And you have ample evidence with which to demonstrate this? Or, if it’s all on faith, how more or less blind?
And, just out of curiosity, would you be willing to commence an exchange in which you connect the dots between the behaviors you choose in regard to conflicting value judgments on this side of the grave, your beliefs in God and religion, and what you imagine the fate of your own particular “I” will be on the other side of the grave.
That, after all, was the whole point of my having begun this thread with zinnat.
I would be equally curious to explore this aspect of the religious experience with those who practice it.
Only more in the spirit of this thread: Christian meditation insofar as it becomes a part of the life that one lives…insofar as there is an existential interaction between morality here and now and immortality there and then.
The part where reflection and study gives way to practice such that one set of behaviors is deemed virtuous and another not.
Again, this is the sort of spiritual/religious exchange that often unfolds here. They can go on and on post after post and almost never bring either the meditation or contemplation down to earth.
It’s all embedded instead in how the technique [whatever it’s called] allows one to attain and then sustain a more comforting and constructive frame of mind.
And that’s not unimportant, of course. But it steers clear of what I deem the most fundamental purpose of religion is: to provide us with a moral scripture on this side of the grave in order that we continue to exist beyond the grave.
And then the extent to which conflicts occur when different faiths clash and the manner in which Marx spoke of religion as the opiate of the people. Religion used by the rich and the powerful in government to sustain their wealth and power.
I understand why people react to denominations that take their faith very, very seriously in this manner…while finding it hard to understand why they would question that they do.
After all, with the fate of all souls for all eternity riding on their worshipping and adoring the right God, who would not feel compelled to witness?
And given Judgment Day for most denominations isn’t the price of admission into Paradise based on the behaviors that are chosen by the faithful on this side of the grave?
The point isn’t why do Jehovah Witnesses go door to door but why aren’t Catholics, Protestants and every other denomination doing exactly the same?
If some Jews see themselves as God’s “chosen people” and if some Moslems are obsessed with “infidels” why aren’t they going door to door or stopping people on the street in order to save their souls?
Either the reality of what is at stake for the soul here is acknowledged or it isn’t.
And then, for some, when those like me note, “we’ll need a context”, they insist we are missing the point.
But here my point is that given what I construe to be the “for all practical purpose” reason for God and religion – morality here and now, immortality there and then – why not take a stab at connecting the dots between God and religion as intellectual contraptions and the manner in which the conclusions you come to here pertain to the behaviors you choose from day to day.
In particular, as they are understood by you to be pertinent in turn to one or another rendition of Judgment Day.
What’s New in….Philosophy of Religion
Daniel Hill describes how the work of Alvin Plantinga has revolutionised Philosophy of Religion.
Of course here the contingency – for all practical purposes – is that if there is a word there must be still more words to define it and it give it meaning. With the word God that’s all the cosmological argument turns out to be. A truth wholly contingent upon a world of words.
The “necessary being” is just that: two more words. I merely suggest that what makes these two words necessary – again for all practical purposes – is that if we don’t merely assume that the words themselves bring this being into existence then we have neither an omniscient/omnipotent font from which to differentiate vice from virtue nor an entity able to bring about our immortality and salvation.
More to the point, why would it never occur to me to ask you the same? In regard to, say, 99% of the things you post?
Anyway, now that I’ve got you here, why don’t you and I explore your own attempts to connect the dots between the behaviors you choose on this side of the grave and your beliefs about the fate of “I” on the other side. Re God and religion.
But instead of bringing the points to bear on having a beer, they are focused instead on having an abortion.
And, further, the mind focuses in as well on the existential relationship between having an abortion and the fate of “I” on the other side of the grave…given one’s belief in any particular God/Universe on any particular religious path.
What of meditation then?
And how come this aspect of it as almost always avoided by those who tout the more “earthly” benefits of it?
What’s New in….Philosophy of Religion
Daniel Hill describes how the work of Alvin Plantinga has revolutionised Philosophy of Religion.
Natural religion. On the other hand, where to begin? With the watchmaker? With the human species? With the first instance of biological life? Than going back to the Big Bang. Then speculating about the possibility of an infinite number of Big Bangs in an infinite number of universes. Then going all the way back to the “design” of existence itself?
To the Designer. The one behind the curtain that minds like us are able to “design” completely out of definitions and deductions that go into “proofs” like this one?
Probability theory and God. How about probability theory and theodicy…or probability theory and conflicting goods intertwined in the probability theory of dasein.
And you can bet that the debate here never gets all that much closer to an actual demonstrable God than all of the other “proofs” above.
But that’s the beauty of proofs like this. The only condition that really counts is that somehow you are able to think yourself into believing them. And what could possibly be more comforting and consoling than that?
Especially given the fact that it can be taken all the way to the grave. And after that it can hardly be said to matter.
What’s New in….Philosophy of Religion
Daniel Hill describes how the work of Alvin Plantinga has revolutionised Philosophy of Religion.
So? You can argue until you are blue in the face about whether God does or does not exist, but one thing [to the best of my current knowledge] doesn’t change: that every and any school of philosophy that has ever existed has never actually succeeded in verifying the existence of God. Let alone Heaven or Nirvanna.
Though, sure, some of us think that is more important to point out than others.
Now you’re talking. This matter is by far – by far – the most important question of all in regard to any God and any religion.
Indeed, imagine that we lived in a world where there was no human suffering. A world where no one ever spoke of evil because there was nothing that could be thought of that would allow us to make sense of what some say that it was. Now, in this world, we may well still be unable to demonstrate that an actual God did in fact exist. But when people spoke of Him as loving, just and merciful that would certainly make a whole lot of sense. We may not be able to communicate with or interact with this God, but how could anyone doubt that something “up there” must be sustaining a world totally without pain and suffering.
Let’s run this by the religionists here. But, really, how could they not all be reduced down to this: God works in mysterious ways.
Or, for the Buddhists, the universe works in mysterious ways.
But, fortunately enough, for both, one of them results in immortality and the other in salvation. And all the evil in the world doesn’t make that go away.
What’s New in….Philosophy of Religion
Daniel Hill describes how the work of Alvin Plantinga has revolutionised Philosophy of Religion.
Okay, there are the “philosophical” arguments here, and there are the arguments that the overwhelming preponderance of the faithful prefer: morality here and now, immortality there and then.
After all, the philosophical arguments are contained almost entirely in exchanges embedded in worlds of words. Here for example: ilovephilosophy.com/viewtop … 1&t=195805
Whereas for those attempting to intertwine God and religion into the lives that they actually live, they can rather easily note how, without a leap of faith, there are no actual viable alternatives for mere mortals on either side of the grave.
What is a “rational belief” given the profound mystery that is human existence itself?
Clearly, it is not irrational to think that a God/the God might be the explanation for the human condition. It’s no more necessarily irrational than to think that existence itself just “banged” into being out of nothing at all. And since the human brain is hard wired to ask questions like this, God is there to be one of the options. A basic belief if there ever was one. But the human brain is also hard-wired to think up many things that are not able to actually be demonstrated to exist. And not just unicorns and ghosts and super heroes.
And around and around and around we go: If this, then that. Now all we need is an actual God to interview on youtube. To finally pin down all the details. To perform miracles and act out all of the things described in the Book of Revelation. If this is the God of Abraham and Moses.
In other words…
All that is necessary for Plantinga is to encompass a not necessarily irrational world of words in which “God” is just one of them. And atheists certainly have to concede that this is the case.
What’s New in….Philosophy of Religion
Daniel Hill describes how the work of Alvin Plantinga has revolutionised Philosophy of Religion.
Anyone here convinced that a "putative direct awareness of God can provide justification for certain kinds of beliefs about God.”
Putative: “generally considered or reputed to be.”
How about more specifically? I have not myself ever had a “direct awareness of God”. Even when I was a devout Christian. But it would certainly interest me if those who have had one would attempt to describe it. And, to the best of their ability, attempt to note any evidence that others could address to confirm the experience.
In other words, something more substantial than just a debate about it “generally”.
What I wouldn’t give to have Paul Helm here bringing his epistemological conclusions about about “reason and religion” and noting their relevance to that which interest me most about religion: morality here and now, immortality there and then.
What would he conclude can be known about this when that knowledge is then taken to sets of circumstances in which the behaviors that he chooses are connected to dots that grapple with that which he anticipates the fate of his own “I” to be on the other side of the grave.
What’s New in….Philosophy of Religion
Daniel Hill describes how the work of Alvin Plantinga has revolutionised Philosophy of Religion.
Now, admittedly, analyzing the claim that God exists is fundamentally different from analyzing the claim that, say, unicorns or fire breathing dragons or werewolves exist.
And that’s because even without any hard evidence for God’s existence, He is one possible explanation for the existence of existence itself.
And yet to explore the claims for His existence – let alone claims for the existence of a God, the God, my God – without any truly substantive accumulation of empirical, material and/or phenomenological confirmation, affirmation, proof, etc., is to all but guarantee an exchange in which God is basically just defined and deduced into existence.
Is that an important consideration? Or, like me, are you far more concerned with how an actual existing God comes down on connecting the dots between morality here and now and immortality there and then.
This one has also fascinated me. Though there are arguments – en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Argument_from_free_will – that proport to reconcile the two, they never really made sense to me. Like compatibilism “reconciling” free will and determinism [given a No God world]. It just doesn’t seem possible to me.
What’s New in….Philosophy of Religion
Daniel Hill describes how the work of Alvin Plantinga has revolutionised Philosophy of Religion.
Actually, it would seem more reasonable to suggest that the concern here must always revolve around whether the language that is used to broach, assess, examine and/or to form conclusions about God, can be defended both substantively and substantially. Otherwise the discussions will almost certainly devolve into intellectual or spiritual contraptions in which God is merely defined and deduced into existence.
Shop talk among the serious philosophers? Such that in saying what you mean and meaning what you say about God and religion, both theists and atheists are up in the same clouds?
If God’s “Divine Nature” is only ever captured in human language what does that tell us about both of them? Not much it would seem.
As for the threat being lifted, in what sense?
Does defining and deducing God into existence through the use of language bring us any closer to an actual extant God?
Instead, nothing has really changed. You can argue yourself into taking that proverbial leap of leap or into making that proverbial wager.
But there’s still the part where you have to connect the dots existentially between the behaviors that you choose “down here” and that which you are able to think yourself into believing about the part “up there”.
The Similarities Between Religion and Philosophy *
Are Religion and Philosophy Two Ways of Doing the Same Thing?
Austin Cline at the Learn Religions website
*and the differences
For me, they are similar given the extent to which either one comes around to this: How ought one to live?
Then it all revolves around the part where most religions conclude that if one follows a particular spiritual path – their own – one has a “transcendental” access to the “right way to live” through God. Not only that but if you choose to live in accordance with what is said to be the “will of God” you are rewarded for all of eternity with immortality and salvation.
As for philosophy here?
Come on, they don’t even come close. At best there are philosophers who contend that someone can reason him or herself to a rational moral understanding of human interactions. The Ayn Rand Syndrome. So, you’ll know how to live optimally. Or, if you prefer Kant, categorically and imperatively.
But then you still die. Obliterated for all time to come.
On the other hand, there is all the difference in the world between the answers. With religion, not only is there presumed to be an answer – the answer – but that answer itself becomes the center of the universe for many. It can impact their lives in many respects. And, for the truly orthodox, in every respect. And while philosophers tend to focus almost entirely on answers relating to human interactions on this side of the grave, the answers provided to religious flocks carry on for all of eternity.
Here though I can only come back to this: in what context? Given a particular “situation” in the lives that we live when does religion become philosophical and philosophy religious?
The Atheist & the Foxhole
Catriona Hanley asks: Is God still dead?
On the other hand, how many of those who claim to believe in God [in or out of the foxhole] go through their days eagerly awaiting their own death knowing what awaits them – paradise – on the other side?
I’ve discussed this with any number of the faithful down through the years. And, sure, there are any number of reactions to explain what can be the same fear of death that many atheists embody. After all, the very notion of faith itself implies doubt. You take an existential “leap of faith” to a God, the God. Or make a “wager”. But some are willing to own up to the implications of that. And they are in turn able to grasp there are many, many Gods professed to be the one and the only God among all the different denominations and spiritual paths.
How could thoughts and feelings of this nature not be but profoundly problematic manifestations of dasein?
This part in particular:
Different strokes for different folks doesn’t even come close to encompassing all of the different reactions we have to “my death”.
And the foxholes are no less all over the map subjunctively. All along the intellectual/spiritual spectrum given whatever you come to think yourself into believing is true about God and religion. Or are indoctrinated to believe.
And, more to the point, one thing doesn’t change. This: that the only possible way in which to truly guarantee that your fear of death is able to be contained [in or out of the foxhole] is through God and religion.
But, then, for however long you are able to keep “my death” on the back burner, it will eventually come around to encompass the whole stove. With no way out of the kitchen.
The Atheist & the Foxhole
Catriona Hanley asks: Is God still dead?
This is the part that matters most to me. In fact, I still recall the first time I really began to think about it. I was reading a book about Jean-Paul Sartre. I believe it was a printed companion to a film/documentary about him.
[No Exit by Harold Pinter perhaps?]
In it, the author spoke of a friend of Sartre’s who had traveled to the Soviet Union to experience first hand the so-called New Man that was being created by the Marxist Revolution. Only when the discussion got around to death – to oblivion – it turned out that the New Man was really no better off than the Old Man. Sure, one might manage to think him or herself into believing that they “lived on” after death through the Revolution. For some that worked.
But, for others, who was kidding whom?
No God? No religious path? Forget about it. You die and you’re just more dead meat ever and always disintegrating back to star stuff. Communist or capitalist.
What’s being “good enough” have to do with it? Seriously. It’s either that, the No God Eastern rendition or oblivion. You know, “for all practical purposes”.
Forget demonstrating it descriptively. That’s still just a world of words, right? The concept of God?
On the other hand, given a No God universe, Humanists are still no closer to transcending conceptual contraptions themselves of whatever reality might possibly be going back – infinitely? – to an understanding of Existence itself.
Then there are those who, in accepting this, abandon philosophy altogether. And then those like me who, in accepting it, still can’t quite bring themselves to go that far.
The Atheist & the Foxhole
Catriona Hanley asks: Is God still dead?
That’s always my point. In the absence of a transcendent – omniscient, omnipotent – font Good and Evil become the existential contraptions that mere mortals are always shape-shifting down through the ages to accommodate different communities across the globe. And now in the “modern age” where, through access to the worldwide media and the worldwide internet, it’s possible to make contact with endless variations of the Humanist alternative.
It’s not a tree anymore however but a whole forest of every imaginable tree that there is. Pick one, gather your own flock and convince yourself that yours is the one true path. Like the objectivists here.
As for the “foundation”…based on what set of assumptions when all of the paths touch down on the planet given any particular conflict.
On the other hand, come on, for countless millions around the globe not only is God not dead but attempts to link both Good and Evil to a particular denominational rendition of Him is still very much the way of the world. Right here in America, evangelicals continue to enflame large swaths of the population. And as long as God and religion remain the only realistic font of choice for both morality and immortality, we can be fairly certain it will always be around.