Okay, but here and now, given the aim of this thread, one either does or does not believe in God and/or religion. And, if they do, this belief will almost certainly impact on the behaviors they choose on this side of the grave. Morality here and now, immortality there and then.
So, as close as you are able configure this into your own embodied frame of mind “here and now” how, in a particular context, do you go about choosing one set of behaviors rather than another?
In other words, to the best of your ability, explain how being an “agnostic” may or may not be the equivalent of my feeling “fractured and fragmented”? How could agnosticsim – again, given what is at stake – not precipitate that sense of feeling drawn and quartered when “I” is confronted with “doing the right thing”?
In other words…
But, again, the whole point of this thread is to focus the beam in on those who sustain their own meta-understanding of themselves in the world around them through one or another religious denomination.
How, for all practical purposes, does that “work” for them when confronted with conflicting goods? And how do they see their “self” here in a way that is not construed as being “derived from an existential contraption rooted in the lives [experiences, relationships, ideas etc. ] they have lived rooted in dasein”.
They – you – will either go there or not. And, sure, your own explanation above is perfectly exceptable to me. But then this thread wasn’t created for agnostics, but for believers.
Okay, let’s focus in on a particular context relating to human morality here and now and human immortality there and then and explore how the words absolute and necessary might or might not be related in this context to things deemed either to be meaningful or meaningless.
You choose the situation.
Well, from my perspective, in a No God/No religion world, necessary and essential meaning applied to human interactions in the is/ought world is different from necessary and essential meaning relating to interactions in the either/or world.
That’s why we need to take these “general description intellectual contraptions” out into the world of flesh and blood human interactions.
Although, sure, I may well be completely misunderstanding what your own general description intellectual contraption means on/in that post.
The obvious answer is that a religious person, a spiritual person, a believer, sees dasein [experiences, relationships, ideas etc. ] as something that comes intentionally from God. It’s not just some random shit.
If “I” revolves around only that which an omniscient/omnipotent God intends, then how on Earth can it be said that “I” have any actual free will at all?
But: my point is that the obscurity here is derived all the more from the fact that you go on making a distinction between these words up in the clouds of abstraction.
Necessary or contingent, absolute or relative, essential or existential meaning in regard to what set of circumstances? As those circumstance relate to morality here and now and immortality there and then?
Over and again, I note that even in regard to “I” in the either/or world, there is that gap between what we seem able to know about ourselves objectively – biology, demographics, empirical facts etc. – and an objective understaning of how that all fits into a thorough understanding of existence itself.
We don’t even know beyond any and all doubt if we embody actual free will in this exchange!
Or, okay, “I” don’t.
Let alone the part where we are able to encompass a complete understanding of “I” grappling with morality here and now and immortality there and then…through God and/or religion.
On a thread like this.
Unless, of course, that’s just me. Maybe others have encompassed this understanding. Maybe I will come upon one here at ILP.
And how on earth would one – I, you, anyone – know that?!! We’re all in the same boat here: “They give birth astride of a grave, the light gleams an instant, then it’s night once more”…“Where I am, I don’t know, I’ll never know, in the silence you don’t know, you must go on, I can’t go on, I’ll go on”.
So, sure, some find their own antidote here in God and religion. Either in being brainwashed by others as children or in groping with questions of this sort on their own as philosophers in places like this.
So, okay, to them I say, “tell me about it”. How do others connect the dots between here and now and there and then given their own understanding of God and religion. In all earnestness, polemics aside.
Look, I set aside a few hours a day groping with and then grappling to understand questions of this sort. Why? Because the stakes couldn’t be higher. But I’m running out of time. So I also set aside many more hours a day for things – distractions – that take me away from these things and bring me enormous amounts of existential fulfillment and satisfaction. That part doesn’t go away just because I construe life as being essentially meaningless in a No God world.
But there it is – oblivion – getting closer and closer. No more “fulfillment and satisfaction” of any kind ever again. Unless someone in a place like this is in fact actually able to link their arguments to demonstrable proof that practicing objective morality on their path here and now can bring about immortality [and even salvation] there and then.
Sorry, I can’t explain it better than not. Not even to myself.
On the other hand, let me say that posts like this from you are actually a pleasure to read. You note what I construe to be important points that actually prompt me to think through my own. And I truly do appreciate that. Above you are not only not Curly, you’re not even a stooge.
Thank you. You say the stakes are high. So you still hold onto the possibility of an afterlife AND the possibility that you can know what to do today with respect to it?
It may interest you to know that according to American New Testament scholar, Bart Ehrman :
What’s New About The New Atheism?
Victor Stenger answers the question.
Sure, as long as the discussions unfold in a series of intellectual contraptions, scientists and theologians can speculate endlessly about their “domains”. One working from one end, another from the other. But sooner or later both have to weigh in on extant sets of circumstances in which some insist that one set of behaviors bodes well for the soul down the road while others insist it is an entirely different set of behaviors. And, as well, they both have to come together to announce any actual evidence that “down the road” includes immortality and salvation.
Until then we are left only with more or less intelligent speculations in assessments like this.
That’s certainly how it can all unfold for any particular scientist or theologian. A mental construct is anchored to a mind such that both can fall back on the possibility that science and religion are two sides of the same coin. As long as the actual reality of human interactions is kept to a minimum up on the pulpit and in the lab. Theoretically, morality and immortality can be conceived as intertwined in any number if “assessments”. So, let’s just leave it at that.
Then this in itself becomes embedded in an intellectual contraption:
You know where I would take this particular “world of words”.
Seriously, what point is he making that someone here might find applicable to their own life in regard to God and religion? What scientific matters do those who are faithful to the Abrahamic religions constantly deal with? And if scientists are not prohibited from delving into “ultimate meanings and morals”, cite some examples of this. Whether as a scientist, an ecclesiastic or a philosopher, we all have our own reactions to “observable phenomena” day in and day out.
But not all of us share the same reactions. That’s the part that interest me. Why this “I” and not that “I”.
Once again a mind-boggling – surreal! – intellectual contraption about God that in no way, shape or form even makes an attempt to demonstrate that it is grounded in anything other serial assumptions that circle around and around and around each other.
I know why people want to believe things like this, but it still amazes me how someone is able to actually think themselves into believing that God creates atoms as building blocks that, through evolution, configure into things like covid-19…and then blame the staggering suffering this disease has caused on the atoms themselves!!
What’s New About The New Atheism?
Victor Stenger answers the question.
On the other hand, come on, would not someone who genuinely believed in a God, the God, my God, not rationalize any and all behaviors in the name of God? Think about it: If what you do here and now is judged by God as the only way in which you can attain immortality and salvation there and then, would not attempts to water down the Scripture be deemed sacrilegious? And rightfully. After all, if others do not join you in worshipping and adoring the one true God [yours] are they not inherently a danger? Could they not, perhaps, corrupt your own youth by touting the false God? Or No God.
Either my religion does revolve around the real me [my soul] in sync with the right thing to do [the will of God], or I can never really be certain how to achieve immortality and salvation.
That assessment of religion has always seemed to be the most reasonable one to me. And, again, precisely because of all that is at stake here if you get it wrong. That’s why based on my own experience with religious men and women over the years, many might have professed to have faith in God, but that’s not really what they believed at all. It’s not faith, it’s certainty.
And, if believing that human existence is not just an essentially meaningless trek to oblivion, the closer you get to certainty, the more comforted and consoled that you are.
Thus…
That is clearly the aim of any number of evangelicals here. But I wouldn’t call this faith. On the contrary, the attempts to politicize religion seems to revolve almost entirely around the absolute certainty that Jesus is coming back. And thus that God must exist.
Blind faith?
And while folks like Trump and his crony capitalist ilk will merely mold and manipulate them into sustaining their own “show me the money” rendition of nihilism, all that really matters in the end is the extent to which they can sustain it. Perhaps all the way to fascism itself.
In the beginning was… Dharma. Dharma is not bound to any one religion or sect…
I doubt we all ponder daily about our fate, but probably do about daily morality and living for longevity. That is my reply, to my interpretation, of your inquiry.
Haven’t you recently been called fatalistic, here, at ILP? I recently learned about a new term… the term ‘OCD thoughts’ …it’s more common than you’d think… perhaps you think constant (OCD) thoughts, such as fatalism and deasin? I’m sure we all have our own…
What’s New About The New Atheism?
Victor Stenger answers the question.
Again, in my view, it’s not really faith we are dealing with in regard to most “God world” folks. Or, rather, in all my years of interacting with them [from both sides] it wasn’t. It is all but rock solid belief that there is a God, the God. And that of necessity it was/is their own God.
Now, I’m sure in times of travail, doubts crept in for some. And I’ve known a few who, like me, pulled out of it completely. But must were way beyond faith. Especially when they are willing to divide the world up [politically] between the righteous and infidels.
And that’s where the danger lies. In objectivism linked to God linked to an authoritarian political agenda. Up to and including the theocrats. And, up to a point, even to those secularists who treat one or another ideology or humanism as the equivalent of religion.
On the other hand, the argument goes, are not the New Atheists more or less in the same boat? Only their own understanding of God and religion is allowed to prevail in any particular discussion. Here, there, everywhere.
Sure, go ahead, challenge it. But the bottom line never goes away: moral nihilism and oblivion. Or, yeah, my own bottom line anyway. Ever and always the atheists [old and new] are stuck there. They somehow have to convince the faithful and the true believers to abandon all hope of immortality and salvation. And to abandon all attempts to propound a moral agenda that can never be more than one or another hopelessly tangled/problematic rendition of “moderation, negotiation and compromise”.
Unless, of course, as with folks like Sam Harris, you actually attempt to connect the dots between morality and science. And how is that not for all practical purposes pretty much the same thing? Okay, you won’t go to Heaven for doing the right thing “down here”, but at least science is there to tell you what all rational and virtuous folks are obligated to choose in regards to, say, abortion?
Clearly, taking into account the actual social, political and economic “situation” in which suggestions like this might be pertinent, the arguments that I raise don’t go away.
Or, perhaps, not so clearly at all? Well, all I can do here is to hear out those who see it all differently. And hope that those who still have faith in or firmly believe in God are willing to explore how that impacts the behaviors that they do choose in regard to conflicting goods “out in the world”.
As I noted previously, whether in regard to an actual religious denomination or to any other “spiritual” path, the aim of this thread is to explore the manner in which those who espouse either connect the dots existentially between the behaviors they choose on this side of the grave and what they believe the fate of “I” will be on the other side of it.
[b]Dharma: (in Indian religion) the eternal and inherent nature of reality, regarded in Hinduism as a cosmic law underlying right behavior and social order.
(in Buddhism) the nature of reality regarded as a universal truth taught by the Buddha; the teaching of Buddhism.
an aspect of truth or reality.[/b]
How do you understand Dharma and how is it pertinent to the behaviors that you choose insofar as you understand the relationship between morality here and now and immortality there and then.
What’s New About The New Atheism?
Victor Stenger answers the question.
In a word: Huh?
Or, rather, the word that pops into my own head in reacting to “critiques” of this sort.
Think about it…
Does this or does this not sum up succinctly – for most, compellingly – why religion is still embraced by the preponderance of human beings around the globe. This is precisely the mindset that a leap of faith can provide members of the flock.
And one reason that atheists – old or new – often fail to break it down is precisely because there is no secular alternative to God. None, in any event, that comes even close to providing the same measure of comfort and consolation.
Not only that but historically there have been any number of secular alternatives that have revolved around such things as survival of the fittest, political ideology, scientism, nihilism and the like. And, ironically enough, these folks have often succeeded in bringing about only greater human pain and suffering.
And then the part about oblivion to boot.
Nope. From my frame of mind the only possible way to construe “the best of all possible worlds” sans God is in one or another political manifestation of moderation, negotiation and compromise. And look at all the turmoil that ever and always brings with it.
Not to mention the fractured and fragmented personalities like mine.
But of course Dharma sprang from other, previous, geo-political concepts, all of which precede indigenous Indic religions… religions having adopted Them. Chicken/egg / politics/religion dichotomy, solved… for India anyway.
I simply, absorb… do… and be, within the moral boundaries I set myself, which are derived from the expectations I have of myself.
What’s New About The New Atheism?
Victor Stenger answers the question.
Again, as soon as you take words of this sort out into the world of human interactions, the very meaning of the word coherent itself when made applicable to the behaviors we choose becomes increasingly more problematic. Believe in a particular God in a particular way and almost anything can be rationalized as intelligent, rational, sound.
Same with any number of secular beliefs. Interpret a political ideology or an assessment of nature to mean [and only to mean] either this or that and everyone becomes fair game: sexism, heterosexism racism, ethnocentrism.
All one needs here is the font.
On the other hand – and for all practical purposes – that is at least an answer. And it is one more than the atheists [old or new] have. They also have other “answers”: the Devil, free will, human evil. The point being to have an answer. In other words, when the alternative is an essentially meaningless existence, senseless suffering and oblivion.
This however is [to me] just another “world of words” in a philosophy magazine. Actual religionists across time historically and across the globe culturally, are able to construct and then reconstruct all manner of complex rationalizations able to make their actual lived sense of reality far more sophisticated. Given, among other things, the very different lives they have to work from.
Still, the true believer is able to convince herself that whatever God’s purpose might be in taking a loved one from her, the loved one is now with God as, in time, she will be too. And given how easy it can be for mere mortals to rationalize their behaviors, the fear of God for many is anything but “constant”. For some, you confess your sins, are forgiven, and go about the business of rationalizing more behaviors still. Between treks to the church on the Sabbath.
The behaviours I choose in life, are not based on my thoughts of the resulting consequences in my demise… why do you ponder on the resultant aspect so?
Even at the height of my allergy-induced illness, the only time such thoughts ever crossed my mind was when my health would dip dangerously low to the point of forcing my mind to ‘go there’ …but otherwise I didn’t and don’t, so why does yours constantly do?
I don’t practice my Dharma with an end result in mind… I guess I do have Ṛta (/ˈrɪtə/; Sanskrit ऋत ṛta “order, rule; truth”) in mind, and simply hope for the best.
this is an interesting read, but you may have come across it before.
Well, as I have noted time and again, I created this thread because my own fractured and fragmented “self” is unable to move much beyond human identity as the embodiment of “I” reflecting political prejudices rooted in dasein as an existential contraption. Why? Because I speculate further that in a No God world, human existence appears to me to be but an essentially meaningless trek from the cradle to the grave. Ending in oblivion.
On the other hand, those who choose God and/or religion as a font onto/into which they can anchor “I”, think about these things very differently.
So, this thread was created in order for them to note just how differently they think about them.
If, however, connecting the dots existentially between morality here and now and immortality there and then is of little or no interest to you, I’d suggest you not participate in the discussions here. Because that is invariably what I will tug the exchanges back to.
What’s New About The New Atheism?
Victor Stenger answers the question.
Talk about an existential contraption. Talk about needing an actual context.
Sure, if your life is bursting with all manner satisfaction and fulfillment. If you are young and healthy and a million miles away from death. If you are in fact reveling in the freedom to think your own thoughts, to live your own life on your own terms, God and religion can be shunted off to the back burner.
But let things start to crumble and the diagnosis be terminal and what’s all that vaunted freedom mean then? It’s not for nothing that most churches attract the old and the infirm. When meaning in your life sinks down into the circumstantial hole that you are now in and the only alternative is oblivion, being a freedom loving atheist can itself be of little consolation.
As though this sort of “rational assessment” actually sinks in with those who recognize God and religion basically as an embodiment of Pascal’s wager. It just depends on how conscious one is that this is all it is. A leap of faith. A leap that really is just that: a leap of faith.
Again, and that’s before we get to the part that Marx preferred tp stress. God used as a political devise to sustain the interest of the rich and powerful. “Keep them doped with religion” as John Lennon once assessed it.
And any number of children in any number of communities around the globe continue to be indoctrinated to sustain a belief in one or another religious dogma. And, in part, because science and the secularists still have nothing even remotely as comforting for the kids as morality here and now and immortality there and then.
