one generation to the next, maybe to another tribe, elaborated, embellished, adapted - always changing. What seems constant is that most of the spirits are human scale, fallible, accessible; people can negotiate and reason with them, even fool them sometimes. Even the central, creator spirit is either directly involved the humans' daily activities, correcting wrongs and errors, or watching non-judgmentally.
None of those fanciful notions or stories ever stopped humans - or apes, or crows - from exercising their scientific curiosity, discovering, inventing and exerting their influence on their material environment.
Quoting universeness
That's only because religion and science don't serve the same human needs. Science is the tool used to understand and manipulate matter. Organized religion (which bears only the most superficial resemblance to prehistoric or tribal ritual) is a tool used in support of stratified power structures.
As I mentioned, religions can and do change their teachings, by reinterpreting or ignoring scripture but not by repudiating scriptural verses. If you disagree, can you provide an instance where a religion admitted a scriptural verse was wrong?
Quoting Hanover
What denominations reject scriptural passages? Witches and slavery demonstrate certain scriptural passages can be ignored. But that's not the same as saying the passages are morally wrong and not from God.
Quoting Hanover
It is quite clear to whom? The following verses are from Leviticus:
"You shall not lie with a male as with a woman; it is an abomination." Chapter 18 verse 22
"If a man lies with a male as with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination; they shall surely be put to death; their blood is upon them." Chapter 20 verse 13
Quoting Hanover
I clearly say views are mutable (as in the case of slavery and witches).
I'm beginning to feel our exchanges are a waste of time..
Quoting Hanover
Wow. Another view I do not hold. Let's just agree to disagree, shall we?
Sure, let us start in the beginning, when God created the heavens and the earth, and then he spent the next 6 days creating all of the plants and animals, and then on the 7th day he rested.
That is not accepted by most major religious groups, but instead evolution is.
"[Evolution] is generally accepted by major Christian churches, including the Catholic Church, Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, Episcopal Church (United States), and some other mainline Protestant denominations;[3] virtually all Jewish denominations; and other religious groups that lack a literalist stance concerning some holy scriptures."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Acceptance_of_evolution_by_religious_groups#:~:text=This%20view%20is%20generally%20accepted,lack%20a%20literalist%20stance%20concerning
I could go chapter by chapter if you'd like. It is generally accepted by non-literalist traditions that the Bible is historically inaccurate.
Quoting Art48
Again, many religions do claim that homosexuality prohibitions are morally wrong. Some very much so.
https://religionnews.com/2015/06/30/ranking-churches-on-acceptance-of-homosexuality-plus-their-reactions-to-scotus-ruling/
There are many religions that do not believe the Bible to be the word of God. That view is limited to certain conservative religions.
Quoting Art48
I indicated that it is clear the Bible is unkind to homosexuals, and then you questioned that, and then you offered support for my position. This comment just doesn't make sense by you.
Quoting Art48
My only way of understanding your comments here is that you are not able to deduce the logical implications of your view and you therefore deny saying what you did in fact say. You continuously state what "religion" requires, yet at no point do you divide these various religions into their specific theologies to see whether they are applicable to your criticisms.
So, when I say that you have asserted a monolithic opinion as to religion, even though you haven't expressly admitted that, it's abundantly clear that you do, considering you speak of religion only as a single indivisible belief system that cannot vary from certain essential elements.
When you say "religion can't admit that certain scripture is wrong," or "religion relies upon the concept that the Bible is the word of God," you assert exactly as I've indicated, which is that religion must be X. I'm saying that view is wrong, and then you say you never said you held it, but you did. That you repeatedly cannot identify the logical implications of your view is apparent, but, what I'd propose instead of your just asserting that you did not say something, explain how my conclusions are not logically demanded from what you did say. That would be a meaningful conversation, as opposed to your refusing to understand my comments.
I'm not missing anything here, and I'm not putting words in your mouth. You simply are not following the conversation. That is not meant to be insulting. It's just true.
If you don't tag me, I don't know you've posted, so there's that.
I don't see that your factual inaccuracies are subject to reasonable disagreement, so I don't know if that's what you're asking that I agree to. In any event, if you're going to post an OP, it would seem reasonable that you defend it and not just simply try to declare a truce.
Quoting Hanover
I'm happy to defend what I posted. If you disagree with something in the original post, please cite the specific sentence(s) and we can proceed from there.If you have multiple disagreements, let's do one at a time to avoid confusion. Deal?
This is just a profoundly bad faith post. My every post cites to your posts, often cites to external websites for support, offers my basis for describing your arguments, and yet yours ignore the bulk of my responses with poorly formed "that's not what I said" type comments. You then try to end by saying we should just shake hands and walk away, and now you say we should start entirely over, as if you can't just scroll up and read what we've been talking about.
My reason for not letting go of this and continuing to respond to you is that religion threads on this site have been notoriously low quality, so much so that some have questioned whether they should remain. I'm replacing my former tact of ignoring the nonsense to responding until some sort of meaningful response can be provided.
The very first sentence in your first post in this thread mentions alarm, which does not appear in the original post. I'm happy to defend WHAT I POSTED. If you disagree with something in the original post, please cite the specific sentence(s) and we can proceed from there. If not, then I'll agree to disagree and move on.
You presented an OP, failed to respond, and so now the OP is left far behind where we talk about your inability to post and what you think you can demand in order for a response to be warranted.
Do you imagine that writing predates religion? Let me tell you a different story. I'll call it "Animism". As Mankind developed through spoken language, the awareness of his awareness that we call consciousness, he naturally assumed that everything else was also conscious, because his philosophy professor had told him not to assume he was special. Animals were obviously aware trees were clearly alive, volcanos were angry, the wind was clearly going places, and the rain was always dancing.
Writing simply organised and ossified the relationships, aided by politics, whereby whoever wins the battle has the better gods on their side.
Philosophers now pour scorn on these ideas, as if they have proved that it is not so, and that the universe is dead. And we all lived happily ever after.
:100: :fire: Excellent post.
:clap:
One of the very early Church fathers was named Origen. Amongst his teachings was a much-neglected principle of interpretation of scriptural texts. He taught that the Bible had multiple levels of meaning and that it should be interpreted allegorically as well as literally. He believed that the literal meaning of scripture was the surface level, but that beneath that there were deeper spiritual truths that could be understood through allegory and symbolism. He also believed that the Bible should be interpreted in light of the teachings of the Church and the Tradition of the Fathers.
A similar understanding was held by Augustine a few centuries later. In fact an often-cited passage from one of his books, On the Literal Interpretation of Genesis, can be read word-for-word as a condemnation of fundamentalism:
None of which goes to show that Augustine and Origen were 'right' or that their ideas are not archaic. But you're stereotyping religion as fundamentalist, even though that is a tendency which has been understood and criticized within Christianity itself from the earliest times.
This observation would be universally applicable to all human institutions. Humans are social animals, and hierarchies always arise, which includes political wrangling and control of power.
That is, what you say about religious organizations applies to governmental organizations, and to lesser or greater degrees based upon the authority they wield, things like the APA, the AMA, or other organizations.
But this is to compare apples to oranges when you compare religious organizations to scientific methods. An apt comparison would be to compare either religious organizations to scientific organizations or to compare religious methods to scientific methods.
Personally, I refer to purposes, meaning the purpose of science is to tell me about the world. The purpose of religion is to tell me how to live in it
Once upon a time, when I was a high school junior, a priest had told me "Reason is for living in this world and faith is living for the world-to-come". (Some months later I recognized I'd not only lost "my faith" but also that I'd never had any "faith" whatsoever.)
So, how does that relate to the question: Why has science, which explains so much, not displaced religion?
Quoting Hanover
Exactly what I did. I was comparing neither methodologies nor organizations. I was pointing out that science and religion are not comparable, not in competition with each other, not operating in the same arena.
Quoting Hanover
Yes, I think the invented religions were meant to instruct in the rules of living. That's why I note the distinction between natural grown belief systems of early human cultures and modern incorporated institutions centered on written tenets and formal canon laws.
The problem with allegorical and symbolic interpretations is that they can make a writing mean anything at all. Sam Harris makes the point better than I could in his recipe analogy.
You can google "Sam Harris recipe" for many links which mention it.. Below is a cut and paste from one link for convenience.
Harris walks into a bookstore (Barnes & Noble), and with his eyes closed, randomly grabbed a book and opened it at random. The book was called A taste of Hawaii: New Cooking from the Crossroads of the Pacific.
Heres what Harris wrote in the end-note.
And therein I discovered it as yet uncelebrated mystical treatise. While it appears to be a recipe for seared fish and shrimp cakes with tomato relish, we need only study list of ingredients to know we are in the presence of unrivaled spiritual intelligence. Then I list the ingredients: One snapper fillet cubed, three teaspoons of chopped scallions, salt and freshly ground pepper theres a long list of ingredients.
Then I go through with a mystical interpretation of this recipe. The snapper fillet is the individual himself. You and I, awash in the sea of existence, and here we find it cubed which is to say that our situation must be remedied in all three dimensions of body, mind, and in spirit. They have three teaspoons of chopped scallions, this further partakes of the cubic symmetry suggesting that that which we need add to each level of our being by way of antidote comes likewise in equal proportions. The import of the passage is clear: the body, mind, spirit need to be tended with the same care. Salt and freshly ground black pepper; here we have the perennial invocation of opposites. The white and black aspects of our nature. Both good and evil must be understood if we would fulfil the recipe of spiritual life. Nothing after all can be excluded from the human experience. This seems to be a tantric text. What is more, salt and pepper come to us in the form of grains which is to say that the good and bad qualities are born at the tiniest actions and thus were not in good or evil in general but only by virtue of innumerable moments which color the stream of our being by force of repetition. Then this dash of cayenne pepper: clearly a being of such robust color and flavour signifies the spiritual influence of an enlightened adept. I go on and on and this is all bullshit because its meant to be bullshit.
Here's my own analogy.
Popeye says "I am what I am and that's all that I am." I can interpret this to mean that we should always be without pretense. Pretense and lies and "fake news" seems to rule the media today. Lord Popeye wants us to avoid pretense and lies. He wants us to simply be what we truly are.
So, Popeye is a wise, spiritual sage? Me thinks not. :lol:
This summation by your priest seems incorrect, or at least overly simplified. Not that I'm any sort of Catholic theologian, but just thinking of St. Thomas Aquinas' reliance upon Aristotelian thought and the role reason plays in the knowledge of religious claims, I don't see how what your priest said is consistent with that. That is, Catholics do place a high regard for faith in living in this world, do believe that faith has an important place in knowing truths in this world, and believe the opposite as well, which is that many religious views are supportable through logic. That is, there is a very developed Catholic theology that tries to bridge reason and faith, which isn't at all well described by your good priest.
https://iep.utm.edu/faith-re/#SH4e. Subsection "e" of this article describes Aquinas' thinking on this in considerable detail.
I would also say that the emphasis on the afterlife is particular to Christianity, especially some strands of it, and it's not an ideology existing in all religions, especially Judaism.
Ask a Christian day school student about the significance of heaven and hell, and he can probably recite to you the entire story of the fall of man. Ask a Jewish day school student about heaven and hell and he'll likely not be able to explain much to you, maybe giving you a vague statement that he knows that souls are eternal. Ask him though whether you can eat shellfish, and he'll say "Are you crazy? They don't have gills or scales."
That is just to say there are religions that are very this worldly, and that is not something essential to religious thought. It's also to say that your priest gave someone who deserved a more detailed response a not very researched answer.
Just so. Only, most of those interpretations are not wise; they're just PR for the doctrine of their choice.
Here's what actually happened: Over many centuries, writings were collected and assembled by various groups of churchmen for various reasons.
Interesting article BTW.
They're not allegorical, symbolical, multi-layered mysterical - they're just old stories, added on to the Jesus story as told by early Christians to give the new deity some historic roots and legitimacy. They were collected and maybe some newer ones added on by one or more of the collators, while some old stories were later thrown out, for several reasons - they didn't fit prevailing doctrine, or were objectionable on some moral ground, contradict papal edicts, or are simply badly written fiction. (I have read some apocrypha and it's uphill work.)
IOW - It is a book of stories. Read as you please.
That was the specific question of a prior thread, but less so this one.
But to answer the question the best I can muster, I'd say (1) because they answer very different questions and respond to very different concerns, and, even if they didn't, (2) an organization's survival is not dependent upon its validity.
That is, as to #1, one generally does not look to science to respond to existential or moral questions. I don't know what sort of lab would look like that would search for answers like that.
As to #2, there are in fact plenty of people who continue to use religion beyond questions of meaning, purpose, and defining good and evil. For example, there are the Creationists and what not, who use religion to answer questions best addressed by science. The reason they continue to exist is because politics is the driver for an organization's success, not just the pure power of logic and truth. While science does have wide acceptance, and a certain amount of that acceptance is based upon the fact it seems to work, its acceptance is also attributable to politics and social issues.
There are areas of the world where science is rejected, which speaks to educational issues, but an emphasis on education, as we understand that in the West, happens to be our social norm due our history and political forces. We therefore treat AIDS with pharmaceuticals instead of the shaman's sagebrush.
However, even in our society, you see all sorts of naturopaths and homeopaths that should have been cast away years ago by medical science, but they haven't been. Their survival is a social phenomenon as complex as the society we live in, which means it's not always adherence to the truth that leads to survivability. That is to say, I'm not committed to the longevity of religion as a basis for suggesting it has value in ascertaining truth. A particularly terrible reason to do something is just because that's the way it's always been done.
But all of this is to say the answer to your question that I broke into 2 parts is combined as: Because science has won the political battle in our society that prizes an objective sense of truth over an imparting of meaning into every event, and so we resort to it when we want answers it can address, but don't when it cannot.
This would be different if we lived in a primitive society that valued finding evidence of the miraculous design of God in every event. And this is why I find the biblical criticisms that appear here often inapplicable, where people read these stories and think they're fraudulent, as if the goal of the authors was that of a 20th Century university trained journalist, whose charge was to provide an objective statement of the facts, offering a balanced view from all perspectives.
It is for that difference in worldview, where people aren't looking for objective statements of fact, where they are looking for meaning in everything, that they still insist upon a 6 day creation. They are not educated in modern ways, or, as we often say from our perspective, they are simply not educated.
Nevertheless, that post you quoted and disputed was a direct response to:
Quoting universeness
Quoting Hanover
I didn't have one. I already knew that people tend to resort to magical thinking when they can't control their environment or their lives. And that magical thinking appears in the form of religious observance, augury, water dowsing, gambling, horoscope and palm reading, witch-burning, ritual dancing, human sacrifice and the avoidance of ladders and black cats. On the up-side, it also manifests as art, literature and cosmology.
I had no way to contextualize your question to me as a response to something @universeness said to you in another part of this debate. Quoting Hanover
That was the question I answered, which was the question you asked.
Quick question. If God doesn't exist, why is it such a persistent archetype of human existence throughout our history as a species? Cultures don't naturally develop an innate concept for "microchips" or "a telegraph" lest they develop that specific tech. But they almost definitively have a word for God that has lasted through the ages. Generation to generation. And still persists to this day.
There isn't a single grown adult in the world that doesn't know what the word God means. It may mean something different to each person but it still a meaning. Even atheists have a concept of it for which they reject as an explanation for existence. But rejection requires acceptance of a specific paradigm for which to deny.
Why do all civilizations, isolated from one another at one point in history, persistently evolve a concept of the word "God"? It seems a permanent and permeating concept regardless of what culture or group is examined.
God in that sense is a "stand-in" for that which current knowledge fails to explain or outright disprove. An idea so massive, profound and mysterious, that at best we can just choose to not believe it has significance. Despite having no ultimate proof to that attitude.
If we replace the word "God" with "existence" , would you ask someone "Do you believe in existence?"
Quoting Hanover
Sorry. I didn't realize. You went to a lot of trouble and I should have paid closer attention. Of course, the explanation is very like the more concise one I had previously offered. Here it is, recontextualized:
Quoting Vera Mont
and then:Quoting Hanover
How does this ^^^^ relate to the matter of science failing to replace religion?
Political, professional and social organizations also exist alongside scientific and religious ones, but they all serve different purposes, and none of them is expected to answer the so-called "Big Questions". Only Science and God are expected to do that, and of course, neither one says an intelligible word in response to Who am I?" "Why am I?" "Where's the universe come from?" "What's it all mean?" One provides answers to some fragments of the what, why and how of things; the other provides rules of conduct, accompanied by a stick and a carrot.
Science is a manifestation of human intent. In my view, science aspires to omniscience.
This relates to my discussion with @noAxioms in my thread 'Emergent,' and I don't want to bore everyone by repeating too much of what I typed there.
Quoting Hanover
Can you give me an example of a way that religion tells people how to live, which could not be delivered by irreligious moral humans? What moral exclusivity do you suggest religion or god (in any of its descriptions, ancient or modern,) has, that humans cannot equal?
Science is a manifestation of human aspiration and curiosity. It is not always intentional or directed; its products are not always functional. In horizontal societies, the product is innovation - more efficient ways to obtain and prepare food, travel, build, carry, preserve, keep warm, recover from illness and injury. In vertical societies, fruitful scientific investigation is co-opted by the ruling classes, to serve their own interests. To the extent that incidental improvement in the lot of the underclasses benefits the ruling class or ensures their security, some benefit extends to the society at large. If an innovation or its byproducts are harmful, the underclasses are affected, while ruling class is shielded from the harm.
Similarly, projection and narrative are manifestations of human self-regard and imagination.
In horizontal societies, the product is some form of animism, myth and spontaneous ritual. From mythology, in vertical social organizations, come invented religions, with their formalized rituals and the concepts of worship, obedience, sin, guilt and sacrifice. This internalization of hierarchy and law benefits the ruling classes, who are also shielded from the harmful effects of obedience, humility and self-denial.
Quoting universeness
Science doesn't aspire any more than a wheelbarrow rolls. Humans aspire and push at the limits of their knowledge. Science is a method applied by humans to human endeavours; it is not a supernatural entity with a will of its own.
I'll try my best to answer, but the question goes against a fundamental tenant of my beliefs, which is that I think religion is at its worst when it tries to convince others to be religious. It's an anti-proselytizing view I have, both because I don't believe in it, and "proselytize" is hard enough to spell that I have to keep trying until it's close enough for spell-check to have a clue what I'm trying to say.
That is, if you are a good, upstanding, moral person who has found a meaningful and fulfilling life, then all is well. You don't need to hear from me and you really wouldn't care to. In fact, I would ask that you not attend any religious service. You'd be annoyed and you'd be annoying.
So, now this turns me to telling you why I believe, which would obviously be personal, idiosyncratic, filled I'm sure with psychological insights into all that is Hanover, all of which you'd consider to be oversharing, and none of which would have any application to you. The best I could do is to say that I derive significant meaning from the idea that there is meaning behind everything big and small. You might find that quaint, stupid, curious, or just simply unnecessary, all to which I wouldn't care.
None of my beliefs are based on fear of societal condemnation or of hell. I reject an actual Jesus entirely, which means I couldn't care any less of this worldly or next worldly condemnation. It's for that reason I find these criticisms of religion generally just so many words of presumptuous nonsense, as if the word "religious" means that certain beliefs must follow.
This is to throw back at you my belief system, which is why in the world could you personally care if I adhere to superfluous beliefs if a positive result in maintained, and why feel the need to cast aspersions upon the religious if a pragmatic result is achieved. As I've indicated in previous posts, William James says it better than me.
What I can say is that the aspersions typically cast by the non-religious are about as accurate and impactful as the aspersions typically cast by the religious upon the non-religious, so blame lies at the feet of both sides, but not of mine because I don't buy into the simplistic nonsense of religion and I find the attacks on those simplistic belief systems pure strawman.
Thanks for articulating your perspective. I always find it fascinating to hear from believers who are not led by dogma and dominated by fear.
Can I ask if you consider your reasons to be located in an aesthetic context? It almost seems that you are saying the world appears more captivating, agreeable or attractive when viewed in this way.
The entire paragraph is as follows:
This is the situation we should expect if God does not really exist: different civilizations making up different stories about God. But its also the situation we should expect if God wants to be discovered fresh, by each person: religion gets us started on the path, but eventually we realize its fictional. At that point, we arrive at a fork in the road: atheism lies on one side, a personal search for genuine knowledge and experience of God lies on the other.
To answer your question more directly, I think that something which deserves to be called "God" does exist but that our pictures of God are inaccurate, perhaps inevitably due to human limitations. 2,000 years ago Jesus taught disease was the result of sin and demons, a primitive, incorrect teaching. Today, we understand disease better but not completely. We are still progressing. Maybe it's the same with God - except that primitive "scriptures" hinder the search, in that if someone is already convinced they have the truth (for example, that sin and demons really do cause disease) then they are less like to find truth than someone who is searching.
:
:up: "Excelsior!"
Human aspiration and curiosity are aspects or 'drivers' of human intent and purpose.
If I am curious about what exists up a dark path or how a bird is able to fly, then I might manifest an intent to find out, such intent to find out would be intentional and directed. I think you are hair splitting.
If you are suggesting something like the discovery of penicillin was not 'intended' science as it contained an aspect of 'fortunate happenstance,' then I disagree, as 'scientists,' or the scientific mind is always vigilant (like the photographer who always carries a camera) and therefore always has scientific intent, purpose, driven by insatiable curiosity and aspiration.
I completely agree with you that nefarious people try to control new tech and employ it for their own benefits only, and that this remains a serious problem today, that all humans must be made aware of, and be convinced to help stop this happening, in the future, and that's an on-going battle, that's been going on for generations. But, I don't understand how such issues connect with your suggestion, that science does not contribute to or; Quoting Vera Mont
You seem to slightly contradict yourself with 'neither one says an intelligible word,' and then 'one provides some fragment of the what, why and how of things.' Science has made enormous in-roads into the 'how' and 'what' of things. It also helps a great deal towards the much more difficult 'why' of things.
We can discuss specific examples if you wish, but maybe that's another thread.
Quoting Vera Mont
Do you not agree that your second sentence above, is less true today than it has ever been since the days of the first cities, such as Jericho and Uruk? Even (in the past, very infuential/powerful male based ritualistic groups) like the 'masons,' have lost a great deal of their membership, and the youth of today seem a lot less interested in such groups. Are you suggesting that they are being replaced by equally ritualistic and equally powerful online groups? If so, what would be an example? Animism, myth and ritualistic practices are in global decline, imo.
Quoting Vera Mont
Scientists are humans and they are the harbingers of science. Nothing supernatural was suggested by me. I am not trying to 'objectify' science in the way you suggest. Practicing science and the scientific method, exemplifies human intent and purpose. Science can be demonstrated successfully without one iota of god content. So, for me, there is no god beyond fiction and god cannot inform humans how to live as it does not demonstrate its existence. We ask questions Vera because our goal is omniscience. I think our reach for omniscience will be forever asymptotic, but I am ok with that. What do you think the purpose is, of humans/transhumans, doing science for the next 200 million years, if we still exist, if it is not to reach for omniscience?
Full respect to that!
Quoting Hanover
:lol:
You have the right to believe or have faith in anything you like, and sure, you can ignore any attempts at dissention you might receive as a consequence. BUT, you cannot and will never get away with just exclaiming 'I am what I am and what I am needs no excuses.'
Perhaps no excuses, but no explanations? No justifications? That just won't do!
If you maintain that position, then I for one, will forever try to gnaw at you. :razz:
Why do you feel the need to be so stubborn in your defence of your right to the esoteric?
I am fascinated about why you need to believe in the existence of something which is metaphysical or supernatural or some presence or 'mind' that is, so much more than you are and cares about you or/and us. Is my description of some of the properties of that which you declare faith in, accurate?
What guidelines are communicated to you? What source do you tap, that you consult when you ask yourself a question like 'how should I react to this particular scenario I am now facing in this life?'
You simply type that your faith helps you know how to live. Is that as far as you intend to go with your explanations?
No further details, no example scenario's to explain the details of your thinking processes, not even some propositional logic arguments that employ identity, contradiction and excluded middle?
If that is your position, then to me, it's quite a weak one.
Yes, I know you don't care if that's my opinion. :grin: I am just disappointed, that's all.
Okay. I meant that the curiosity drives investigation, even when it has no particular end in mind. You want to know what's down a dark alley, not because you expect to find something of value there, but just to know - even if it turns out to be dangerous. There is always an element of happenstance in the exercise of curiosity. (How many times have we sat in front of a movie screen, yelling "Don't go in the basement, Stupid!!!")
Quoting universeness
There is no contradiction. Neither science nor religion talk. People talk. They tell you all kinds of things, and some of those things are incorrect, garbled, ambiguous or downright lies.
A methodology helps humans to figure out the what and why of things - that was the operative word: things - not the purpose or identity or destiny of humans, and it's no help at all with moral and ethical questions or the conduct of society.
Quoting universeness
Not at all. It was never true in any city-state. All 'civilizations' are vertical. There are very few examples of horizontal society anymore; even the Innu of northern Canada are half Europeanized. I understand there are still some uncontaminated pockets of native people in the Andes mountains.
Quoting universeness
Masons are irrelevant. That is a very recent past and there are much more sinister cabals now. In all post civilized societies (the last 6000 or so years: stone walls, writing, kings and warlords, legal codes, big tombs for the elite, little wooden markers for the peasants) one to three classes or castes run the whole show and control all the wealth; one or two middle layers carry out the administrative and law-enforcement work and get a decent standard of living; some merchants and artisans do all right; the vast majority work hard for small reward and are mostly scared.
Quoting universeness
Animism has been all but wiped out along with the peoples who practiced it. Myth has been reduced in popular parlance to a synonym of "falsehood". Rituals of all kinds are still widely practiced, however, not only in churches, but in offices, stock markets, public meetings, parliaments, casinos, in households and on the street.
Quoting universeness
Practitioners, not harbingers.
Quoting universeness
I did not suggest objectifying. I accused you - and you are very far from alone in this - anthropomorphizing. It does not speak, desire, intend or do anything.
Quoting universeness
That's one goal - or at least wish - of humans. Some humans. Many others would rather be spared all that learning and just know enough to get by and they resent the eggheads.
Another thing humans want is 'meaning' - they want to be special and significant. The more scientists reveal of the universe, the smaller and less significant people feel. They resent the hell out of that!
Another thing humans want is magic bullets. Somebody more powerful than themselves, who cares for them, protects them and can make their problems go away.
The most important thing humans wish for is immortality.* Most of them are not content with the prospect of living on as a computer program or a cyborg or as a popsicle, waiting for someone to invent a cure for death - they want to be in heaven, young, happy and reunited with the people they've lost. And that's why they won't let go of religion.
(That's somewhat oversimplified, as there are also practical reasons.)
*Best line in Genesis; says it all: [quote] 3:22 And the LORD God said, Behold, the man is become as one of us, to know good and evil: and now, lest he put forth his hand, and take also of the tree of life, and eat, and live for ever. [quote]
The scientific method at its most fundamental level holds to a theory of causation, which, as Hume noted, is not an empirically based conclusion. Kant attempted to remedy that by declaring causation a truth about the world that is known prior to experience (the synthetic a priori). The basis for that remedy was a recognition that we cannot organize our thoughts without such an acceptance. This jettisons though those that organize their thoughts around the teleological. The sun rising because the earth spun is the causative explanation. The sun rising to provide energy to the plants the teleological one. We assert the former without explanation of what the first cause might have been and the second without explanation for the final purpose. That is, we look no further than the surrounding causes to know the cause and we look no further than the surrounding purposes to know the purpose, but, in either instance, we assume much more remote causes and much more remote purposes.
My point here is only to point out a logical basis for a belief in the teleological exists as much as the causative, but, I'm less committed to that reason than the pragmatic implication of the teleological.
When I ask why the sun rises today from a causative perspective, I would be overwhelmed with the response, as those causes go back to the first cause. It was going to happen as it did under such a determined system. (And I do realize that indeterminate events at the quantum level made resulted in some predictive determinacy, which I point out not because it's relevant here, but to proactively respond to the detractors.) But to ask the first cause for having the sun rising would not yield any known answer other than that there must have been because here's the sun today.
So, what would a world look like to someone who instead of simply remarking "every event has a cause" (the causative position), but also "every event has a purpose" (the teleological position). It would sound something like this (from the Reform Jewish prayer book):
"Days pass and the years vanish and we walk sightless among miracles. Lord, fill our eyes with seeing and our minds with knowing. Let there be moments when your Presence, like lightning, illuminates the darkness in which we walk. Help us to see, wherever we gaze, that the bush burns, unconsumed. And we, clay touched by God, will reach out for holiness and exclaim in wonder, How filled with awe is this place and we did not know it.
Start there, and you're left with the idea that there are no coincidences, and that all has meaning. We study the Bible, therefore, not because it is more holy than the blade of grass or more imbued with meaning, but simply that it has been studied more extensively for the purposes of finding meaning, and we benefit from history's most insightful from having previously studied it. The same can be said of the sacred texts of other traditions as well.
Is this aesthetics? In a way I suppose, but the beauty is found in the meaning.
And from this theology, much else follows, which is a trust in the perfection of things and an optimism terribly missing throughout the posts here.
As I've noted also, I'm not primarily concerned with the accuracy of theology, although there is a meaningful ground to hold to it logically, but just as much so with the pragmatic implications, which I have cited to in other posts and alluded to here.
What do you champion about humans Vera? anything?
In my opinion you have already stated that in general, you are a doomster, when it comes to the future.
I get the impression that you think the human race is incapable of producing a society which you yourself would judge as significantly better than any society we have created in the past or present.
Are you a secular naturalist or do you assign some credence to the existence of the 'immaterial?'
I think that our sociopolitical viewpoints, align more that they diverge. We seem to disagree mainly on issues of personal or popular interpretation.
Stuff like:
Quoting Vera Mont
One interpretation would see science simply as a totality of the efforts of all scientists.
Another would see science (as I do,) as a little bit more than that totality or sum of its parts.
The 'totality' of all scientific effort DOES speak towards human questions such as 'why am I.'
An answer such as 'I am, because I can think and I can demonstrate intent and purpose and I can do science and I can affect my surroundings and environment in ways that no other species on Earth can.' To me, this Is a fairly good claim, that any member of our species can claim. Not only claim, but demonstrate. At the moment we can only demonstrate to others in our own species, as other species don't seem to be able to investigate us, in the same way we can investigate them.
You and some others on TPF are free to predict that any future benevolent human/transhuman society, will have to go through many more apocalyptic experiences, before they learn how to create a society which makes living as a human a very positive experience. You can also suggest that it is more likely that we will go extinct and be replaced by some better candidates.
For me, at it's core, that's too close to choosing to live life as a curse. I will never choose to do that, no matter what happens to me! I will fight against living my life as a curse, every moment of every day.
You should watch some online stuff such as offerings from folks like Forrest Valkai.
I believe him when he claims he has hardly had a negative day in his life:
Perhaps realising that the sun does not actually 'rise' at all, EVER! would be a good start.
The Earth turns, and as it does, different parts of it are in the direct path of the sun's radiations.
Is sunrise or sunset more accurate than dayrotation and nightrotation?
But hey, perhaps sunrise and sunset are just more 'romantic,' in the same way that its romantic to think a god loves us.
Yours is a worse delusion in that you actually think you contribute something to this conversation.
Nothing. I don't fight anymore. That doesn't mean I've become deaf and blind and too stupid to make predictions from what has been and what is to what will likely be. Quoting universeness
Not incapable. That's the tragedy. We're capable, and have made some pretty good stabs at it, but we keep getting distracted, sidelined, deluded. It's like, every time we're on the right track, some megalomaniac jingles his car-keys and we follow him off a cliff.
Quoting universeness
I'm not much of an 'ist', though in walking political life, I support the most nearly socialist party available to vote for. "Immaterial" is an elusive concept. There are attributes and ideas, feelings and impressions, imagination and relationships that are not physical, and are hard to trace to a physical cause. As to the supernatural, no, I give it no credence at all.
Quoting universeness
In what language? What has it said? How do you know the voice you heard belonged to a 'totality', and not the man behind the curtain?
Quoting universeness
That's a self-satisfied description, not a reason to exist. And that description could have been spoken by Tonda or any man since.
Quoting universeness
Good for you!
Thank you, I'll need to sit with that for a while.
Quoting Hanover
Yes. That's how I should have put it. That's much better.
Right back at you twinkle!
In whatever language you understand. The man behind the curtain, exemplifies deception.
The 'totality,' of scientific knowledge exemplifies human intent and purpose to pursue the answers to every question we can ask. To me, that's a very honest and honourable goal.
Science has said and continues to say that the universe is knowable and it also confirms that we can do better as we can learn more. No god scripture has EVER offered a scientific formula/equation. There is no god beyond fiction.
Quoting Vera Mont
Not only is it a reason to exist, its a reason to thrive and a reason to celebrate life and being alive.
Any man could have spoken such words, yes, men like Albert Einstein or Carl Sagan or any woman or any gender variant.
Yes, I can see that.
:fire:
Why is magical thinking still a thing with some folks 'discussing philosophy' in the twenty-first century? :smirk:
By chance, Hanover, I just came across the following statement which the eminently learned Padre no doubt had paraphrased:
[quote=Galileo Galilei]The Bible shows the way to go to heaven, not the way the heavens go.[/quote]
:fire: