Anyone here seen a ghost, UFO, or other strange entity?

+++Okay, that sounds good. And, if it pertains to human ghosts, you won’t find many more eager than me to be convinced that they may well exist. Better perhaps to be a ghost than for “I” to be obliterated for all of eternity on its way back to “star stuff”.+++

Well, to be honest, you didn’t seem all that bothered, so I feel disinclined to put myself out trying to organise it. If you want to experience something, you’ll have to go out and experience it for yourself. I’m always happy to offer advice and suggestions about that.

+++Without going into great detail, I’ll start with the first. Whenever I would get into discussions about death with others, I would often bring up the memory of my first close encounter with it. I was a boy crossing a train trestle with my cousin Bobby and a friend Ed. At the end of it I slipped and fell over the edge. I managed to grab onto a shrub and held on for dear life. And that is because if I fell I would tumble way, way down into a stream filled with jagged boulders. I would either suffer horrific injury or die. So my cousin ran to my Uncle John’s house [close by] and got him. He returns with a rope, lowers it, I grab onto it and he pulls me up. I’m saved.

I would often have dreams about it.

But…

One day, years later, my Granny died. My sister drove us up to the funeral. After the burial, I am in the local bar with my cousin, Eddie and others. The discussion got around to all of our adventures as kids. That’s when I mentioned the trestle. Well, my cousin and Eddie looked at me bewildered. They insisted that never happened at all. I was adamant that it did and back and forth we went. Finally, they took me to the trestle. Even if I had fallen off it the drop was no where near as steep as I imagined. And the “boulders” never existed. Just small stones and pebbles in a creek. At worst, I might have sprained my ankle.

Bottom line: I went to see Aunt Mary. My Uncle John had died but I knew there was no way he would have kept a life and death incident like that from her. But, no, he hadn’t told her of any such thing. So, I left Miners Mills the next day realizing that I was absolutely certain about something in my past that in fact had not happened.

So, what else in my memory was in part or wholly fabricated by my brain?+++

Sounds like it might have been a dream you had when you were little, which you later remembered as something real. I have some very early memories that I’m not really sure if they were dreams or not.

+++Okay, but how many people are willing to explore their own views as the existential embodiment of dasein? How many people are willing to risk coming to the conclusion that their own value judgments are not derived from God or “categorical imperatives” or political ideology or nature, but from what is ultimately a fractured and fragmented “I” given the assumptions that I make?

Not many that I’ve come across. Here or elsewhere. At least not out in the deep end of the philosophical pool.+++

It’s obvious that everyone’s views are based on their life experiences.

+++So, then you are basically suggesting that within an actual Pagan community, they practive “moderation, negotiation and compromise”. If, in interacting with nature, they come to embody their own personal sense of being a “moral person” then in regard to issues like abortion or animal rights or gun ownership or Brexit or vaccination or gender roles or social justice or the role of government etc., the “might makes right” or “right makes might” approach to the actual “rules of behavior” in the community is rejected They all come together instead to work out a kind of “best of all possible worlds” approach to community interactions?

And the part where I root value judgments existentially, in dasein, in the lives we live…that just never comes up?+++

There is no “moderation, negotiation and compromise” and no one comes together to work out any value judgments. When Pagans organise events its not for the purpose of talking, but rather, of doing things. There are no “rules of behaviour” in the Pagan community as a whole, and I can safely say that the subject of “dasein” never, ever comes up.

+++A classic example of the right makes might community. It is thought by those who lead the community that only particular behaviors are allowed. And this is derived from their own particular objectivist font. On the other hand, this sort of community can be become indistinguishable from the might makes right community. Certain behaviors are either prescribed or proscribed but largely because those in power have the final say on what they are.

Either way, these communities appeal to many because they are generally authoritarian. Everyone has a place in the community and everyone had best know their place in the community. A rigid and ritualized order is established so that the members can anchor “I” to the One True Path.+++

If a particular Pagan group doesn’t want you, you can join another, or set up your own.

+++And, in regard to things like “strange entities”, the more I can seek out the experiences that others have, the more likely it is that I will gain a more sophisticated understanding of them.+++

You will not gain any genuine understanding of them simply by listening to others describe them, of that I’m sure.

+++Is this addressed to me?+++

Yes.

Yes, I saw a strange entity…

She has red hair and posts on ILP a lot.

That’s entirely up to you. I am particularly intrigued with anyone here able to provide me with evidence that human ghosts exist. For all the reasons I noted. So, if you ever do go down that road and find something especially intriguing, please let me know about it. As for focusing only on your own experiences here, we’ve discussed that in turn. Besides, given my current circumstances – remember my world being “imploded”? – that’s not really much of an option for me.

Maybe. It’s not something that I attempted to explore further. Shrink wise. All I know is that even to this day I still find it very, very difficult to believe my brain made it up. And, as well, why?

But then why is it not obvious to most that their moral and political and spiritual value judgments are derived in turn from their own unique existential trajectory? Instead, most cling to one or another transcending font: religion, ideology, deontology, nature.

You note that you are not an objectivist here. But: You acknowledge that your value judgments are derived from your past experiences; and that had those experiences been different your values might have been different; that you might not have ever encountered Paganism at all. In turn, you acknowledge that given new experiences or relationships or access to information and knowledge, you may well reject what you believe now.

Yet from my frame of mind there is a part of you that clearly construes this differently than I do. The part that sees Paganism and Nature and the Goddess as the equivalent of the One True Path. So, for all practical purposes, here and now, from my frame of mind, you might just as well be an objectivist.

Only I have to flat out acknowledge here that I am basing all of this given the gap between how I think about you and how you think about yourself. I scarcely know you at all when push comes to shove. That’s why I was once hoping we would become “virtual friends”…to close that gap.

Now, however, that doesn’t seem nearly as plausible to me. I think when I’m being honest with myself, my inclination is more in the way of bringing you down into the philosophical hole that I am in rather than in imaging you can perhaps succeed in bringing me up out of it spiritually.

This makes no sense to me. If John impregnates Jane in a Pagan community and, in communing with nature, he deems that a “moral person” should oppose abortion as unethical, while Jane, communing with nature, concludes that a “moral person” should accept abortion as ethical, what then unfolds in the community? Same with all the other moral issues embedded in conflicting goods.

Either someone in the community has the power to determine whether there will be a birth or an abortion, or someone in the community has the capacity to determine which is most ethical option or, one way or another, John and Jane work something out. Maybe abort this fetus but give birth to the next when things change for Jane and she wants to give birth.

Thus:

Okay, but that doesn’t make my point above go away. Just because you join another community doesn’t make the conflicting goods go away. Jane joins a new community, gets pregnant but this time the new man also wants to shred the unborn fetus into oblivion? Okay, but then Jane is a staunch believer in the right to bear arms and her new man is a fierce opponent of it. And there are dozens and dozens of potential conflicts in any community.

Indeed, that’s why I am so adamant about going beyond mere description of strange entities and making every possible effort to actually demonstrate them to others. But since so many different people can experience them in so many different ways, going beyond the narrow parameters of your own life would seem to the more reasonable approach.

What on earth did I do to make you think that I was not interested?

+++That’s entirely up to you. I am particularly intrigued with anyone here able to provide me with evidence that human ghosts exist. For all the reasons I noted. So, if you ever do go down that road and find something especially intriguing, please let me know about it. As for focusing only on your own experiences here, we’ve discussed that in turn. Besides, given my current circumstances – remember my world being “imploded”? – that’s not really much of an option for me.+++

If you want evidence, you’ll need to go out and experience it yourself. That’s the bottom line, really. Whether you choose to or not is entirely up to you.

+++But then why is it not obvious to most that their moral and political and spiritual value judgments are derived in turn from their own unique existential trajectory? Instead, most cling to one or another transcending font: religion, ideology, deontology, nature.

You note that you are not an objectivist here. But: You acknowledge that your value judgments are derived from your past experiences; and that had those experiences been different your values might have been different; that you might not have ever encountered Paganism at all. In turn, you acknowledge that given new experiences or relationships or access to information and knowledge, you may well reject what you believe now.

Yet from my frame of mind there is a part of you that clearly construes this differently than I do. The part that sees Paganism and Nature and the Goddess as the equivalent of the One True Path. So, for all practical purposes, here and now, from my frame of mind, you might just as well be an objectivist.+++

I don’t regard my own particular path as a one true path. In fact, the concept of a one true path is explicitly contradicted by my opinion that everyone has their own path, which I’ve stated many times. And one’s own path meanders around in all sorts of ways. I think you’re assuming that just because I have a different opinion to you on these matters, then I must be an objectivist.

+++Only I have to flat out acknowledge here that I am basing all of this given the gap between how I think about you and how you think about yourself. I scarcely know you at all when push comes to shove. That’s why I was once hoping we would become “virtual friends”…to close that gap.

Now, however, that doesn’t seem nearly as plausible to me. I think when I’m being honest with myself, my inclination is more in the way of bringing you down into the philosophical hole that I am in rather than in imaging you can perhaps succeed in bringing me up out of it spiritually.+++

Repeatedly and angrily accusing someone of not wanting to talk to you will tend to do that. But, you know, I’m not perfect, and I do have a quick temper at times.

As for dragging me down into your hole, let me assure you that it’s not going to happen.

+++This makes no sense to me. If John impregnates Jane in a Pagan community and, in communing with nature, he deems that a “moral person” should oppose abortion as unethical, while Jane, communing with nature, concludes that a “moral person” should accept abortion as ethical, what then unfolds in the community? Same with all the other moral issues embedded in conflicting goods.

Either someone in the community has the power to determine whether there will be a birth or an abortion, or someone in the community has the capacity to determine which is most ethical option or, one way or another, John and Jane work something out. Maybe abort this fetus but give birth to the next when things change for Jane and she wants to give birth.+++

No one in the Pagan community as a whole has that power. If John and Jane can’t work something out between themselves, then the most likely scenario is that Jane will have the abortion whether John wants her to or not, and there’s nothing he can do about it.

+++Okay, but that doesn’t make my point above go away. Just because you join another community doesn’t make the conflicting goods go away. Jane joins a new community, gets pregnant but this time the new man also wants to shred the unborn fetus into oblivion? Okay, but then Jane is a staunch believer in the right to bear arms and her new man is a fierce opponent of it. And there are dozens and dozens of potential conflicts in any community.+++

And countless different groups to join. Or if not, you can practice on your own.

+++Indeed, that’s why I am so adamant about going beyond mere description of strange entities and making every possible effort to actually demonstrate them to others. But since so many different people can experience them in so many different ways, going beyond the narrow parameters of your own life would seem to the more reasonable approach.

What on earth did I do to make you think that I was not interested?+++

Your enthusiasm seemed a bit underwhelming.

So, what, if we do have a personal experience with ghosts, it wouldn’t be the experiences of others, so why share our experiences at all? The bottom line is obviously intertwining both frames of mind and aiding and abetting each other in getting a fully picture.

And here you are not able to see what you experience and so dependent on others who can to add that element to your own understanding.

When someone speaks to me of encountering a Goddess in nature that enables them to become a moral person, I bring up the points I raise above. What would interest me is a more deep-seated attempt on your part to square your own understanding of being a “moral person” on a path that is profoundly personal, existential, subjective, subjunctive etc., while acknowledging that the only reason you are on this path does revolve around the points I make in regard to the past, the present and the future.

You accept that your moral values are derived largely from the your own particular past…a past that brought you into contact with Paganism but might not have. And if it’s a path that you might fall off of given new experiences, what does it really mean to speak of morality here for all practical purposes.

I’m trying to imagine you raising the points I make with other Pagans and pondering their reactions.

While accepting this:

That’s your assessment of what is going on between us. It’s certainly not mine. I’m trying to draw you down deeper into what I construe to be the philosophical pool. And it is because I respect both your intelligence and your curiosity about the world we live in that I hold out at least some hope of you bringing me up out of the hole or me bringing you down into it.

Then here you are contradicting yourself. You acknowledged before that given new experiences, new relationships and access to new information and knowledge you might come to change your mind about either Paganism or my own philosophical assumptions. But now you are insisting that’s not true at all. You just know that will never happen. Just as I once knew that I would never stop being a Christian or a Marxist or a social-democrat or an existentialist. Or that I just knew I could never be a moral nihilist.

Perhaps you should just sever contact with me once and for all. Why take chances when you are on a spiritual path that does provide you with so much comfort and consolation as a Pagan.

I’ll understand that.

On, and let me add this…

I don’t construe myself as “dragging you down” into the hole I’m in. Instead, I attempt to offer reasons why being down in the hole seems reasonable to me in a No God world. Though, admittedly, as a natural born polemicist, I do have a tendency toward provocative exchanges.

So, Jane draws her moral convictions from nature and kills the unborn fetus. Ethically. John draws his moral convictions from nature and insist that is unethical. But with no leader around to either enforce a might makes right or a right makes might resolution, Jane exercises the power all her own and flushes both the fetus and John’s own moral conviction down the toilet.

i would of course be curious if you would take my objections above to other Pagans that you interact with. Garner their own reactions.

Okay, but, again, that doesn’t make my points above go away. And in my own personal opinion you are not really addressing them in depth.

Or, sure, just agree to disagree. You’re right from your side, I’m right from mine.

Based on what? The responses I give to the points your raise seem [to me] considerably more drawn out than the responses that you give to mine.

+++So, what, if we do have a personal experience with ghosts, it wouldn’t be the experiences of others, so why share our experiences at all? The bottom line is obviously intertwining both frames of mind and aiding and abetting each other in getting a fully picture.

And here you are not able to see what you experience and so dependent on others who can to add that element to your own understanding.+++

Talking about these experiences and sharing them, and sharing ideas about them, is clearly a good thing. But just talking about them, without experiencing them, will not be very productive.

+++When someone speaks to me of encountering a Goddess in nature that enables them to become a moral person, I bring up the points I raise above. What would interest me is a more deep-seated attempt on your part to square your own understanding of being a “moral person” on a path that is profoundly personal, existential, subjective, subjunctive etc., while acknowledging that the only reason you are on this path does revolve around the points I make in regard to the past, the present and the future.

You accept that your moral values are derived largely from the your own particular past…a past that brought you into contact with Paganism but might not have. And if it’s a path that you might fall off of given new experiences, what does it really mean to speak of morality here for all practical purposes.

I’m trying to imagine you raising the points I make with other Pagans and pondering their reactions.+++

I tend to respond in the manner that I’m being addressed. So if you ask me some specific questions, I’ll try and answer them. Bear in mind that whenever I’ve told you things about my opinions and what I do, both in relation to Paganism and my life in general, it has been in response to something you’ve asked.

+++That’s your assessment of what is going on between us. It’s certainly not mine. I’m trying to draw you down deeper into what I construe to be the philosophical pool. And it is because I respect both your intelligence and your curiosity about the world we live in that I hold out at least some hope of you bringing me up out of the hole or me bringing you down into it.+++

If you want me to respond more fully and openly, then try and be less antagonistic and accusatory.

+++Then here you are contradicting yourself. You acknowledged before that given new experiences, new relationships and access to new information and knowledge you might come to change your mind about either Paganism or my own philosophical assumptions. But now you are insisting that’s not true at all. You just know that will never happen. Just as I once knew that I would never stop being a Christian or a Marxist or a social-democrat or an existentialist. Or that I just knew I could never be a moral nihilist.+++

It’s certainly possible that my opinions about this or that aspect of Paganism, or indeed about anything, might evolve and change over my life. After all, they have already. But one thing I can say for sure is that I’ll never become a nihilist. It’s not in my nature. I’m very much a glass half full sort of person, an eternal optimist. Nihilism seems the very antithesis of that. You say that nihilism gives you freedom, but you never tire of complaining about your life being fragmented, and how you’re stuck in your flat all the time never doing anything. This doesn’t sound much like freedom to me.

It’s also worth adding that mere words are very unlikely to change my opinions on anything at all, from the trivial to the profound. Only experience can do that.

+++Perhaps you should just sever contact with me once and for all. Why take chances when you are on a spiritual path that does provide you with so much comfort and consolation as a Pagan.

I’ll understand that.+++

If I ever block you, it won’t be because of your attempts to convert me. The only reason I block people is lack of respect towards me. Having said that, I’ve only ever actually blocked one person, but since he’s the one with the million-and-one accounts, it made no difference.

+++I don’t construe myself as “dragging you down” into the hole I’m in. Instead, I attempt to offer reasons why being down in the hole seems reasonable to me in a No God world. Though, admittedly, as a natural born polemicist, I do have a tendency toward provocative exchanges.+++

Your attempts to convert people to nihilism remind me very much of religious zeal, which is also something that is not in my nature.

I do have a question, though. Does the reason why you considered me a suitable candidate for conversion have anything to do with me being blind? Please be assured that as long as your answer is honest, it won’t offend me.

+++So, Jane draws her moral convictions from nature and kills the unborn fetus. Ethically. John draws his moral convictions from nature and insist that is unethical. But with no leader around to either enforce a might makes right or a right makes might resolution, Jane exercises the power all her own and flushes both the fetus and John’s own moral conviction down the toilet.+++

Correct.

+++i would of course be curious if you would take my objections above to other Pagans that you interact with. Garner their own reactions.+++

Perhaps you should join some Pagan forums and ask them yourself.

+++Okay, but, again, that doesn’t make my points above go away. And in my own personal opinion you are not really addressing them in depth.

Or, sure, just agree to disagree. You’re right from your side, I’m right from mine.+++

Again, you need to be specific in what you’re asking. For ages now you have kept asking me the same question over and over again, namely, how does the Pagan community deal with conflicting ethical opinions (e.g. on abortion), but in response to my answer, that it doesn’t, you keep asking the same question again. If you want a different answer, ask a different question. If you want a longer, detailed answer, ask a more specific, practical question.

+++Based on what? The responses I give to the points your raise seem [to me] considerably more drawn out than the responses that you give to mine.+++

I was referring in particular to your suggestion that I should try and take a photo of any entity that I might encounter. After you first suggested it I told you of the potential issues involved but said that I’d give it more thought, as I found the idea intriguing. And then you pretty much forgot about it, or so it seemed to me, anyway. Since it would be a bit of a hassle to organise it I decided it wasn’t worth the bother.

True, but some of us have more options than others in being able experience certain things. My own in regard to exploring the existence of ghosts, ufo and strange entities is particularly limited. So basically I can only rely on those who do share their experiences and are able to provide me [and others] with an actual accumulation of evidence able to demonstrate that these things exist.

Well, my question is how certain can you be about Paganism when recognizing that there was always the possibility it would never have been a part of your life at all; and in recognizing that new experiences might convince you to abandon it altogether? You can think that it has made you a “moral person” but there are many, many people who are on completely different paths – hundreds of them – who are just as adamant that it is their path which makes someone a moral person.

And that with Paganism, it’s the same Mother Nature [and maybe the same God/Goddess] resulting in moral convictions that can be very much in conflict. I just have trouble wrapping my head around how you acquire a strong sense of moral rectitude when there are so many variables out there that could have led you, can lead you, might lead you to so many different paths instead.

I can only react to your posts as I do. I don’t think that I am consciously attempting to be antagonistic and accusatory. But there it is: my own spontaneous, subjective reaction to what I construe to be answers from you that don’t seem [to me] to be nearly as thought out as I was hoping for.

Though, sure, if you sincerely believe that my reactions to you is the actual problem here [and it may well be], we may be not be able to move beyond that. Lots of people here have problems with my posts so, yeah, I may well be the obstacle to better communication. But I am also inclined to think that the reaction of others here to a philosophy like mine revolves in turn around their discomfort that my “I” in the is/ought world, may be applicable to them as well.

“In your nature” in the manner in which, say, Satyr might encompass it. That, in fact, genes trump memes and those that do become moral nihilists are somehow contradicting the “natural order of things”?

Is there some genetic predisposition that particular individuals have to eschew nihilism. It’s in your genetic code not to be?

That for you it is simply not possible that new experiences, new relationships or access to new information and knowledge can ever alter the deep down inside Real You?

In other words, you just know this in the same way that you just know that your own personal experience with nature makes you a “moral person”.

Okay, there is certainly no way in which I can argue [let alone demonstrate] that this is not correct. Only the future itself will either bear or not bear this out.

No, I argue that given the arguments I make in the OPs here…

ilovephilosophy.com/viewtop … 1&t=176529
ilovephilosophy.com/viewtop … 5&t=185296
ilovephilosophy.com/viewtop … 1&t=194382

…“I” am not anchored to one or another moral font such that I am obligated to ever and always do “the right thing” or risk offending my God or Goddess or guru or comrades or mates or anyone else who is said to show me “the way”. The one true path either to enlightenment on this of the grave or to immortality and salvation on the other side of it.

And I’m “stuck” in my flat for health reasons that are “beyond my control”. And quite the contrary, the things that I do here are hardly “never doing anything”. The things that I do – philosophy, watching films, listening to music, reading books, exchanging emails with my virtual friends etc. – bring me enormous satisfaction.

Someone might just as well say that you are “stuck being blind”.

Okay, I hope it doesn’t come to that. I just know from vast experience over the years that my own philosophy of life often does disturb people. It’s not so much what I believe about identity, value judgments and political economy at particular existential junctures, as it is the concern that they might come to believe the same thing about their own now fully anchored Self. I meeting “I” for the first time and beginning to have doubts about just how solid their own sense of reality is.

Again, that’s your assessment of what I am doing here. My own assessment is considerably more complex and convoluted. And certainly more ambiguous. My “win/win” approach to these exchanges always takes into consideration both sides. Me coming up out of the hole because of something you convey to me or you coming down into it because of something I convey to you. Same with all the others here at ILP that I respect the intelligence of. Those like Bob and Felix and phyllo and pood and peter and zoots and Mr. Reasonable and Ierrellus.

Polemics aside of course.

No, not at all. And certainly not here at ILP. As I note over and again, my interest in philosophy – and ILP is a philosophy venue – revolves around…

1] the question, “how ought one to live [morally] in a world awash in both conflicting goods and contingency, chance and change”?
2] connecting the dots between “morality here and now” and “immortality there and then”
3] the truly mysterious “Big Questions”: why something instead of nothing? why this something and not something else? Also things like determinism, solipsism, sim worlds, dream worlds, the actual possibility of a Matrix reality.

Okay, I try to imagine taking “correct” to all of the members of the community, and then noting how “for all practical purposes” their community could sustain itself in regard to all of the many, many moral issues in which each member on his or her own personal path comes to completely conflicting ethical convictions.

Again, what was crucial in the Wicker Man was us against him. What if it becomes us against us?

Okay, would you recommend one. Are you involved with one. That way I could come to them through you…and not as just someone out of the blue.

On the other hand, I’d probably feel uncomfortable interacting with them virtually only in order to question their beliefs. That’s not what most such communities form for. Many are like families and the last thing they want is an interloper among them.

From my frame of mind there is not a human community on the face of the Earth that doesn’t deal with conflicting ethical opinions. And that is because conflicting ethical opinions often lead to conflicting behaviors that bring about very real consequences. To suggest that with Pagans this is somehow different doesn’t really answer my specific question of how this can even be possible.

They have to deal with situations in which members on their own personal paths with nature might come to opposite moral convictions in regard to abortion or gun ownership or gender roles or animal rights or the use of drugs or what constitutes criminal behavior or all the issues that revolve around human sexuality or what to teach kids or capitalism/socialism or where the individual stops and the community begins or issues of immigration…and all of the other moral and political conflagrations we hear about “on the news”.

It would not seem [to me] that Pagans are exempt from the potential for turmoil of this sort.

I’ve suffered from those too, except mine has nothing to do with visiting sacred places. I once quite audibly heard an impish laugh outside my window as clear as day, during daytime, while somebody was revving their outrageously loud engine. I’m pretty sure I had my window shut when I heard it. I have exceptionally good hearing, but not necessarily clairaudience.

When you visit these sacred places, have you ever fallen asleep in those sites? The Christians would lie down near cemeteries in hope of receiving visions while the ancient pagans would visit caves and natural places.

Do you often lose track of time, was there an eerie silence? Did you pay attention to the wind, was it blowing or not? Have the birds ever freaked out, are other living beings present or absent?

Which places in nature are you drawn to specifically? Also, were you ever drawn to the stars as a youth before learning astronomy?

Interesting, I thought Fall and Spring were the best times to go out into the mountains. Doesn’t it get snowy during winter?

Was it like the lullaby from Pan’s Labyrinth by any chance? Ever listen to Debussy’s compositions?

That’s odd, I’ve come across cases where group activity, particularly when saging and praying, seems more effective. Perhaps it means that the participants aren’t synchronized in their intent or there is an incompatibility with their wavelength. There’s also the possibility that some individuals unconsciously drain people they come into physical contact with rather than giving their own energy freely. Ever since Covid distancing, have you noticed any improvements in people’s physical vitality or more exhaustion?

I was under the impression that bad spirits preferred shewing themselves to skeptics. Religious people feel comforted by their indoctrination, by leaving them be, it makes them believe they’re specially protected. Skeptics are also more likely to receive actual inexplicable healings compared to religious people, who are conducted by a combination of suggestion, placebo effect, and the atmosphere of their worship (see Benny Hinn).

How would you explain the thought-form concept to a layman?

+++True, but some of us have more options than others in being able experience certain things. My own in regard to exploring the existence of ghosts, ufo and strange entities is particularly limited. So basically I can only rely on those who do share their experiences and are able to provide me [and others] with an actual accumulation of evidence able to demonstrate that these things exist.+++

To be honest, I doubt if there’s anything that anyone could say that would convince you.

+++Well, my question is how certain can you be about Paganism when recognizing that there was always the possibility it would never have been a part of your life at all; and in recognizing that new experiences might convince you to abandon it altogether? You can think that it has made you a “moral person” but there are many, many people who are on completely different paths – hundreds of them – who are just as adamant that it is their path which makes someone a moral person.+++

I’m not sure what you mean by how certain I am about Paganism. I’m as certain about Paganism as I am about anything else that my senses tell me. Paganism is not a belief system, but rather, a way of interacting with the world.

+++And that with Paganism, it’s the same Mother Nature [and maybe the same God/Goddess] resulting in moral convictions that can be very much in conflict. I just have trouble wrapping my head around how you acquire a strong sense of moral rectitude when there are so many variables out there that could have led you, can lead you, might lead you to so many different paths instead.+++

While Paganism has certainly influenced my morality I like to think that I would be a pretty moral person anyway. Paganism is not an essential factor in making someone a good person, and probably isn’t even sufficient to do so.

+++I can only react to your posts as I do. I don’t think that I am consciously attempting to be antagonistic and accusatory. But there it is: my own spontaneous, subjective reaction to what I construe to be answers from you that don’t seem [to me] to be nearly as thought out as I was hoping for.

Though, sure, if you sincerely believe that my reactions to you is the actual problem here [and it may well be], we may be not be able to move beyond that. Lots of people here have problems with my posts so, yeah, I may well be the obstacle to better communication. But I am also inclined to think that the reaction of others here to a philosophy like mine revolves in turn around their discomfort that my “I” in the is/ought world, may be applicable to them as well.+++

While I wouldn’t want to speak for anyone else, I can assure you that I’m not in the least bit disturbed by the idea that I might come round to your way of thinking, because I know it’s not going to happen.

+++“In your nature” in the manner in which, say, Satyr might encompass it. That, in fact, genes trump memes and those that do become moral nihilists are somehow contradicting the “natural order of things”?

Is there some genetic predisposition that particular individuals have to eschew nihilism. It’s in your genetic code not to be?

That for you it is simply not possible that new experiences, new relationships or access to new information and knowledge can ever alter the deep down inside Real You?

In other words, you just know this in the same way that you just know that your own personal experience with nature makes you a “moral person”.

Okay, there is certainly no way in which I can argue [let alone demonstrate] that this is not correct. Only the future itself will either bear or not bear this out.+++

Well, from a strictly scientific point of view, yes, a person’s genetic make up can indeed decide whether they are predisposed to all sorts of character traits, including, one must assume, optimism and pessimism. And again, I think I would be a moral person anyway, regardless of my connection to nature.

+++…“I” am not anchored to one or another moral font such that I am obligated to ever and always do “the right thing” or risk offending my God or Goddess or guru or comrades or mates or anyone else who is said to show me “the way”. The one true path either to enlightenment on this of the grave or to immortality and salvation on the other side of it.+++

I’m not either. I do what I think is right because I want to, not because I feel obliged to.

+++And I’m “stuck” in my flat for health reasons that are “beyond my control”. And quite the contrary, the things that I do here are hardly “never doing anything”. The things that I do – philosophy, watching films, listening to music, reading books, exchanging emails with my virtual friends etc. – bring me enormous satisfaction.

Someone might just as well say that you are “stuck being blind”.+++

Someone might indeed say that, if they didn’t know me. Being “stuck” with being blind makes it sound like I’m somehow unhappy with it.

I think this is the first time, however, that you’ve mentioned that you have health issues, at least as far as I recall. May I ask what they are?

+++Okay, I hope it doesn’t come to that. I just know from vast experience over the years that my own philosophy of life often does disturb people. It’s not so much what I believe about identity, value judgments and political economy at particular existential junctures, as it is the concern that they might come to believe the same thing about their own now fully anchored Self. I meeting “I” for the first time and beginning to have doubts about just how solid their own sense of reality is.+++

I suspect it’s not your philosophy that annoys people, but your apparent over riding desire to convert them to it. That’s how it comes across, anyway.

+++Again, that’s your assessment of what I am doing here. My own assessment is considerably more complex and convoluted. And certainly more ambiguous. My “win/win” approach to these exchanges always takes into consideration both sides. Me coming up out of the hole because of something you convey to me or you coming down into it because of something I convey to you. Same with all the others here at ILP that I respect the intelligence of. Those like Bob and Felix and phyllo and pood and peter and zoots and Mr. Reasonable and Ierrellus.

Polemics aside of course.+++

Has your approach ever worked?

+++No, not at all. And certainly not here at ILP. As I note over and again, my interest in philosophy – and ILP is a philosophy venue – revolves around…

1] the question, “how ought one to live [morally] in a world awash in both conflicting goods and contingency, chance and change”?
2] connecting the dots between “morality here and now” and “immortality there and then”
3] the truly mysterious “Big Questions”: why something instead of nothing? why this something and not something else? Also things like determinism, solipsism, sim worlds, dream worlds, the actual possibility of a Matrix reality.

Okay, I try to imagine taking “correct” to all of the members of the community, and then noting how “for all practical purposes” their community could sustain itself in regard to all of the many, many moral issues in which each member on his or her own personal path comes to completely conflicting ethical convictions.

Again, what was crucial in the Wicker Man was us against him. What if it becomes us against us?+++

There is no unity of purpose in Paganism, and it is riven with countless factions all arguing against each other, but these arguments hardly ever centre around the sort of moral questions you are bringing up here. Probably because morality is regarded very much as a matter for the individual. As for connecting morality to the afterlife, I can safely say that I’ve never heard any Pagan talk in this way, nor read anything written by Pagans that mention it. A lot of Pagans (though probably a minority) don’t even believe in an afterlife, and of those that do, most would probably say that we can’t know for sure about it. Many accept the idea of reincarnation in some form, though it’s not regarded as something that needs to be escaped from, as in the Hindu or Buddhist concept of it, but rather, as a joyful thing. Your third point, about the nature and purpose of reality, is probably discussed a bit more than the others, but I’ve never heard anyone being dogmatic about it or arguing about it.

+++Okay, would you recommend one. Are you involved with one. That way I could come to them through you…and not as just someone out of the blue.

On the other hand, I’d probably feel uncomfortable interacting with them virtually only in order to question their beliefs. That’s not what most such communities form for. Many are like families and the last thing they want is an interloper among them.+++

It’s been some time since I’ve bothered with any of the Pagan networking forums and much prefer practicing on my own these days.

+++From my frame of mind there is not a human community on the face of the Earth that doesn’t deal with conflicting ethical opinions. And that is because conflicting ethical opinions often lead to conflicting behaviors that bring about very real consequences. To suggest that with Pagans this is somehow different doesn’t really answer my specific question of how this can even be possible.+++

It’s possible because Paganism is not an organised community. All of those issues are dealt with at group level, if at all.

+++They have to deal with situations in which members on their own personal paths with nature might come to opposite moral convictions in regard to abortion or gun ownership or gender roles or animal rights or the use of drugs or what constitutes criminal behavior or all the issues that revolve around human sexuality or what to teach kids or capitalism/socialism or where the individual stops and the community begins or issues of immigration…and all of the other moral and political conflagrations we hear about “on the news”.+++

Yes, as I said before, every group will have its own way of dealing with all these issues, including the option of not dealing with them. The leader of the Wiccan group I used to be in had strong views about abortion, for example. Gun ownership isn’t an issue in the UK, though. Gender roles are pretty important in many Pagan traditions, but not in others. Most Pagans would probably support the idea of animal welfare (to varying degrees), and while vegetarianism is more prevalent among Pagans than the general population, it certainly isn’t universal. Most Pagans have a relaxed attitude to soft drugs like cannabis, and smoking it is very common indeed at almost all Pagan events. I’ve tried it myself a couple of times but it did nothing for me except induce coughing fits. Some Pagans, however, are against the use of any artificial stimulants. As for sexuality, lesbian, gay and bisexual people are represented in Paganism to a greater degree than the general population, possibly because of the more accepting attitude of Pagans to that sort of thing. On the other hand, political issues such as capitalism or socialism are hardly ever touched upon. Most Pagans are probably fairly liberal, though there are also some far right groups too.

+++It would not seem [to me] that Pagans are exempt from the potential for turmoil of this sort.+++

One of the reasons I became disillusioned with going to Pagan events was because of all the gossip and backbiting. Pagans are people, and are not immune to acting like everyone else in the world. But the arguments don’t usually involve the issues you’ve brought up.

Quite the contrary, over the years others – in the flesh and in books – have said things that helped convince me to abandon, among other things, a gang life, Christianity, religion, Objectivism, Marxism, socialism, anarchism. Even existentialism when the focus is on “authenticity”. So, sure, why not someone able to say something that convinces me to reject moral nihilism and a fractured and fragmented “I”.

But it’s no less a way of interacting with the world that is derived existentially from the life you’ve lived, live now or will live. So, in being this “moral person” that was, is and will be no less subject to change. After all, all those folks on all those hundreds and hundreds of alternative moral, political and spiritual paths end up interacting with the world as well. Only for the objectivists those interactions are often subsumed in one or another Scripture. Sacred or secular.

When they speak of being a moral person prompting them to interact ethically with others their font of choice is often quite solid. I’m just grappling to understand how your moral convictions might be deeply felt but anchored only to your own personal experiences…experiences which might have been, can be or will be very different.

This part:

Again, to me, you speak of being a “moral person” as though in regard to conflicting goods, being moral is just something you know that you are. Like saying you just know you have a soul. You recognize the role that your past played in merely predisposing you to think that these things are moral and those things are not, that had your life been very different, it might have been the other way around, but [unlike me] you are able to tamp that part down and feel more comfortable in accepting that, in being a “moral person”, it’s closer to some necessary truth.

That’s the frame of mind I’m most interested in. And not just you but anyone here who is able to anchor their moral and spiritual convictions in an understanding of the world that is not nearly as drawn and quartered as mine is.

Back again to that. You just know something that, in my view, you can’t really know at all because you have no way of grasping what new experiences, relationships and knowledge might be on the horizon. It would be as though someone totally unfamiliar with Paganism, and found it so alien they said, “I know I would never become one of them”. And then one day because of experiences they never imagined they would have, they become one.

I’m thinking: how on earth can she not grasp this?! When, in my view, this is precisely the frame of mind that the objectivists cling to in order to anchor their own comfort and consolation in their very own moral, political or spiritual path.

On the other hand, the closer we come to believing it’s genetic, the closer we come to accepting that, basically, it’s “beyond our control”. I’m an optimistic moral person because I inherited that from my parents. Or, perhaps, genetically, this can be taken all the way back to everything that we think, feel, say and do: determinism.

But there’s still this: Optimist and moral about what? And, given a Pagan’s individual interactions with nature, is that all too largely just a manifestation of biological imperatives?

And, of course, my point is that you come to want these things and not those things because the existential trajectory that is your life itself, nudge or propel or compel you to want them. It has less to do with what is necessarily or inherently right and what has, instead, just come to “seem” right to you because your life has predisposed you to feel this rather than than about one or another moral conflagration that rends the species.

Exactly my point about your reaction to what you suppose it must be like being me. Though, sure, just as I wish I was able to get up and about as I once did, I can’t imagine a part of you not wishing that you could see. And then for you of course what would it mean to be unhappy regarding something that you never once had and then lost. Being blind is you. From birth.

Mostly they revolve around a swirl of psycho-somatic symptoms derived from the fact the my life had often been bursting at the seams with one or another traumatic “stresspool”. My nerves became “shot” and I found myself less and less able to interact with others. My world imploded for all intents and purposes.

That’s always possible of course. But I do genuinely believe that it is my “philosophy of life” that most perturbs others: the part that revolves around an essentially meaningless and purposeless existence one day tumbling over into the abyss that is oblivion. The part pertaining to “the gap”. The part pertaining to determinism. The part pertaining to a fractured and fragmented “I” in the is/ought world.

Yeah. I’ve still got a handful of “virtual friends” I’ve exchanged emails with for years now. I managed [more or less] to “reason” them down into the hole with me. Just no one [yet] who has managed to “reason” me up out of it.

And, I believe, that is because my own moral philosophy is just so much more radical. Even Pagans are able to believe that given their interactions with nature they arrive at a point where they can think of themselves as a “moral person”. That’s no longer an option for me. Moral convictions for me are not rooted in God or spirituality or ideology or deontology or nature. They are subjective/subjunctive existential “contraptions” derived merely from the life I happened to live at a particular time historically and a particular place culturally and given the particular trajectory of experiences I had. I can no longer find a “font” to anchor a Self to.

This makes sense [to me] because if, through nature, you can think of yourself as a moral person and yet believe that morality itself can be embodied given convictions and behaviors all up and down the moral and political spectrum, then what determines your fate in the afterlife? After all, for most religious and spiritual paths, what that fate will be very much depends on the behaviors you choose on this side of the grave.

Here though I can only come back to this: the gap between what someone believes about the afterlife and what they can actually demonstrate is true about it. And then the part where what they believe, they believe because believing it makes them feel better…comforts and consoles them. Never ever underestimate psychological defense mechanisms.

Well, even if there were only a handful of Pagans that did spend a considerable amount of time together, I can’t wrap my head around how, for all practical purposes, they can be on separate paths with nature, come to conflicting moral convictions that prompt them to behave in ways the others did not approve of and not have a lot of turmoil. Other than by way of “moderation, negotiation and compromise”. But how is being a “moral person” really squared with that?

Thus…

Well here it seems that Pagans, just as with all the rest of us, have wide and varied opinions about these things. I’m just unable to really grasp how, being out in nature, the interaction with nature itself can lead a particular individual to a conviction about all of these things. Convictions that can then be in conflict with others generating conflicting behaviors and yet everyone agreeing that the other is still a “moral person”.

I think I’m going to explore this further. If only through the internet.

+++Quite the contrary, over the years others – in the flesh and in books – have said things that helped convince me to abandon, among other things, a gang life, Christianity, religion, Objectivism, Marxism, socialism, anarchism. Even existentialism when the focus is on “authenticity”. So, sure, why not someone able to say something that convinces me to reject moral nihilism and a fractured and fragmented “I”.+++

Ok, fair enough. But I must say again that it’s not my job, nor anyone else’s, to pursuade you of the existence of ghosts, etc. I don’t even know what they are myself.

+++But it’s no less a way of interacting with the world that is derived existentially from the life you’ve lived, live now or will live. So, in being this “moral person” that was, is and will be no less subject to change. After all, all those folks on all those hundreds and hundreds of alternative moral, political and spiritual paths end up interacting with the world as well. Only for the objectivists those interactions are often subsumed in one or another Scripture. Sacred or secular.

When they speak of being a moral person prompting them to interact ethically with others their font of choice is often quite solid. I’m just grappling to understand how your moral convictions might be deeply felt but anchored only to your own personal experiences…experiences which might have been, can be or will be very different.+++

Yes, there’s no doubt that had my life been different, I would probably have had different opinions, including about moral issues. I don’t regard this as some sort of profound insight, though, just an obvious truism.

+++Again, to me, you speak of being a “moral person” as though in regard to conflicting goods, being moral is just something you know that you are. Like saying you just know you have a soul. You recognize the role that your past played in merely predisposing you to think that these things are moral and those things are not, that had your life been very different, it might have been the other way around, but [unlike me] you are able to tamp that part down and feel more comfortable in accepting that, in being a “moral person”, it’s closer to some necessary truth.

That’s the frame of mind I’m most interested in. And not just you but anyone here who is able to anchor their moral and spiritual convictions in an understanding of the world that is not nearly as drawn and quartered as mine is.+++

Well, I like to think I’m a moral person but I know full well that I’m not perfect. Perhaps I’d have been a more perfect person in a different life. Who knows? As it happens, though, I have indeed lived the life that I’ve lived, and so I’m the person that I am.

+++Back again to that. You just know something that, in my view, you can’t really know at all because you have no way of grasping what new experiences, relationships and knowledge might be on the horizon. It would be as though someone totally unfamiliar with Paganism, and found it so alien they said, “I know I would never become one of them”. And then one day because of experiences they never imagined they would have, they become one.

I’m thinking: how on earth can she not grasp this?! When, in my view, this is precisely the frame of mind that the objectivists cling to in order to anchor their own comfort and consolation in their very own moral, political or spiritual path.+++

I do grasp it, I just don’t think it’s any sort of revelation. It’s just obvious, really.

+++On the other hand, the closer we come to believing it’s genetic, the closer we come to accepting that, basically, it’s “beyond our control”. I’m an optimistic moral person because I inherited that from my parents. Or, perhaps, genetically, this can be taken all the way back to everything that we think, feel, say and do: determinism.

But there’s still this: Optimist and moral about what? And, given a Pagan’s individual interactions with nature, is that all too largely just a manifestation of biological imperatives?+++

The sensible option is surely not to believe one extreme or the other. Genetics undoubtedly influences us, but then so does environment, and all sorts of other factors, including free will.

+++And, of course, my point is that you come to want these things and not those things because the existential trajectory that is your life itself, nudge or propel or compel you to want them. It has less to do with what is necessarily or inherently right and what has, instead, just come to “seem” right to you because your life has predisposed you to feel this rather than than about one or another moral conflagration that rends the species.+++

Yes, I agree. But, again, it’s just obvious.

+++Exactly my point about your reaction to what you suppose it must be like being me. Though, sure, just as I wish I was able to get up and about as I once did, I can’t imagine a part of you not wishing that you could see. And then for you of course what would it mean to be unhappy regarding something that you never once had and then lost. Being blind is you. From birth.+++

A part of me does indeed wish that I could see, not least because of a sense of overwhelming curiosity. But this is not the same as saying that I’m unhappy with my life as it is.

+++Mostly they revolve around a swirl of psycho-somatic symptoms derived from the fact the my life had often been bursting at the seams with one or another traumatic “stresspool”. My nerves became “shot” and I found myself less and less able to interact with others. My world imploded for all intents and purposes.+++

What have you done to try and work round these issues? Thinking back, I believe this was one of the first questions that I asked you.

+++That’s always possible of course. But I do genuinely believe that it is my “philosophy of life” that most perturbs others: the part that revolves around an essentially meaningless and purposeless existence one day tumbling over into the abyss that is oblivion. The part pertaining to “the gap”. The part pertaining to determinism. The part pertaining to a fractured and fragmented “I” in the is/ought world.+++

I think you should seriously entertain the possibility that this is not the case.

+++Yeah. I’ve still got a handful of “virtual friends” I’ve exchanged emails with for years now. I managed [more or less] to “reason” them down into the hole with me. Just no one [yet] who has managed to “reason” me up out of it.+++

Isn’t it a bit selfish to want to bring people down into your hole?

+++And, I believe, that is because my own moral philosophy is just so much more radical. Even Pagans are able to believe that given their interactions with nature they arrive at a point where they can think of themselves as a “moral person”. That’s no longer an option for me. Moral convictions for me are not rooted in God or spirituality or ideology or deontology or nature. They are subjective/subjunctive existential “contraptions” derived merely from the life I happened to live at a particular time historically and a particular place culturally and given the particular trajectory of experiences I had. I can no longer find a “font” to anchor a Self to.+++

I’m not sure I would call it radical. Nihilism and despair are pretty mainstream, I would say.

+++This makes sense [to me] because if, through nature, you can think of yourself as a moral person and yet believe that morality itself can be embodied given convictions and behaviors all up and down the moral and political spectrum, then what determines your fate in the afterlife? After all, for most religious and spiritual paths, what that fate will be very much depends on the behaviors you choose on this side of the grave.+++

Why assume that your fate in the afterlife, if there is one, is connected to your own morality? If it takes fear of punishment for someone to be a good person, then they’re not a good person.

+++Here though I can only come back to this: the gap between what someone believes about the afterlife and what they can actually demonstrate is true about it. And then the part where what they believe, they believe because believing it makes them feel better…comforts and consoles them. Never ever underestimate psychological defense mechanisms.+++

As whith ghosts, no one is under any obligation to demonstrate the truth about the afterlife. And definitely not me, because I don’t know what the answer is.

+++Well, even if there were only a handful of Pagans that did spend a considerable amount of time together, I can’t wrap my head around how, for all practical purposes, they can be on separate paths with nature, come to conflicting moral convictions that prompt them to behave in ways the others did not approve of and not have a lot of turmoil. Other than by way of “moderation, negotiation and compromise”. But how is being a “moral person” really squared with that?+++

If it were only a handful of Pagans, spending considerable amounts of time together, then you are almost certainly talking about a group, and groups do indeed have codes of morality, usually decided by the person who runs it (though not always).

+++Well here it seems that Pagans, just as with all the rest of us, have wide and varied opinions about these things. I’m just unable to really grasp how, being out in nature, the interaction with nature itself can lead a particular individual to a conviction about all of these things. Convictions that can then be in conflict with others generating conflicting behaviors and yet everyone agreeing that the other is still a “moral person”.

I think I’m going to explore this further. If only through the internet.+++

Good luck.

Well, if you think that I think that coming into this particular philosophy venue means it’s someone’s job to persuade me to think a certain way about things like ghosts, you really do not understand my point at all. Instead, my point is that in regard to human ghosts, you have your experiences and others have theirs. And only by coming together and sharing what experiences we do have is it likely that our understanding of their existence [or lack thereof] will be enhanced.

And that this is of particular importance to me because “here and now” I believe that death = oblivion. So, to the extent that others can demonstrate to the world that human ghosts do in fact exist, they’ve got my rapt attention.

Whether it is a profound insight or not, how can it not trouble someone convinced that they are a Pagan only because they just happened existentially not to have not become one and that, since there is no way for them to demonstrate that Paganism is the most reasonable frame of mind for becoming a “moral person”, any new experience, relationship or access to information and knowledge could knock them right off this particular path altogether. And, instead, they find themselves on one of the zillions of other paths there are to choose from when taking on the task of being a “moral person”.

Then this part:

Again, to speak of moral perfection at all suggests the gap between us here. You are who you are basically because the life that you lived could not have resulted in you being other than you are. Though you agree that had any number of variables in your past been different you might be here arguing as I do and not as a Pagan.

For me it’s the manner in which, from my frame of mind, you fail to grasp just how precarious and problematic “I” is in the is/ought world that reflects the greatest challenge for me. Is it possible that I might succeed in making you understand it? Or, instead, will you succeed in making me understand that, in regard to moral and spiritual value judgments, I am the one unable to “see the light”. If not yours than another’s.

Especially in regard to this:

So, that’s your answer and you’re sticking to it?

Seriously, though, while I suspect I am unlikely to change your mind, I’m not altogether convinced of it. And, ironically enough [again, from my own subjective perspective], it is because I do have such respect for your intelligence. And ultimately your curiosity about these things. It’s just a matter of convincing you that Paganism is but one of hundreds and hundreds of moral and spiritual fonts “out there”, all convinced that on their path one truly can become a “moral person”.

Also, a miracle might happen and we actually do end up becoming “virtual friends”. :astonished:

No, for me, the most sensible option of all is that, in regard to nature and nurture, as with in regard to Paganism and moral nihilism, we accept the staggering gap between what we think we believe about them and all that must be known about them in order to know for sure what to believe about them. Rummy’s Rule in other words. In the interim, all we have is our more or less educated wild ass guesses.

I know, I know: Let’s not go there.

You agree, but our understanding of the “for all practical purposes” implications of that in regard to becoming a “moral person” are very different. Paganism has come to “seem right” to you but from my frame of mind only because you didn’t live the sort of life whereby it would not “seem right” to you at all. You might have lived a life that predisposed you to think it is ridiculous.

But [it seems to me] you’re okay with that.

Yes, I understand this distinction and it is a very important one. And I am truly happy that you do live a happy life. And that comes through loud and clear here in many of your posts. You are comfortable in your own skin as few of us are.

But I am curious about one thing.

In your exchanges over at Know Thyself, I recall a discussion that revolved around your interactions with others who have “disabilities”. How, for example, if I am remembering this correctly, you would prefer a romantic relationship what someone who was not “disabled”. And in our own exchanges, I sensed that you were more comfortable interacting with others who were not blind. And that in fact most of your relationships are with sighted people.

Is that something you would feel comfortable discussing? Or am I completely wrong in my understanding of this?

To be perfectly honest, I have actually come to take advantage of it all.

In other words, all my life I have surrounded by people: a large extended family, gang members, friends I met working in the shipyards and steel mills, friends from the church, army buddies, a zillion relationships in college, getting married, interacting with my daughter and all her friends, countless interactions with men and women as a political activists. But now in my imploded interactions with almost no one, it has given me the sort of time I need to dive deep down into philosophy and music and films and books. I live alone and while it can be painful not having others around to share my life with, I am now in a situation where I only choose to do what I and I alone want to do. And it’s a trade off that I have come not only to accept but to relish.

Well, all I can really go by is the reactions that others have to me here. My own interpretation of them. That’s honestly and introspectively the way it seems to me.

Only if you were down in a similar hole yourself, might you be less inclined to think like that. Your own hole might not be the same as mine, but when you’re in a philosophical hole like mine, it can be particular unnerving. Also, given my win/win scenario, there’s the other side of the coin: that someone might actually succeed in helping me to extricate myself from it.

Okay, but I suspect there are few who root it in philosophy itself. For many it revolves more around circumstances. Their own life is in the toilet and they see no other option but to flush. It’s the combination of being “fractured and fragmented” on this side of the grave and being eyeball to eyeball with oblivion re the other side that I see separating me from others.

But “here and now” nihilism brings me not despair but options. Options that those who anchor their Self to one or another font often don’t have.

Fear of punishment and anticipation of rewards.

Let’s face it, millions and millions and millions around the globe do link their fate on the other side to their behaviors on this side. After all, for all practical purposes, what else is there?

Am I demanding that they do? Yeah, it might be construed by some this way. But mostly what I’m after are those who recognize that just believing in the afterlife is no where near the same as demonstrating that it does in fact exist. And that, in a philosophy forum, providing evidence for something that you do believe is far more important than a discussion about among family and friends at the dinner table or around the campfire or at the local bar/pub.

I’m talking about a community of Pagans. Any community in whatever demographic configuration it might take. How can each member be on their own path, come to their own moral convictions, have those convictions clash and still create the least dysfunctional community. If the person who runs it decides what the codes of morality are then his or her path would ever and always take priority. And how is that different from might makes right?

I’ve already found a couple of websites that explore this. When I do get around to it I will put it on my morality thread: ilovephilosophy.com/viewtop … 1&t=175121

Edit [a couple of hours later]:

Let me add this…

The thing I least understand about Paganism and morality is how Pagans connect the dots between their experiences “out in nature, with nature, through nature” and moral convictions themselves.

How in particular does nature through the Goddess convey this to you?

Most Pagans can see nature. You cannot. But in in other respects your other senses might be enhanced. So you hear nature, smell, nature, touch nature…feel nature’s “energy” rise up and become a part of you.

But how does this then configure into to your thinking about the moral issues that impale the human species?

When I went out into nature a few months ago and tried to experience it more deeply that’s what kept coming back to me. I’m sitting there focusing my senses on the woods around me and I kept wondering how this can possibly impact on my moral narrative. Especially given my own conclusion that nature itself seems utterly amoral in regard to us.

True, my own attempt here was shallow. I barely gave it a chance. But how do your own exercises and rituals out in nature translate into a moral experience?

There was a very strange entity floating in the toilet this morning, but I do not want to describe it in detail.
If fact I wish I could un-see it!!

Again, as Magnus pointed out, with you it’s not what you post so much as why you seem compelled to go after others who refuse to think exactly as you do. Your own take on why you have become a fulminating fanatic objectivist. The evangelical equivalent of an atheist.

This part:

Come on, let’s go there. :sunglasses:

Have you had a humourectomy??
:laughing: :laughing:

This is YOU.
As is evidenced by your own post.

Pure projection.

If I had to describe what was floating in the toilet I’d have to call it iambiguous.

Oh, right: you were just trying to be funny.

Come on, even you know that’s bullshit.

Then the part you left out:

So, tell us what’s behind your contempt for anyone who refuses to toe your line. Was it one experience in particular or a whole bunch of them.

I suspect there must be something or someone in your life that absolutely infuriates you…but you can’t [or won’t] do anything about it.

So you need to come in here and use us as the targets.

Virtually only of course but it’s better than nothing? :-k

Note to others:

Over and again I point out that in regard to that which is of most interest to me philosophically – connecting the dots existentially between morality here and now and immortality there and then – my own arguments are no less embedded in, well, my own arguments.

Never in a million years would I suggest that how I think about these things others are obligated to think the same way about…or be mocked and ridiculed. I’m the first to admit that “I” am but an infinitesimally tiny and insignificant speck of existence in the vastness of all there is.

You know, like Scripture.

And that’s before “the gap”! :sunglasses:

+++Well, if you think that I think that coming into this particular philosophy venue means it’s someone’s job to persuade me to think a certain way about things like ghosts, you really do not understand my point at all. Instead, my point is that in regard to human ghosts, you have your experiences and others have theirs. And only by coming together and sharing what experiences we do have is it likely that our understanding of their existence [or lack thereof] will be enhanced.

And that this is of particular importance to me because “here and now” I believe that death = oblivion. So, to the extent that others can demonstrate to the world that human ghosts do in fact exist, they’ve got my rapt attention.+++

I’m inclined to think that ghosts are unlikely to be the spirits of humans who have passed on, though I suppose some might be. For a start off, I’ve heard stories of ghosts of people who are still alive. This seems a lot more like astral projection. But most ghosts, I would say, are more likely to be something akin to nature spirits, or spirits of place. This would tie into folklore about other non-corporeal or magical creatures.

+++Whether it is a profound insight or not, how can it not trouble someone convinced that they are a Pagan only because they just happened existentially not to have not become one and that, since there is no way for them to demonstrate that Paganism is the most reasonable frame of mind for becoming a “moral person”, any new experience, relationship or access to information and knowledge could knock them right off this particular path altogether. And, instead, they find themselves on one of the zillions of other paths there are to choose from when taking on the task of being a “moral person”.+++

I don’t believe that Paganism is the most reasonable frame of mind for becoming a moral person. It all depends on the individual, and indeed, it also depends on where that individual happens to be on their path. One can be moral without being a Pagan, and vice versa. This doesn’t trouble me in the slightest, because it just seems perfectly natural.

+++Again, to speak of moral perfection at all suggests the gap between us here. You are who you are basically because the life that you lived could not have resulted in you being other than you are. Though you agree that had any number of variables in your past been different you might be here arguing as I do and not as a Pagan.

For me it’s the manner in which, from my frame of mind, you fail to grasp just how precarious and problematic “I” is in the is/ought world that reflects the greatest challenge for me. Is it possible that I might succeed in making you understand it? Or, instead, will you succeed in making me understand that, in regard to moral and spiritual value judgments, I am the one unable to “see the light”. If not yours than another’s.+++

It’s no more precarious and problematic than anything else in the world. I fully understand what you’re saying, I just happen to disagree.

+++So, that’s your answer and you’re sticking to it?

Seriously, though, while I suspect I am unlikely to change your mind, I’m not altogether convinced of it. And, ironically enough [again, from my own subjective perspective], it is because I do have such respect for your intelligence. And ultimately your curiosity about these things. It’s just a matter of convincing you that Paganism is but one of hundreds and hundreds of moral and spiritual fonts “out there”, all convinced that on their path one truly can become a “moral person”.

Also, a miracle might happen and we actually do end up becoming “virtual friends”.+++

You don’t need to convince me that Paganism is only one of countless moral and spiritual systems out there because I already know it. And indeed, have said it often enough, namely, that everyone has their own path.

+++No, for me, the most sensible option of all is that, in regard to nature and nurture, as with in regard to Paganism and moral nihilism, we accept the staggering gap between what we think we believe about them and all that must be known about them in order to know for sure what to believe about them. Rummy’s Rule in other words. In the interim, all we have is our more or less educated wild ass guesses.

I know, I know: Let’s not go there.+++

Indeed.

+++You agree, but our understanding of the “for all practical purposes” implications of that in regard to becoming a “moral person” are very different. Paganism has come to “seem right” to you but from my frame of mind only because you didn’t live the sort of life whereby it would not “seem right” to you at all. You might have lived a life that predisposed you to think it is ridiculous.

But [it seems to me] you’re okay with that.+++

Yes, I’m very much ok with that.

+++Yes, I understand this distinction and it is a very important one. And I am truly happy that you do live a happy life. And that comes through loud and clear here in many of your posts. You are comfortable in your own skin as few of us are.

But I am curious about one thing.

In your exchanges over at Know Thyself, I recall a discussion that revolved around your interactions with others who have “disabilities”. How, for example, if I am remembering this correctly, you would prefer a romantic relationship what someone who was not “disabled”. And in our own exchanges, I sensed that you were more comfortable interacting with others who were not blind. And that in fact most of your relationships are with sighted people.

Is that something you would feel comfortable discussing? Or am I completely wrong in my understanding of this?+++

Yes, that’s right, I would not consider dating anyone who’s blind, or who had some other disability. And yes, it’s also true that all my close friendships are with sighted people too. With only a small number of exceptions, I’ve had little personal interaction with the blind community since leaving school. I find its insularity and petty political bickering completely stultifying.

+++To be perfectly honest, I have actually come to take advantage of it all.

In other words, all my life I have surrounded by people: a large extended family, gang members, friends I met working in the shipyards and steel mills, friends from the church, army buddies, a zillion relationships in college, getting married, interacting with my daughter and all her friends, countless interactions with men and women as a political activists. But now in my imploded interactions with almost no one, it has given me the sort of time I need to dive deep down into philosophy and music and films and books. I live alone and while it can be painful not having others around to share my life with, I am now in a situation where I only choose to do what I and I alone want to do. And it’s a trade off that I have come not only to accept but to relish.+++

As long as you’re happy, or find it fulfilling, then that’s fine. I live alone too, but that’s where the similarity ends, since, as you know, I’m a pretty active sort of person, both at work and in my social life.

+++Well, all I can really go by is the reactions that others have to me here. My own interpretation of them. That’s honestly and introspectively the way it seems to me.

Only if you were down in a similar hole yourself, might you be less inclined to think like that. Your own hole might not be the same as mine, but when you’re in a philosophical hole like mine, it can be particular unnerving. Also, given my win/win scenario, there’s the other side of the coin: that someone might actually succeed in helping me to extricate myself from it.+++

I would always try to drag myself out of any such hole, without hoping that someone else might do it for me.

+++Okay, but I suspect there are few who root it in philosophy itself. For many it revolves more around circumstances. Their own life is in the toilet and they see no other option but to flush. It’s the combination of being “fractured and fragmented” on this side of the grave and being eyeball to eyeball with oblivion re the other side that I see separating me from others.

But “here and now” nihilism brings me not despair but options. Options that those who anchor their Self to one or another font often don’t have.+++

Can you give me an example of any such options?

+++Fear of punishment and anticipation of rewards.

Let’s face it, millions and millions and millions around the globe do link their fate on the other side to their behaviors on this side. After all, for all practical purposes, what else is there?+++

What else is there in what context?

+++Am I demanding that they do? Yeah, it might be construed by some this way. But mostly what I’m after are those who recognize that just believing in the afterlife is no where near the same as demonstrating that it does in fact exist. And that, in a philosophy forum, providing evidence for something that you do believe is far more important than a discussion about among family and friends at the dinner table or around the campfire or at the local bar/pub.+++

While I accept your point that we’re on a philosophy forum and not down the pub, I’m far more interested in the sort of philosophy that deals with how we percieve the world around us and interact with it.

+++I’m talking about a community of Pagans. Any community in whatever demographic configuration it might take. How can each member be on their own path, come to their own moral convictions, have those convictions clash and still create the least dysfunctional community. If the person who runs it decides what the codes of morality are then his or her path would ever and always take priority. And how is that different from might makes right?+++

I can’t think of an instance where a small group of Pagans would regularly hang around together over an extended period if they were not members of some sort of organised group. I suppose they could be regulars at a moot, but even in that case, the moot will have a leader. Within groups, it is indeed very much the leader who decides on the codes of conduct. I know of examples where some groups have attempted a more democratic type of structure, but these almost always fail, because no one takes responsibility.

+++Let me add this…

The thing I least understand about Paganism and morality is how Pagans connect the dots between their experiences “out in nature, with nature, through nature” and moral convictions themselves.

How in particular does nature through the Goddess convey this to you?+++

The simple answer to this is that it doesn’t. Morality is a personal thing, and nature does not directly influence it.

+++Most Pagans can see nature. You cannot. But in in other respects your other senses might be enhanced. So you hear nature, smell, nature, touch nature…feel nature’s “energy” rise up and become a part of you.

But how does this then configure into to your thinking about the moral issues that impale the human species?+++

It doesn’t, at least not directly. Through experiencing nature, I know that all life is connected, which is probably as close as it comes to influencing my thoughts on matters of morality. Nothing specific, in other words.

You’re right to say, of course, that being blind has caused me to experience nature, as indeed everything, in different ways to most people. Which is one of the many reasons, incidentally, why I wouldn’t change it.

+++When I went out into nature a few months ago and tried to experience it more deeply that’s what kept coming back to me. I’m sitting there focusing my senses on the woods around me and I kept wondering how this can possibly impact on my moral narrative. Especially given my own conclusion that nature itself seems utterly amoral in regard to us.

True, my own attempt here was shallow. I barely gave it a chance. But how do your own exercises and rituals out in nature translate into a moral experience?+++

My exercises and rituals are not moral experiences. Their purpose is primarily about communing with nature, and they have no direct bearing on my moral stances on any issue, or my morality in general. I do not become a more moral person by doing these rituals.

I must point out though that I’m only talking about my own experiences here. Other Pagans will have different opinions on the matter. And while Paganism as a whole has no moral stance on anything, certain traditions within it do. Wicca, for example, has something called the three fold law, which states that whatever you do, good or bad, will come back to you with three times the force. You’ll find this written about a lot online, ad nauseam in fact, but as a former member of a Wiccan group I can tell you that in practice, they often ignore it. They have another one too, a sort of mantra, which goes, an it harm none do what ye will. Again, in practice, this is often ignored too. But even if it were properly adhered to, it seems pretty selfish and self-indulgent to me. But then, I’m no longer a Wiccan, anyway.

Yes, people down through the ages have called them different things. But what they call them based on what they believe they are will always pale [for me] next to what they can demonstrate to me such that I am actually able to hope that death does not equal oblivion. On the other hand, if my life were to become a living hell, I might find myself begging to die. It’s all profoundly embedded in our individual lives. And how different they can be. Thus the need to share experiences in order to acquire more pieces to the ultimate puzzle that death is.

How you have come to understand “natural” here is not the same as I have. For now, that may be as far as we can go in communicating each other’s understanding of it. Though Paganism is not seen by you to be the most reasonable frame of mind in regard to morality, it certainly must seem reasonable to you “here and now” to be a Pagan. But my point is that had your life been different, you might well be arguing here instead that Paganism – given the amoral nature of nature itself – would be the last place one would go to acquire a belief that one is a “moral person”.

This part:

Well, from my frame of mind, “I” in the is/ought world is considerably more problematic than [b][u]I[/b][/u] in the either/or. world. Think about all the variables in your life that come together to make you who you are. Your gender, your age, your health, your blindness, your parents, your community, your job, your day to day routine. How problematic are they until something dramatic in the either/or world changes? Moral and spiritual values on the other hand seem [to me] considerably more open to ambiguity and confusion and uncertainty. That’s why in my view so many people do embrace objectivism: it makes “I” on par with I. And that’s the source of their comfort and consolation. Not what they believe so much as that what they do believe they believe emphatically.

I suppose that’s the part I struggle most to grasp. It’s like you are telling me something important about yourself – about me – but I can’t figure out exactly what it is. If I came to believe that I am a moral nihilist only because my experiences did not predispose me to believe I am something else…and that something/anything else in my life down the road might yank me off that path altogether, the first thing I’d think is, “okay, what about philosophy?” Can philosophy provide me with a methodology such that I can know – rationally – what it means to be a “moral person”? I have come to conclude that it cannot. And if it [or science] cannot than I’m back to dasein…to the profoundly problematic and precarious “I” that I understand differently than you do.

Indeed, indeed. But I suspect because to go there confronts each of us with just how infinitesimally insignificant we are in the staggering vastness of “all there is”.

Just out of curiosity, does the fact that you and I inhabit this teeny, tiny rock orbiting a Sun that is part of a galaxy that is but one of hundreds of billions – some say trillions – of other galaxies in what may well be and infinity of other universes even come up between you and the Goddess?

Of course as soon as I think of a Goddess I am left with all of the bewildering questions I might ask regarding how on earth you interact with her. I’m still confused as to the extent that this is literally.

Well, right now, there is no way I can understand that. If I were to one day come to believe that moral nihilism is ridiculous, it would be precisely because new experiences, relationships, information, knowledge, ideas etc., led me to it. And if I believed that, well, I would be all the more intent on pinning down whether I am on the right path. Through philosophy among other things. Otherwise I am admitting to myself that the only reason I am a moral nihilist at all is because I “just happened existentially not to have not become one”.

That doesn’t work for me.

Okay, I was just curious. But sometimes we can’t help who we fall in love with. And I am curious how others who are blind from birth might react to that. How, perhaps, they might be configure it all into any number of directions. Critical of that point of view. After all, it’s hard to believe that most blind people are insular and politically petty.

But, okay, true: what the hell do I know about that?

Or maybe it’s just how I tend to go in the opposite direction. I always seek out those who are most like me.

In any event, you still have 3+ years to honor your commitment to the Goddess in embodying celibacy. At least insofar as romantic relationships go.

The important point is that each of us in our own way is happy with the life that we live.

True enough. That would certainly be the best of all possible worlds. Hole wise.

Mostly in my imploded world, they revolve around not second guessing myself in choosing what I do. As opposed to my own many, many years as one or another “ist”. Back then it was always…

“Is this the right thing to do?”
“What will others in ‘the group’ think if I do this?”
“Will others shun me or punish me for not toeing the “ist” line?”
And when I was a Christian:
“Will I go to Hell if I do this?”

How about with you among other Pagans?

Well, here you are on this side of the grave. You don’t want to believe that death = oblivion. So, for all practical purposes, it’s not just what you believe about the other side but what you have to do in order to get there…as you most want it to be. That’s how literally hundreds of millions of people think about it.

For me, how we perceive the world and then interact with others based on that perception can only be enhanced all the more if we are able to demonstrate that what we believe is a rational belief.

That’s my beef with many members here. When it comes to connecting the dots between morality here and now and immortality there and then many [to me] seem quite content to let it all revolve merely around what they believe.

And that might be okay [in any given community] if they all came to agree on what to believe. But in most communities there are many hopelessly conflicting assessments of that. And if it just then comes down to what you perceive/believe, what happens when those with the most power get to call all the shots?

This part:

Again, I have no practical experience with such groups/communities. So it is hard for me to grasp the points that you are making. Perhaps when I begin to explore it more in probing morality and Paganism on the internet, it might become clearer. Though, sure, to the extent your own interactions might allow you to provide me with insights please send them along.

Especially this part…

Then that just baffles me all the more. You seem to put so much weight on your interactions with nature, it’s hard for me to understand how morality is separate from it.

And if that is the case it just convinces me all the more that your own moral convictions are no less rooted in dasein than my own fractured and fragments “I” is in turn. Different lives, different conclusions. And any new dramatic changes in those lives “down the road” and…and who knows?

Life is connected. But it is connected in different ways for different people. Historically, culturally, experientially. Then when you add a never ending conveyor belt of contingency, chance and change, you get, well, what I get anyway.

Maybe I will come closer to understanding what you mean. There’s a part of me that is drawn to it…but I’m not sure why.

Still, what makes your own life what it has become is that you were born blind. Why would you change something in that regard when you have no real understanding of what the alternative is? Thus, for someone who spent a good portion of their life sighted and then went blind at or around your age…how might their own reaction be very different. If it would be.

Then that’s the part I failed to understand correctly. I thought that nature and being a moral person were more intertwined for you. Now I’ll have to give more thought to the way you have made me understand it otherwise.

In one way it is all the more mysterious and in other ways I just go back to attributing it all to dasein.

Here though Wiccans would need to provide me with specific examples of how this played out in their own lives. Otherwise it just becomes a “belief” that is largely abstract to me.