God Discovered!

[MagickMonkey]

You know there is none? How?

We may as well assume there is none. There's no proof of otherwise. That's not to say there definitely is no purpose in nature. But what's the point of wishful thinking, if you simply don't know? A person may as well act on whatever information they DO have.

We may assume there is none? People find purpose to life all the time. What sort of proof do you need? You think science will discover the 'purpose' particle? Or is meaning not a matter for proofs and evidences? Science can't say there is no purpose. That is not what science is for. That is a personal philosophy that says this, and as such.... where's your evidence? (just saying)

 

 

One my hypothesize endlessly about things whose existence can neither be proven or disproven. When it seems obvious that a concept stems from wild, baseless explanations for natural phenomena, there's no reason to believe those concepts have any basis in reality, and if they do, it would seem to be coincidental. To whatever extent our lives have purpose (and to whatever extent purpose actually exists), it's a purpose we grant to our lives rather than any preexisting purpose we find (unless we adopt the purposes of others). If we can nail down a good definition of purpose, then perhaps science can determine its existence or lack thereof.

[MagickMonkey]

To me, this is spiritual in the sense that it engages the parts of my mind that feel spiritual. At the time I wrote the op, it gave me the same spiritual feelings that religion once gave me.

Very well then, I accept that as valid. I'll put together a good response for discussions points with you later.

 

It seems that in defending my responses, perhaps this thread has taken a very non-spiritual turn. If you think it doesn't fit, you won't hurt my feelings at all by moving it. But yeah, to me, the op was spiritual, or at least as close to spiritual as someone like me can be.

[Antlerman]

It seems that in defending my responses, perhaps this thread has taken a very non-spiritual turn. If you think it doesn't fit, you won't hurt my feelings at all by moving it. But yeah, to me, the op was spiritual, or at least as close to spiritual as someone like me can be.

Well we see. I don't think it is invalid at all to have valid spiritual experience without believing in anything supernatural. I don't believe in the supernatural and yet I most definitely have what is correctly called profound and deep spiritual experience on a daily basis through practice. I don't call myself an atheist anymore, but I had no problem calling myself one before and having spiritual experience within that. My reasons for not calling myself atheist don't have to do with spirituality.

 

What I'm interested in is the fact that you state you experience something for which you have no rational basis in nature, as you understand it. We can get to that, but you can chew on that in the meantime.

[MagickMonkey]

He isn't being serious, and my response was to challenge his simply calling that 'spiritual', while he himself explicitly recognized it probably didn't belong in this forum as it technically isn't spiritual. In his own words, "Of course, this is spiritual only in the metaphoric sense, but it has a spiritual feeling, at least to me. I'm sure the moderators will move it if they feel the need." He has a history of chiding anything spiritual, so I thought to play along with it to a point to see if a good conversation could actually ensue before I just moved it out of here.

 

Actually, I honestly was being dead serious. I was in one of those moods. I don't know that I "probably" knew it didn't belong here, but I knew it was "iffy". I was on the fence about whether to put it here. And I don't know that "chiding" is the correct verb to describe how I respond to spirituality. (Well, at least not all the time.) I simply bluntly state what I believe to be true, but not necessarily in a way that fits the idea of chiding.

[MagickMonkey]

It seems that in defending my responses, perhaps this thread has taken a very non-spiritual turn. If you think it doesn't fit, you won't hurt my feelings at all by moving it. But yeah, to me, the op was spiritual, or at least as close to spiritual as someone like me can be.

Well we see. I don't think it is invalid at all to have valid spiritual experience without believing in anything supernatural. I don't believe in the supernatural and yet I most definitely have what is correctly called profound and deep spiritual experience on a daily basis through practice. I don't call myself an atheist anymore, but I had no problem calling myself one before and having spiritual experience within that. My reasons for not calling myself atheist don't have to do with spirituality.

 

What I'm interested in is the fact that you state you experience something for which you have no rational basis in nature, as you understand it. We can get to that, but you can chew on that in the meantime.

 

Well, I must concede that I believe that even my feelings of spirituality stem from biochemical processes in my brain. They are just a part of human neurobiology. Does that make such feelings not count as spiritual? Perhaps not.

[Antlerman]

Well, I must concede that I believe that even my feelings of spirituality stem from biochemical processes in my brain. They are just a part of human neurobiology. Does that make such feelings not count as spiritual? Perhaps not.

I will get around to some other thoughts in response to early things, but for the moment I feel to dwell here a moment. What do you mean it makes them not count? You experienced something that gave you a momentary jolt beyond simply a reasoned conclusion, and you consider that possibly an invalid experience? Let me ask this question, in that momentary experience that you called spiritual (not merely emotional, mind you), did it evoke thoughts in your mind that took you beyond a simple series of thought that you get through some sort of analytical assessment, and into something you might can 'visionary'? And did that moment inspire something that transcended reason itself? If so, how on earth is knowledge through mind experience invalid because it has a physiological component to it?

 

I don't get this business that if human experience has physical relationships that it invalidates spiritual experience? So damned what! Of course the brain in involved. It's involved in your love for you wife, it's involved in everything that you consciously are aware of. Does that invalidate love ("They are just a part of human neurobiology")? Does it stand as the arbiter of what we as humans should consider truth???? How damned arrogant of one branch of science to speak to the validity of human knowledge through the 'non-rational' engagements of human experience.

 

Those non-rational experiences are equally as valid as what we examine through a microscope and call the natural world. To not trust those things which are part of our human experience as valid knowledge is to live our lives split in half. We become out of touch with who we truly are; body, mind, soul, spirit. Reductionism is a foul stench to a liberated mind and soul; bent on robbing us our evolutionary heritage because it mistakes myth as fact and wishes to deny any spiritual component which dare may look to it. Such a sad affair.

 

I'll get to my other thoughts later.

[Antlerman]

I don't think anyone has found any god in any non-metaphoric sense. I suppose we could argue this ad-nauseum. I see in later responses questions about the definition of god. I'll just leave it as a god being some super-being. Yeah, it's vague, but concepts of god are to varied to really nail down something specific.

Well, regardless you are stuck with me saying I have and do experience God all the time. And no other word can adequately be substituted, even though it isn't the mythic-literal God you are familiar with. Super-being? The way I describe it is the Face on the Infinite. There is God beyond God, if that makes sense. So the bottom line is when you say no one has found God in any non-metaphoric sense, then I suppose that's not true. Even those who experience God as mythic-literal in their minds, are in fact experiencing "God". What other word is there? Nature? What if it beyond nature? Being? Yes, that works, but Being in the sense of All that IS. I think the word God fits that better than any word, but others could I suppose be used, so long as it captures something on that level.

 

There is no evidence of any purpose in nature. In fact, in the absolute sense of the term, there may be no purpose at all - even our own purposes. It seems more and more like our concept of will is just a story told to the conscious parts of our brains by the rest of the pieces of our brains. Our brains do whatever they're bound to do according to the laws of physics, and our conscious minds are given a load of crap about how we intended to do what we did.

Well of course you're making faith statements here about the nature of nature. I was just reading something today (I haven't finished yet) which takes your oversimplified conclusions and shows them to be far from so easy to draw those conclusions. Enjoy the read: Link

 

But, it seems that conscious animals have the best approximation of purpose there is. Everything else (or approximations of purpose aside, everything) is simply a sequence of causes and effects.

Yes, conscious awareness affords a great deal of understanding above what minds in a slumbering unconsciousness is aware of - including such higher level questions as meaning and purpose. Why do you insist on reducing the world to that of the lizard? Is there a valid good reason, since we are already experience the world beyond the awareness of a lizard?

 

Time and time again, our understanding of the universe and our ability to act on such understanding has been held back by religion.

And time and time again our understanding of our humanity is being held back by reductionist philosophies - the new religion. Yes, I absolutely agree it is a category error for religion to try to speak of the processes of the natural world. It is equally a category error for science to judge religion and spirituality. It is simply not its domain, just as the natural world wasn't for religion.

 

It seems to me that rather than being a trait that is directly selected for, religiosity (is there a better noun for this?) is a trait that is a side effect of our psychology stemming from a time when our ancestors were not cognitively equipped to understand agency and lack thereof. In any case, I think mankind has outgrown it.

OK, I daily practice insight meditation through which I have profound experiences of the Divine (to use that word). Absolutely not one iota of it has anything, whatsoever to do with trying to understand agency in the natural world!! That's absurdly silly. What it does have to do with is experiencing a greater depth of being alive in the world as a living, sentient, conscious being responding to that fact in a joyful dance of life. What the F* does that have to do with explaining what it rains, or why earthquakes occur? Nothing.

 

Yes, historically prior to science religion trying to use mythology as part of a cosmology, but just because science has come along (rather been developed by us) and it offers clearer pictures of the natural world, that was not religion's sole role in humanity by a long stretch. How overly simplified and political to say since science is so good there, everything in life can now be answered by it. It cannot replace philosophy either, for that matter.

 

They are expressions of ourselves, but unfortunately, the people who believed in these gods did not realize this is what they were. Rather than see them as fictional expressions of ourselves, they regarded them as real beings who's rules must be followed.

They are not fictional expressions of ourselves, they are real projections of ourselves through which we access higher internal states through symbolically externalizing ourselves. It would take some time to explain that, but not in this post. That some take them as literal, is simply a developmental stage of consciousness, identical to the child who sees a cloud 'looking' at him and imagines it as a real person. It's simply a projection of that state of mental development on the world. The cloud is still there, however.

 

One my hypothesize endlessly about things whose existence can neither be proven or disproven.

Does God exist in human experience? Yes. Proven.

 

When it seems obvious that a concept stems from wild, baseless explanations for natural phenomena, there's no reason to believe those concepts have any basis in reality, and if they do, it would seem to be coincidental. To whatever extent our lives have purpose (and to whatever extent purpose actually exists), it's a purpose we grant to our lives rather than any preexisting purpose we find (unless we adopt the purposes of others). If we can nail down a good definition of purpose, then perhaps science can determine its existence or lack thereof.

God is not about natural phenomena, nor even about purpose. It's about self-sense in a cosmological reality. It is the sun the plants reach to, it is about breath of life and being and becoming. It is about human experience. Science has nothing to say in this, even though it contributes through its knowledge of our world into our direct experience of it. Science is not a symbol of something that transcends just the plane of the natural into the realm of mind and spirit. It is not about that.

 

 

P.S. Meaning and purpose are questions of philosophy, not spirit. They are mind questions, not matters of connection with our existential being.

[mymistake]

Does God exist in human experience? Yes. Proven.

 

 

What does "God exist in human experience" mean? Is that like how the Easter Bunny exists in marketing? If you mean some other kind of existence then when and how was it proven?

[badpuppy]

A lioness comes from a place of hunger when she takes a gazelle. When there is no hunger, her skill at the hunt stays hidden. This is what humility means.

 

I like this. I don't know why, but I like the way it's stated.

[badpuppy]

Ok, christmas business (along with neurotic-pregnant-wife-wanting-chores-done business) done! Let me take a crack at this.

 

 

As far back as we can tell, people have searched for God and failed.

 

 

Of course people have failed to find God. Some haven't failed.

 

 

 

 

I don't think anyone has found any god in any non-metaphoric sense. I suppose we could argue this ad-nauseum. I see in later responses questions about the definition of god. I'll just leave it as a god being some super-being. Yeah, it's vague, but concepts of god are to varied to really nail down something specific.

 

 

I'd like to jump in and say that I think the talk about "finding god" seems to come from a "countering monotheism" perspective. Like "god" is somewhere "out there" for us to find. The way I see it, God is the "universal consciousness"... like... everything that exists, but somehow conscious. So I guess I'm a type of pantheist. I see us as like cells in the body of god. From that perspective, how could I ever "find god"? I'm part OF God. It's like the individual cells in my body can't "find me". And I can't communicate personally with them. I don't wish them harm, but I can't intervene in their "lives".

 

I do acknowledge that the way I see things is not empirically provable using the scientific method. I'm okay with that, because I'm not just sitting around trying to come up with some "faith statement" I can quote to make me feel warm and fuzzy. I just look at the information available to me and my own experience and my own intuitions and this is the working framework I come up with. Is this "metaphorical"? I'm really not sure. I think when some little peon (like a human being...before anyone objects to that, we are each wildly insignificant in face of the grandeur of even just what we are able to know of the universe from physics and the Hubble telescope) decides they have some cute theory about how "everything works" and the "ground of all being", then... well... it HAS to be metaphorical language on some level. Like... I could also say that I believe we are the "dream of God" because I think Consciousness split off into many other consciousnesses (sort of like my consciousness does on the individual level when I dream. All those dream characters are me, split apart.) Taking any spiritual language totally "literally" I think is a problem many of us inherited from Christianity. But I don't find it personally productive.

 

So I think when I speak about my own beliefs/way of perceiving the world, that I am likely speaking in some form of metaphorical/symbolic language. But that doesn't mean I'm just being poetic. I actually do believe there is a grander reality I'm trying to describe. It's not just flowery language to me, and I'm not sure that that is always fully understood by people who mention the use of myth and metaphorical language for spirituality.

[Antlerman]

Does God exist in human experience? Yes. Proven.

 

 

What does "God exist in human experience" mean? Is that like how the Easter Bunny exists in marketing? If you mean some other kind of existence then when and how was it proven?

The context of MM's question in which I responded answers the question. To compare God and the Easter Bunny in marketing is not a good analogy. Does the Easter Bunny symbolize the experience of Spring and all that comes with it? That might come closer, but it is operating on markedly different levels. But the comparison of symbols of human experience is closer than simply a hook for marketing purposes, "Oh look mommy at the cute bunny. Can I get a chocolate bunny?".

 

When I say God exists in human experience and that proves God exists means that what humans experience which they call God does in fact exist. They experience it. Therefore as much as a "tree" exists because we assign a symbol to an object in nature (even though I would challenge you to actually find a "t-r-e-e" occurring naturally in nature without the mental construction of humans), so too God is assigned to something that essentially includes and/or transcends nature, something experienced like a tree is experienced.

 

In fact all of reality to the human mind is mediated through a series of symbolic constructions. Does reality therefore not exist? In fact, many mystics say that the more direct that experience the more no-words at all fit, not even God. God beyond God. How I describe it is that God is the Face we put upon the Infinite. A closer analogy would be Ocean. An ocean doesn't exist as some naturally occurring element in nature, but is rather what we call a vast collection of water molecules. Jump anywhere you want in it, and it is all ocean. So what do you call what includes and transcends everything? Therefore as humans experience the Infinite, that symbol of God is just as valid as the symbol Ocean.

[MagickMonkey]

Well, I must concede that I believe that even my feelings of spirituality stem from biochemical processes in my brain. They are just a part of human neurobiology. Does that make such feelings not count as spiritual? Perhaps not.

I will get around to some other thoughts in response to early things, but for the moment I feel to dwell here a moment. What do you mean it makes them not count? You experienced something that gave you a momentary jolt beyond simply a reasoned conclusion, and you consider that possibly an invalid experience? Let me ask this question, in that momentary experience that you called spiritual (not merely emotional, mind you), did it evoke thoughts in your mind that took you beyond a simple series of thought that you get through some sort of analytical assessment, and into something you might can 'visionary'? And did that moment inspire something that transcended reason itself? If so, how on earth is knowledge through mind experience invalid because it has a physiological component to it?

 

I don't get this business that if human experience has physical relationships that it invalidates spiritual experience? So damned what! Of course the brain in involved. It's involved in your love for you wife, it's involved in everything that you consciously are aware of. Does that invalidate love ("They are just a part of human neurobiology")? Does it stand as the arbiter of what we as humans should consider truth???? How damned arrogant of one branch of science to speak to the validity of human knowledge through the 'non-rational' engagements of human experience.

 

Those non-rational experiences are equally as valid as what we examine through a microscope and call the natural world. To not trust those things which are part of our human experience as valid knowledge is to live our lives split in half. We become out of touch with who we truly are; body, mind, soul, spirit. Reductionism is a foul stench to a liberated mind and soul; bent on robbing us our evolutionary heritage because it mistakes myth as fact and wishes to deny any spiritual component which dare may look to it. Such a sad affair.

 

I'll get to my other thoughts later.

 

I would call my experience somewhat visionary. That's not a bad adjective at all. It was like I was seeing something for what it was in a way I never had before. It was more than reason, but not divorced from it. It seemed to complement reason. It was certainly not anti-reason. I don't consider that invalid. I was just wondering, at least for the purposes of this forum, if my acknowledgment that it's all a product of biochemical processes in my brain means it's not really spiritual. I consider truth to be in the realm of reason, but I think it's our subjectivity that makes various truths relevant to us.

[Antlerman]

I would call my experience somewhat visionary. That's not a bad adjective at all. It was like I was seeing something for what it was in a way I never had before. It was more than reason, but not divorced from it. It seemed to complement reason.

Exactly! That is exactly what I am saying. It is not a violation of reason, but it is a compliment to it. There are modes of knowing that enhance and inform each other. The spiritual also can be enhanced by reason, but it is not itself a reasoned state. Reason should not violate the spiritual either in the same was the spiritual should not violate reason. The best description I can tell you is that is it like having two brains that are layered together.

 

It was certainly not anti-reason. I don't consider that invalid. I was just wondering, at least for the purposes of this forum, if my acknowledgment that it's all a product of biochemical processes in my brain means it's not really spiritual. I consider truth to be in the realm of reason, but I think it's our subjectivity that makes various truths relevant to us.

That spiritual experience happens within the brain as any other sort of experience does not negate it at all. You could hook up an EEG to my brain as I meditate and you will in fact see changes occurring within it. But those changes are not the experience itself. They merely register the experience. The direct apprehension of the experience occurs within the mind itself, with that space of symbolic structures of language and imagery - the same sort of way our physical experience of the world registers in the mental space. What the spiritual component of it is that is not the same as philosophy or science is that it transcends even mental conception themselves into raw experience. As one looks into that raw experience, that unmediated experience through still thoughts about it to direct immersion within it, then what arises to the mind arises from the subconscious to the conscious through the superconcious.

 

Of course these things are happening within the brain. That is somewhat irrelevant. It's the content, the insights, and the resulting effect that comes from a place within that transcends just component level biology, just philosophical constructs, into a sort of waking mind that processes unmediated reality into highly symbolic truths that the body, mind, and spirit all experience. It is far more than just a query into how the brain works.

 

The source of the misgivings I hear is what I believe to be entirely rooted in a misunderstanding of spirituality that equates it with some mythical external realm of literal gods and spirits. Those are just those symbols that the subconscious offers to the conscious, and for those who are in fact in their cognitive stages of development still in the mythological stage, will like take those as literal encounters with literal gods. The entire theme of that stage is the externalization of all of these deeper internal realities. That they take it to mean that, and therefore since science show that it happens in the brain so therefore the spiritual isn't real, is to essentially follow suit in understanding the spiritual as the mythic-literalists themselves! Instead of understanding the spiritual in a more sophisticated light, they take the easy route of not trying to understand it and simply call it an illusion, not real, not valid. That's not only a category error of science, it's also tragic. It is itself a violation of reason against spirit. It is irrational.

[MagickMonkey]

I hope this isn't annoying, but in the interest of staying out of quotetag hell, I'm going to once again give a series of replies instead of one bulk reply.

 

 

 

I don't think anyone has found any god in any non-metaphoric sense. I suppose we could argue this ad-nauseum. I see in later responses questions about the definition of god. I'll just leave it as a god being some super-being. Yeah, it's vague, but concepts of god are to varied to really nail down something specific.

 

 

Well, regardless you are stuck with me saying I have and do experience God all the time. And no other word can adequately be substituted, even though it isn't the mythic-literal God you are familiar with. Super-being? The way I describe it is the Face on the Infinite. There is God beyond God, if that makes sense. So the bottom line is when you say no one has found God in any non-metaphoric sense, then I suppose that's not true. Even those who experience God as mythic-literal in their minds, are in fact experiencing "God". What other word is there? Nature? What if it beyond nature? Being? Yes, that works, but Being in the sense of All that IS. I think the word God fits that better than any word, but others could I suppose be used, so long as it captures something on that level.

 

 

Ok, but within the context of my op, God means something different that what you're calling God. I can extend the scope of any word enough to say I've found it. I can say "I found Mickey Mouse" if I extend the meaning of Mickey Mouse enough. I'm not trying to belittle your use of the term. Just saying it seems to be beyond the scope of what I'm discussing. Whenever we've had discussions about this in the past, I have a hard time really even understanding you enough to debate. I don't think I can ever make sense of God beyond God except in some extremely vague way.

[MagickMonkey]

I would call my experience somewhat visionary. That's not a bad adjective at all. It was like I was seeing something for what it was in a way I never had before. It was more than reason, but not divorced from it. It seemed to complement reason.

Exactly! That is exactly what I am saying. It is not a violation of reason, but it is a compliment to it. There are modes of knowing that enhance and inform each other. The spiritual also can be enhanced by reason, but it is not itself a reasoned state. Reason should not violate the spiritual either in the same was the spiritual should not violate reason. The best description I can tell you is that is it like having two brains that are layered together.

It was certainly not anti-reason. I don't consider that invalid. I was just wondering, at least for the purposes of this forum, if my acknowledgment that it's all a product of biochemical processes in my brain means it's not really spiritual. I consider truth to be in the realm of reason, but I think it's our subjectivity that makes various truths relevant to us.

That spiritual experience happens within the brain as any other sort of experience does not negate it at all. You could hook up an EEG to my brain as I meditate and you will in fact see changes occurring within it. But those changes are not the experience itself. They merely register the experience. The direct apprehension of the experience occurs within the mind itself, with that space of symbolic structures of language and imagery - the same sort of way our physical experience of the world registers in the mental space. What the spiritual component of it is that is not the same as philosophy or science is that it transcends even mental conception themselves into raw experience. As one looks into that raw experience, that unmediated experience through still thoughts about it to direct immersion within it, then what arises to the mind arises from the subconscious to the conscious through the superconcious. Of course these things are happening within the brain. That is somewhat irrelevant. It's the content, the insights, and the resulting effect that comes from a place within that transcends just component level biology, just philosophical constructs, into a sort of waking mind that processes unmediated reality into highly symbolic truths that the body, mind, and spirit all experience. It is far more than just a query into how the brain works. The source of the misgivings I hear is what I believe to be entirely rooted in a misunderstanding of spirituality that equates it with some mythical external realm of literal gods and spirits. Those are just those symbols that the subconscious offers to the conscious, and for those who are in fact in their cognitive stages of development still in the mythological stage, will like take those as literal encounters with literal gods. The entire theme of that stage is the externalization of all of these deeper internal realities. That they take it to mean that, and therefore since science show that it happens in the brain so therefore the spiritual isn't real, is to essentially follow suit in understanding the spiritual as the mythic-literalists themselves! Instead of understanding the spiritual in a more sophisticated light, they take the easy route of not trying to understand it and simply call it an illusion, not real, not valid. That's not only a category error of science, it's also tragic.

 

This seems interesting enough to not worry about responding to the other stuff. I think the experiences are the physical processes, but perhaps whether we agree on that or not doesn't matter. Whatever the experiences are composed of, they are worth having.

[MagickMonkey]

Then again...

 

 

 

There is no evidence of any purpose in nature. In fact, in the absolute sense of the term, there may be no purpose at all - even our own purposes. It seems more and more like our concept of will is just a story told to the conscious parts of our brains by the rest of the pieces of our brains. Our brains do whatever they're bound to do according to the laws of physics, and our conscious minds are given a load of crap about how we intended to do what we did.

 

 

Well of course you're making faith statements here about the nature of nature. I was just reading something today (I haven't finished yet) which takes your oversimplified conclusions and shows them to be far from so easy to draw those conclusions. Enjoy the read: Link

 

No faith statements here. Just telling what the evidence seems to show, though I'm not sure enough about it to make an absolute statement of fact. Purpose seems to be an illusion. Perhaps it's a useful illusion like free will. Regardless of whether either or both are illusions, they're important ones to human psychology.

[MagickMonkey]

 

 

Time and time again, our understanding of the universe and our ability to act on such understanding has been held back by religion.

 

 

And time and time again our understanding of our humanity is being held back by reductionist philosophies - the new religion. Yes, I absolutely agree it is a category error for religion to try to speak of the processes of the natural world. It is equally a category error for science to judge religion and spirituality. It is simply not its domain, just as the natural world wasn't for religion.

 

 

I really see no sense in separating the two domains. Reality is reality. Even if one regards spiritual experiences as being more important than how the experiences are physically constructed, knowing how they are constructed can be useful.

[MagickMonkey]

 

 

It seems to me that rather than being a trait that is directly selected for, religiosity (is there a better noun for this?) is a trait that is a side effect of our psychology stemming from a time when our ancestors were not cognitively equipped to understand agency and lack thereof. In any case, I think mankind has outgrown it.

 

 

OK, I daily practice insight meditation through which I have profound experiences of the Divine (to use that word). Absolutely not one iota of it has anything, whatsoever to do with trying to understand agency in the natural world!! That's absurdly silly. What it does have to do with is experiencing a greater depth of being alive in the world as a living, sentient, conscious being responding to that fact in a joyful dance of life. What the F* does that have to do with explaining what it rains, or why earthquakes occur? Nothing.

 

 

Yes, historically prior to science religion trying to use mythology as part of a cosmology, but just because science has come along (rather been developed by us) and it offers clearer pictures of the natural world, that was not religion's sole role in humanity by a long stretch. How overly simplified and political to say since science is so good there, everything in life can now be answered by it. It cannot replace philosophy either, for that matter.

 

Sorry, but how our ancestors viewed agency in everything certainly had a big part in the development of religion if not its roots. It seems as though when you speak of religion, you are speaking perhaps something beyond the superstitions of the past.

 

Obviously, science cannot answer anything. Where it does work, it should be preferred. Outside of that, I don't know that anything else can be determined to be objectively true. Of course, not all that is relevant has to be described in terms of truth.

[Antlerman]

I really see no sense in separating the two domains. Reality is reality. Even if one regards spiritual experiences as being more important than how the experiences are physically constructed, knowing how they are constructed can be useful.

Of course, but the danger I continue to hear is summarized in statements that it is "just your brain". Tell me that doesn't dismiss them, or at the least reduce them to mere oddities, blips in an otherwise rational world.

[Legion]

Reality is reality.

I think... yes and no.

 

I believe there DOES EXIST an objective reality. But I don't believe any of us have direct access to its nature. An understanding of the objective world is a relation between it and a subjective mind.

[MagickMonkey]

 

 

They are expressions of ourselves, but unfortunately, the people who believed in these gods did not realize this is what they were. Rather than see them as fictional expressions of ourselves, they regarded them as real beings who's rules must be followed.

 

 

They are not fictional expressions of ourselves, they are real projections of ourselves through which we access higher internal states through symbolically externalizing ourselves. It would take some time to explain that, but not in this post. That some take them as literal, is simply a developmental stage of consciousness, identical to the child who sees a cloud 'looking' at him and imagines it as a real person. It's simply a projection of that state of mental development on the world. The cloud is still there, however.

 

 

But they are fictional. The gods of the bible, and other pantheons were fictional regardless of whether or not the infer anything about reality. In your analogy, yes the cloud is still there, but it's not a person looking at the child. The idea that it is is a fiction. Why is realizing that a bad thing?

[MagickMonkey]

I really see no sense in separating the two domains. Reality is reality. Even if one regards spiritual experiences as being more important than how the experiences are physically constructed, knowing how they are constructed can be useful.

Of course, but the danger I continue to hear is summarized in statements that it is "just your brain". Tell me that doesn't dismiss them, or at the least reduce them to mere oddities, blips in an otherwise rational world.

 

I think understanding the objective nature of our minds doesn't make them less special in the least. If not for our subjectivity, reality would be useless (to us, anyway).

[MagickMonkey]

 

 

One my hypothesize endlessly about things whose existence can neither be proven or disproven.

 

 

Does God exist in human experience? Yes. Proven.

 

 

Hehehe, I don't think so. At least not in the sense most of us are talking about.

[Legion]

I think understanding the objective nature of our minds doesn't make them less special in the least.

I completely agree.

 

I suspect that the human mind is phenotypic. Or rather... I think a promising approach to the study of mind, regards mind as phenotypic.

[MagickMonkey]

 

 

When it seems obvious that a concept stems from wild, baseless explanations for natural phenomena, there's no reason to believe those concepts have any basis in reality, and if they do, it would seem to be coincidental. To whatever extent our lives have purpose (and to whatever extent purpose actually exists), it's a purpose we grant to our lives rather than any preexisting purpose we find (unless we adopt the purposes of others). If we can nail down a good definition of purpose, then perhaps science can determine its existence or lack thereof.

 

 

God is not about natural phenomena, nor even about purpose. It's about self-sense in a cosmological reality. It is the sun the plants reach to, it is about breath of life and being and becoming. It is about human experience. Science has nothing to say in this, even though it contributes through its knowledge of our world into our direct experience of it. Science is not a symbol of something that transcends just the plane of the natural into the realm of mind and spirit. It is not about that.

 

 

 

P.S. Meaning and purpose are questions of philosophy, not spirit. They are mind questions, not matters of connection with our existential being.

 

 

Perhaps for you, meaning and purpose aren't quetions of spirituality, but in religions in general, they are.