God is an Impossibility

This quote is supposedly attributed to Einstein [disputed];

The fact as I noted is the ultimate effectiveness of Buddhism [& other Eastern spiritualities] is too advanced for the masses at the present. This is why at present the Abrahamic religions are more popular, i.e. just believe and viola one is ‘saved’.

In addition to crude practices for the masses, Buddhism has a solid Framework and System of knowledge & practices to enable the believer to align optimally with reality san an illusory God and its negative baggage.

The effectiveness of genuine Buddhism can only be realized upon a high degree of continuous hardwork in the self-development of rewiring one’s brain for the purpose. This is why not many people are taking Buddhism seriously at present.
In your case, if you are above 55, genuine Buddhism is not going to be very effective on an older atrophized brain with low degree of plasticity.

As for the future generations, with the incremental trend of the exponential expansion of knowledge and technological in the advance knowledge of the neurosciences, genomics, etc. I am optimistic one can use these advancing knowledge to advance self-development programs like Buddhism [& other Eastern spiritualities] to optimize spirituality without malignant elements.

Btw, I am not a Buddhist per se and I am not insisting Buddhism is the only way. I believe in the future humanity must adopt the effective principles and practices from Buddhism and the likes and repackaging them for general use without reference to any specific religion or spirituality.

Prisimatic is right about one thing: ontology — the philosophical study of the nature of being, becoming, existence, or reality, as well as the basic categories of being and their relations — ultimately leads to the existence of the ontological God. He’s wrong about everything else, but he was right about that. It’s a mystery to me how he can say that and, in the very next line, say that it is restricted to an existence that is independent of human conditions.

I’m not seeing the truth of that. Can you explain a bit more detail? Why would a ontology necessarily lead to the existence of a “God”? Being an ontologist, I am a little curious.

Metaphysics is a very broad field, and metaphysicians attempt to answer questions about how the world is; ontology is a related sub-field that answers questions pertaining to what things exist in the world. An ontological narrative serves the same purpose as myth: it tells us how be in the world and how to relate to it. The prevailing modern myth is secular scientism – a metaphysics devoid of living First Principles. It’s rich in factual knowledge, but very, very poor in it ability to tell us how to live and relate.

Ships are safe in their harbors, but that’s not what they’re for. Once we knowingly set foot on a metaphysical path to discover the nature of Ultimate Reality, the reality of First Principles, there is the “danger” that we might want to find meaning in the quality of existence. And quality, being a matter of mind interpretation, represents an estimate of values and must, therefore, remain an experience of the individual. Interactions can be had between nonpersonal things, but not companionship. Companionship cannot be enjoyed unless both are persons. Only personalities can commune with each other. The concept of truth might possibly be entertained apart from personality, the concept of beauty may exist without personality, but the qualative concept of goodness is understandable only in relation to divine personality.

This is what Prismatic fears.

Well, that was very well put and in general would seem to be true. People do tend to either fall toward an anthropomorphic God or First Principle God. But I have to disagree that it is of necessity that values and quality of life cannot be understood through impersonal principles. Just because they didn’t, does mean that we can’t. My own Affectance Ontology bridges that gap, as has been brought up here in RM:AO - EM:DE.

And in here Where Does Meaning Come From?

And quite a few other threads.

Well, I guess I don’t understand it. The highlighted are my concerns about your philosophy. The first has to do with certainty. Certainty is an illusion. It imprisons us and closes the doors of perception to the unlimited possibilities before us. Linked to the human need to belong, which is driven the fundamental anxiety Prismatic talks about, it establishes rivalrous interests. Read the article I linked to at Psychology Today.

While true to some extent, my second concern is that it has the same as problem Prismatic’s idea of “evil”: it rests firmly on a foundation of thin air. There’s no there there. There’s nothing to facilitate fellowship except personal interests.

The last fails to distinguish between values and things that have value. Values (for finite beings) are indeed relative and subjective, but relative to what? Values are utterly meaningless without an Absolute or ideal against which they can be measured.

No doubt. It takes considerably more than a superficial revue to understand such things, whether they be worth while or not.

Emm… certain about that, are you? Perhaps a presumptuous illusion?

That is the second time I have noted you claim a falsehood based upon your prediction of how people would handle the thought; “If it leads to people behaving the foolish way that I think they will, then it must be a false theory.

That one, I will have to completely disagree with and ask for your evidence.

Actually, I explicitly pointed out both of those concerns and their relation to each other as well as to the make of the universe itself.

As is often the case, you appear to be guilty of your own accusations; you are claiming certainty that something can’t be done and even the certainty that one can’t be certain of anything such as to maintain the status quo “illusion”.

But this isn’t the thread to bandy this topic.

And the point being that the ontology did not lead to claims about a “God” character. Einstein’s General Relativity is also an ontology, involving the warping of spacetime and makes no mention of God, nor does the Quantum Physics ontology of the Standard Model.

Well, either I don’t understand what you’re saying, or I’m seeing something you are not. (Beware of philosophy’s hidden implications.)

As is often the case, you appear to be guilty of your own accusations: you, too, are claiming certainty. :angry-argument: Com’on, let’s not be childish about it. Each of us is confident in what we believe. So what? I don’t think either one of us do what so many others here do, which is to sit back and wait for truth to come to us in the form of evidence.

You’re conflating physics and metaphysics.

No, no. I didn’t say that one cannot be certain. I teach quite the opposite. So no, I’m not guilty of my accusation in that way … perhaps in some other way.

All that said was “Without a reason, make no judgement.
Of course not (although a rarity to actually do).

Personally, I never expect anyone to accept anything that I say without me providing a reason. And more than that, if they do not accept something that I say, it can only be that I did not provide the right kind of reason for them. The problem is, as you mentioned, most people don’t actually seek out or even listen to reasons, but rather merely want to make snap, superficial decisions and go about preaching their opinion. And that seems to be the case concerning this thread; " I did my part. All objectors are childish and ignorant.".

No. The metaphysics of General Relativity proposes an ontological foundation that space and time “warp”/“contract”/“dilate”. The physics then describes the relations involved, the equations concerning how much.

Classical Newtonian physics involves the motions of items within a space described by the ontology of Newton’s Laws of Motion. It is an ontology of rigid bodies, forces, and scaler velocities (It’s claim as to the nature of being and existence). The Newtonian metaphysics has no room for “bending space” as in General Relativity (“gravitational force” doesn’t exist in Relativity). The question as to whether space bends is an ontological question, from which physics equations can be derived in order to give detail concerning the specifics. As it turns out, neither ontology is true to reality, but that is another issue. They are both “physics” based upon their own “metaphysics” presumptions.

One cannot have a physics without there being an underpinning metaphysics.

That’s the problem.

True. And the underpinning metaphysics of physics is the belief that the “scientific method” is valid.

Anselm of Canterbury said something very poignant: “For I do not seek to understand in order that I may believe, but I believe in order to understand.” Felt values are among the things I want to understand, and “that unless I believe I shall not understand.”

Search deep enough, and it is a dilemma all of us will encounter. We all want to belong to something bigger than ourselves, and only a person can love and be loved. Only a person can give us solace without being in denial.

What is meant is,
in general, the term ‘ontology’ ultimately leads to a discussion of the existence of God and thus ontological God.

From my awareness and experience the subject most related to ontology is God, the Soul, the Whole Universe or Whole Reality, the devil.
No philosopher would be interested in discussing the ontological existence of an apple or a ball. By default the term ‘ontology’ is restricted to things beyond the empirical, which is metaphysical [more so the empirical impossible].

Any attempt to bring in ‘ontology’ to relate the empirical or anything scientific [like JSS] is trying to be rhetorical and deceptive.

The central theme of discussion related to ‘ontology’ is about whether an existence is absolute independent of human conditions [philosophical realism] or interdependent with human conditions.

Theists will claim God has an ontological existence in the sense God who created humans is absolutely independent from humans. Some theists will claim the Soul has an independent existence and will survive after physical death.

I claim the the ideas of God, Soul and ‘Whole Universe created by God’ is not independent but interdependent with the human conditions. In this senses, God exists only as conditioned by human psychological factors, i.e. no humans no God.

Good post. =D> It reminds me of an article I read:

For many theists, it’s not that that there is absolute independence, but that God is ontologically different; i.e., non-contingent as opposed to contingent.

Existence (the fact or state of continued being) is axiomatic (meaning that it does not rest upon anything in order to be valid, and it cannot be proven by any “more basic” premises) because it is necessary for all knowledge and it cannot be denied without conceding its truth (a denial of something is only possible if existence exists). “Existence exists” is therefore an axiom which states that there is something, as opposed to nothing. Theists argue that God is that existence. True, it’s not a predicate – it doesn’t say anything about God, but with it comes a whole slew of philosophical implications and ramifications.

Non-contingent is independent, but for God it has to be absolutely independent as theists [to be certain] would want the existence of God to be conditioned by anything in relation to humans.

Existence is axiomatic because you and others of the like agree, said so and insist upon it.

Kant argued ‘exist’ cannot be a predicate.
God exists… must be predicated on something, else it is groundless.
Existence exists … must also be predicated and qualified to something.

When we state ‘that apple exists’ there is a default of of a whole ‘slew of philosophical implications and ramifications’ within a Framework and System, but ultimately its truth must be justified empirically & rationally. There is no credible justification basis for reality other than the empirical-rational basis.

Thus for ‘God exists’ to be credible, it must be justified within empirical-rational basis. The next best basis is a justification by pure reason without empirical basis which in the case of ‘God’ the conclusion is illusory.

The only empirical-rational basis for ‘God’ is, it is only a thought and has truth relative to the psychology of a human being. The idea of God has psychological utility.

Let’s consider something…

The act of walking is static, a “platonic form”, yet it is also motion. Unmoved motion is a concept that has been used to describe reality for a long time, and perhaps it’s fine just to leave it at that.

No. Your certainty that it is a problem is the problem - denying your own consequent, "I am certain that one cannot be certain" - an oxymoron.

No, the scientific method is a Philosophy for discovery of false hypotheses. Science itself is not a metaphysics, but always presumes one. Get your terminology straight.

Are there forces and rigid bodies? That is an ontological issue. Science presumed that there were during the Newtonian days. Science discovered that ontology to be untrue to reality. Science still accepts the ontological elements of forces, but not rigid bodies. In reality, there are no forces either, but Science might get around to that one day.

Cartesian virtues are ontological elements that are accepted outside of Relativity. Relativity is an ontology of bending or warping what is normally thought of as straight in accord with how much energy is present, and thus non-Cartesian. That makes it a different ontological basis for physics. In certain circumstances, the Relativity ontology will yield absurd conclusions (such as a circumference being smaller than its diameter). Science is aware that Relativity doesn’t always work and thus as a whole, isn’t always true to reality, thus a false ontology, but useful at times.

Quantum Physics (not to be confused with Quantum Mechanics) has time moving forward and backward as well as existence itself depending upon observation. That is an ontological construct (nonsensical, but none the less their ontology). Very few physicists actually believe in the Quantum Physics ontology as a reality, but rather merely Quantum Mechanics as a useful tool for calculating average particle activity.

Science is always operating with a presumed ontology, even when it is already known that the ontology is “incomplete” or actually proven to be not always true.

Ancient scriptures have their ontology as well involving “spirits”, “devils”, “gods” and the like. It was merely their way of understanding the universe. When you properly translate their ontological elements into modern ontological terms, they can hardly be argued as nonsense; “spirit = behavior”, “devil = any cause of entropy”, “a god = an irrevocable principle”.

NONE of those ontologies, scientific or religious, actually truly fit reality. They are each maps with vague borders and limited use. But they are ontologies, none the less. Science itself is not an ontology, but merely a method.

And thus this claim:

… is a lie. Most modern ontologies are materialistic in nature and never discuss “God”.

And neither the use nor usefulness determines the truth of a chosen understanding/ontology. Whether the ontology of God and his angels is psychologically useful has nothing to do with the accuracy of such an ontological map. ALL current ontologies are untrue to reality, yet ALL are useful within their own scope and purpose.

Usefulness is the guide (which is why people lie). Truth is merely a compass. None of the current or ancient compasses are true, yet all are useful.

Why would absolute perfections as you define them be impossible? I realize that there are no perfect circles in nature, but that’s just because matter is too lumpy and fragile and moved by forces too chaotic to bring one about. There’s nothing inherently contradictory or incoherent about the concept of a physically existing perfect circle so far as I am aware.

More to the point [of the thread], cats don’t have an inherent biological capacity to ponder whether it is possible that a God, the God, my God does in fact exist.

They don’t have conflicting value judgments rooted in dasein either.

In other words, one can very well comprehend why those of our own species would ponder the existence of God. After all, look what is at stake. A font for morality on this side of the grave, and immortality, salvation and divine justice on the other side of it.

Provided of course that we do not live in an entirely determined universe.

On the other hand, why on earth would someone of our own species get into a debate over whether cats are actually able to grasp the existence of the internet.

Or, have I entirely missed your point, James?

If so, try to reconfigure it.