Killing In The Name Of Atheism

[Antlerman]

That's good. It's a start of a dialog.

 

So there's an extreme innate feeling in us that death is not good, sucks basically. And I have opportunities to make choices that I see as life-giving. Yet, there is a balance of life and death in our humanity.

Here's the part you're missing. We naturally avoid death because survival is part of that balance. That's biological. We also have a sense of preservation of our sense of self. When a human lives he faces death not just physically, but our own self-awareness. When we die, we don't just die once, but twice. The body, and who we see ourselves as also dies. "I" die. Not just my body. That is most likely not what an animal experiences, nor any child who has not become yet fully 'self aware'.

 

It's the latter where we actually experience 'fear', on an existential level. It's the latter where we build all manner of immortality projects in order to avoid facing the end of that "me" that we know. It's the latter why myths of an afterlife, a resurrection from the dead to live in heaven with Jesus comes from. We don't want to face the end of "me", which is different than just our body going bye-bye. It stems in a sense from that same survival instinct to avoid death, but it is extended to our sense of self in the ego "me".

 

And as some religion holds, Christianity even, that creating those life-giving moments are often by sacrificial or figurative death.

I agree with this, but it's less to do with physical death, as it is more a release of that hold, that desperate self-preservation of that ego "me". In releasing ourselves from that 'attachment', we experience freedom, an existential awakening, resurrection, salvation, enlightenment, whatever you want to call it. You find your true Self, not tied to the body, so to speak.

 

It has nothing to do with when you physical body quits functioning and it dies. It has to do with our own self-awareness being released from our own hold upon it to preserve it. We avoid letting go of 'me' in order to find ourselves. We die to self, and are reborn as who and what we truly are. This is within Christianity as well as Buddhism, but few Christians get it as they see the whole thing in literal terms, in mythological realms of some external event where your physical body rises whole again from the grave. It misses the point. "The kingdom of God is within you". The Hindu calls it your true Self.

 

Seeing it yet?

[Guest end3]

.......Seeing it yet?

 

Thanks K, I understand that concept mostly. I guess my question is why are we predesposed to the "life half of balance" rather than the death half. And why is morality so realistically innate or possibly inherent. In other words, if global centric was intended, then why not an equal predisposition to death?

[Guest end3]

Never mind.....thx.

[JoeCoastie]

I would take it less personal being killed by a dictator than I would someone who worshipped invisible super friends and then told me they were killing me because I did not believe in those super friends.

If the dictator put you to death for not serving the State, how is that not an invisible super friend itself? States don't exist. A State is a creation of ideals and rules and laws and symbols. It is a fiction that is promoted as a truth that you live up to, or in some cases are put to death by. Doesn't that sound identical to the way God is used to justify the actions of a people, or a person? Doesn't that sound identical to 'religion' in this context? "It is not us who kill you. You are being put to death because the State so orders it".

I know what you're getting at, but I'd still say a state is a tangible thing. Any society is a group of people deciding to play ball together.

...who chose to create a name to identify themselves as: The French; Americans; Russians, etc. Suddenly you have an entity that doesn't actually exist, yet people band themselves together as the people of X. Nation-States are artificial creations in order for people to create ties with one another on common grounds. We are the people of these artificial lines drawn on a map. We share the same resources and conduct social affairs and commerce with one another.

 

America doesn't actually exist as some object in nature.

 

The trappings of the state like laws and borders may seem like a construction, but at least they're more real than any deity. Within the state are very real things people, cities, mountains, rivers, and beaches.

How is calling the area between the between two lines on a map a State, any different than saying God exists? Isn't it how people understand what a State consists of? It's true you have infrastructure such as laws and peoples, cities and roads, etc, but those are external manifestations of what people create to support that subjective creation called a State. To cite those as proof a State is real, it seems you would need to likewise recognize all the churches and religious infrastructure around the world as proof of God as well. Georgia exists because we can see the State Capital building? God exists because we can see the Vatican?

 

You have to look at these things in the same context when saying that religion in somehow different than what we do in these other fictions.

Because the land is actually tangible. Its territory its property. Its saying this rock is mine and it doesn't belong to you. The Georgia state capital is a monument to a bunch of land north or Fl, south of the Carolinas and TN, East of AL. It contains millions of people calling themselves Georgians. Sure billions call themselves Christians, but those Churches are monuments to a fairy tale. The Church is real. The Vatican is real. It has buildings, borders, and people, but it doesn't make god real.

People form nations as they form families. You have a house and its YOUR house, your domain. Just as a state is a domain. Albeit the state like god is a man made construction its still people and turf and its real.

[Antlerman]

How is calling the area between the between two lines on a map a State, any different than saying God exists? Isn't it how people understand what a State consists of? It's true you have infrastructure such as laws and peoples, cities and roads, etc, but those are external manifestations of what people create to support that subjective creation called a State. To cite those as proof a State is real, it seems you would need to likewise recognize all the churches and religious infrastructure around the world as proof of God as well. Georgia exists because we can see the State Capital building? God exists because we can see the Vatican?

 

You have to look at these things in the same context when saying that religion in somehow different than what we do in these other fictions.

Because the land is actually tangible. Its territory its property. Its saying this rock is mine and it doesn't belong to you. The Georgia state capital is a monument to a bunch of land north or Fl, south of the Carolinas and TN, East of AL

Actually the capital is a monument to a body of laws and ideals extended over those living within boundaries defined by those. That land is a material display of these bodies of law doesn't make them more real than God in this way. Land ownership is a concept, backed by a body of laws which are conceptual. Land ownership is not something material, even though there are material results from it. You can walk onto a piece of land and tell yourself you own it. But really what does that mean if it weren't first a conceptual construction? The squirrels in my backyard don't care if I think this is my property. Those tomatoes they eat are not my tomatoes according to them. Who between them and me lives in a fictional world?

 

These only become real or tangible because people act upon the belief and create institutions supporting those. Religion is identical to this in that they take a set of beliefs about God and codify those and extend them to something tangible like a body of people. That may or may not include land borders, but it certainly includes belief boundaries, or bloodline boundaries. They are the Jewish people, Christians, Muslims, Buddhists, Hindus, etc. Nations are different only that they are more inclusive of these artificial ties. There are limits to who can be included when you say the people of this bloodline, so it is extended to belief lines which transcends bloodlines. But beliefs are also limited, since I may choose to not believe like you, so a Nation-State overcomes that. You are now those who live within these boundaries on a map and share common currencies. "Land" is only another physical object for "people" that serve as a tangible expression of the ideal. "The people of God" is no different than "The land of Georgia".

 

It contains millions of people calling themselves Georgians. Sure billions call themselves Christians, but those Churches are monuments to a fairy tale.

Why is it a fairy tale in this context, anymore than belief in a body of laws? If seeing tangible manifestations of this in material objects is the criteria of validity than both win on that front. Outside people's beliefs about the land or the people, Georgia doesn't exist. The world as it is prior to those and long after those is what exists. Same with beliefs about what God is.

 

The Church is real. The Vatican is real. It has buildings, borders, and people, but it doesn't make god real.

Same with Georgia. Isn't God an ideal, a symbolic object people call their experience of the universe? Is that any less real to them than Georgia is? You don't recognize God in your experience, and nor did the Native Americans recognize these fictions such as land ownership. It was not part of their reality.

 

People form nations as they form families. You have a house and its YOUR house, your domain. Just as a state is a domain. Albeit the state like god is a man made construction its still people and turf and its real.

So then again, the institutions of a religion are real.

 

I would suggest that God, like the land itself is not an object of belief in its nature. Beliefs do not define its ultimate reality. Beliefs only define ones experience of that reality, which experience then becomes that reality to those 'believers', in the State, or in God. The beliefs about the object become that objects reality for them. I would say God is more like the land this way than any belief about it.

[florduh]

How is calling the area between the between two lines on a map a State, any different than saying God exists?

You're using hyperbole to make a point, right? Because the people who created the legal entity of the state are (or were) available for comment. The state was not physically created by forces unknown, but rather it is a legal definition for a defined geographical area. The state exists because known individuals have marked the area off from surrounding areas. Conversely, a god is anything an individual can imagine, from a rock statue to the forces of nature to some vague universal power. IOW, everyone can agree on what a state is, its population, its laws, its borders, etc. Nobody can agree on the characteristics of god, or even if such a thing exists outside of mental constructs.

[Guest end3]

How is calling the area between the between two lines on a map a State, any different than saying God exists?

You're using hyperbole to make a point, right? Because the people who created the legal entity of the state are (or were) available for comment. The state was not physically created by forces unknown, but rather it is a legal definition for a defined geographical area. The state exists because known individuals have marked the area off from surrounding areas. Conversely, a god is anything an individual can imagine, from a rock statue to the forces of nature to some vague universal power. IOW, everyone can agree on what a state is, its population, its laws, its borders, etc. Nobody can agree on the characteristics of god, or even if such a thing exists outside of mental constructs.

 

Nature takes the place of Jesus in this aspect, yet God the Father is Nothingness. Come on C, catch on already. You've seen the floating flower on the water picture, right?

[Antlerman]

How is calling the area between the between two lines on a map a State, any different than saying God exists?

You're using hyperbole to make a point, right?

No. I'm making a direct comparison.

 

Because the people who created the legal entity of the state are (or were) available for comment.

Just as they were at the council of Nicaea when they decided the boundaries of their system of beliefs for the purpose of governance, for instance.

 

The state was not physically created by forces unknown, but rather it is a legal definition for a defined geographical area.

Religion was created the same way, not by forces unknown. Creeds and doctrines are your 'legal' definition for a body of people who share the same beliefs. The State is not simply a geographical area. In fact, that's actually very secondary to it. It's about group identification on common grounds, beliefs, ideals, laws, economies, etc. How is that different than a religion in this regard?

 

The state exists because known individuals have marked the area off from surrounding areas.

Religion exists for the same reasons. Physical land areas are irrelevant. Religion can and has claimed land as well.

 

Conversely, a god is anything an individual can imagine, from a rock statue to the forces of nature to some vague universal power.

So is an ideal such as democracy. There were lots of these ideas about how to run a country that were also "anything an individual can imagine". The ones that caught on, led to the formation of a government. Same thing with God. Lots of ideas about God. The ones that caught on, led to the formation of a religion, modified, evolved, ratified, etc. Same difference.

 

IOW, everyone can agree on what a state is, its population, its laws, its borders, etc. Nobody can agree on the characteristics of god, or even if such a thing exists outside of mental constructs.

Everyone can agree on what a religion is as well, it's population, its laws, its boundaries, etc. Those that recognize it as legitimate recognize its characteristics the same way you would a State or a Nation. The point you are missing is that you assume because something has physical attributes, such as roads, and geographies, that the State is real because of these. Religion has the same sorts of material infrastructures.

 

The only difference is that the State is based on human ideas and ideals. Oh wait, that isn't a difference. Look at God in the context of religion as the same as a belief in Democracy. Religions are formed through that belief. Then once formed, there are tangible manifestation of that such as buildings, laws, doctrines, creeds, etc. The only difference to you is that you recognize the State because you believe in it.

 

Again, the mistake is in equating a belief about God with the existence of God itself. The land exists. A belief about the land, that it belongs to you, is what leads to the creation of a State, for instance. A belief about God, that you have the correct understanding of it leads to religion and its laws of the land, so to speak. Outside of these beliefs, the land is just the land. The land is not Georgia. That is a fiction as much as believing God is defined, understood, or owned by any religion. But yet, you accept Georgia as a reality?

[Guest end3]

I think one just assumes the ideas from the source, man, and one assumes the mental agreement to have another source.

[florduh]

Religion was created the same way, not by forces unknown.

I agree with that, but the original was a comparison the existence of God, not religion - which as you would no doubt agree are two distinctly separate things.

[Guest end3]

Religion was created the same way, not by forces unknown.

I agree with that, but the original was a comparison the existence of God, not religion - which as you would no doubt agree are two distinctly separate things.

 

Aye

 

How is he going to get his king out of that corner now.

[Antlerman]

Religion was created the same way, not by forces unknown.

I agree with that, but the original was a comparison the existence of God, not religion - which as you would no doubt agree are two distinctly separate things.

No, it was this:

 

I would take it less personal being killed by a dictator than I would someone who worshipped invisible super friends and then told me they were killing me because I did not believe in those super friends.

If the dictator put you to death for not serving the State, how is that not an invisible super friend itself? States don't exist. A State is a creation of ideals and rules and laws and symbols. It is a fiction that is promoted as a truth that you live up to, or in some cases are put to death by. Doesn't that sound identical to the way God is used to justify the actions of a people, or a person? Doesn't that sound identical to 'religion' in this context? "It is not us who kill you. You are being put to death because the State so orders it".

 

It was only later that the comparision was that the State was more real because it has things like land to point to, that religion is based on a "fairy tale" verses what a State is based on. I set to disprove that makes it different in this context. I've yet to be shown how it's different, or how the existence of God can't be compared to the existence of land around which beliefs are then formed to create either States, or religions, or both.

[florduh]

 

 

How is calling the area between the between two lines on a map a State, any different than saying God exists?

 

This is what I was referring to. Religions may or may not claim the existence of gods.

 

Anyway, if I dig deeply enough, I probably basically agree with your premise.

[Guest end3]

We realize all these conversations end up in the same place. How is it that we stand at the window of this unknown and peer through countless times and argue about what we see when reality suggests the window is cloudy.

 

So at some point, this seems more like a grand waste of time other than traversing the path to the window.

[florduh]

That is a fiction as much as believing God is defined, understood, or owned by any religion. But yet, you accept Georgia as a reality?

Is that not also a definition of God?

[Antlerman]

That is a fiction as much as believing God is defined, understood, or owned by any religion. But yet, you accept Georgia as a reality?

Is that not also a definition of God?

Is undefined imposing a definition? Is saying limitless imposing a limit?

[florduh]

Is undefined imposing a definition?

It is declaring that all other definitions are wrong because the right description of God is that it's indefinable. How one might "know" that for a fact eludes me as does how one would "know" that the description of God in the Bible is accurate. Presumably, the same methods of "knowing" (revelation/vision/feeling) apply to both.

[Antlerman]

Is undefined imposing a definition?

It is declaring that all other definitions are wrong because the right description of God is that it's indefinable. How one might "know" that for a fact eludes me as does how one would "know" that the description of God in the Bible is accurate. Presumably, the same methods of "knowing" (revelation/vision/feeling) apply to both.

No it is not. All descriptions are partial. There is no correct description. To say that is not to offer a description. Descriptions describe features. Is featureless a feature? Please tell me how you would or could ever use any language like this? Would you say formless has form because you described it?

 

In one sense however this is true what you say because we are using words. Any words at all are describers. So then there question is is there any case where words cannot be used at all? Is there any case to speak about "X" that is not a thing, an object, or a subject? No? Then this is what is meant when it is said no definition can be offered - not even that.

[Vigile]

I think you both have points. My head hurts.

[florduh]

Then this is what is meant when it is said no definition can be offered - not even that.

I understand that. What I don't understand is the reason that should be postulated. It assumes there must be something that exists so far from our experience we can't begin to comprehend it.

 

I don't mean to be rude, I am curious. Why would you entertain such a thought in the first place and of what value is something we cannot possibly comprehend, even if there was somehow a reason to believe it even exists?

 

BTW, while not fluent in Zen, I can speak it enough to order a meal or get on the right bus. Thanks.

[Antlerman]

I think you both have points. My head hurts.

 

The real problem is that when you deal with something like this you are of necessity moving into a paradox. And as such, any language like this will become contradictory. As much as I would love to be able to put words to it, it's shooting your own foot. It's hard for me to simply say it is not-definable, not even that. That said however, the fact that there are groups busily defining God in explicit terms, that is definitely 'not that'. I forget the person who said this, but it's really best "Neti Neti", Not this, not that.

[Vigile]

"Neti Neti", Not this, not that.

 

I'm guessing he/she was a slav. In Russian it would be нет, нет (nyet, nyet).

[Antlerman]

Then this is what is meant when it is said no definition can be offered - not even that.

I understand that. What I don't understand is the reason that should be postulated. It assumes there must be something that exists so far from our experience we can't begin to comprehend it.

That's the difference. It isn't so far from our experience. In fact it is directly experienced. That there are no words to describe it makes a lot of sense on a lot of levels. For one our entire language is dualistic, geared to subject/object distinctions. It's very easy for me to say I am me, and not you. But what do you say when that distinction becomes blurred? We don't have language for that other than vague things like "oneness". The more towards that unity you move, the more and more words fail. Instead of strict descriptive language, it is much more expressive of a less defined distinction. Poetry comes closer. Would anyone really say poetry is literal descriptions?

 

When we say it isn't comprehensible, it means using the means of rationality that relies directly on linguistic structures. It cannot be comprehend by reason and logic. That doesn't mean however it cannot be known by direct experience.

 

I don't mean to be rude, I am curious. Why would you entertain such a thought in the first place and of what value is something we cannot possibly comprehend, even if there was somehow a reason to believe it even exists?

It really isn't anything you believe in. Believing is a rational function. The only reason to use words at all is to trying to integrate it into some loose framework of understanding in order to somewhat loosen the tight grips of our views of reality that relying solely on what can be easily defined in order to navigate the world of subject/object dualities. Though those are essential and useful, they are not the whole experience of living. We may need to analyze what provisions we need for our trip to the beach, but once there, we simply fall back into that Ocean and be. Both parts are there.

[Vigile]

Let's talk about this practically for a moment. I concede that you make some very interesting points with your state/god analogy. But the state very much has power over my life that is measurable. God, at one point in my life could be somewhat comparable, but I've spent 20 years now without him and I'm doing just fine. If I ignore the state, it still finds me and makes me pay taxes, renew my passport and keep up with visa regulations.

 

I'm off to bed.

[florduh]

My head hurts, too. I guess I had the pebble in my own hand all along.