More errant nonsense from N/A. When confronted with logic he lapses into more mumbo jumbo to complete the circle started by his previous mumbo jumbo. It’s a self-contained nonsense narration, a bubble of bullshit he thinks he can live in and behind which he thinks he can safely ward off rational argument. Can’t happen, N/A. Yo bubble gonna burst, man. Bubbles always do.

But you’ll just keep trying to blow a new one. A life blowing bubbles cannot result in an intellectually fulfilled existence, much less a satisfying one overall. You need to ‘think’ about your position logically and then accept life for what it is. Otherwise you’ll always be wasting time tilting at windmills and getting nowhere. Your wanting the supernatural is never going to make it real no matter what nonsense you rattle off in support of it.

What I find fascinating is the persistence of guys like you and BM - the inability to accept when you are beaten. You are like alcoholics who insist that they can drink (and think) normally but never seem to manage to do it. Religion is like a virus and a drug. It fucks you up but you are unable to break free of it because it makes you think you are ok. You need to put the metaphorical cork in the religious bottle, N/A. Otherwise you will always remain N/A. Not an enviable state for normal, rational folks.

The concern for what we ARE is the domain of the essence of religion.

You must create the domain of the essence of religion and explain its necessity before you can explain why it is necessary to be concerned about what we are in it… or why science cannot answer concerns about what we are.

Your form is pretty good. We seem to have exhausted your capacity to explain your necessities.

Yup! With N/A it’s turtles all the way down.

@Nick: It doesn’t make sense. the only reason it has become acceptable is to deny a conscious source for creation. How long would it take robots of different types to appear by chance and interact with each other? The chances of it ocuring make it an impossibility. yet this is what we are supposed to believe. Forms of life came to exist for no reason other than chance and these forms interact and reproduce for no reason other than chance.

I share this thought, but it can’t be defended.  It would be true in a closed system, but the Universe may be eternal and infinite, plus mult-layered.  In that case, robots appearing and interacting by “chance” is not impausible. You know….the old “if an infinite number of monkeys bang on a piano throughout eternity, one of them is going to end up playing Beethoven’s Fifth.”

But, as I said, I agree with you that the laws of the Universe suggest an intelligence of some sort.  However, I recognize that this is not a fact, but an article of faith.  I would have no problem with you, Nick, if you admitted that all these metaphysical ideas which thrill you so much are a hope and a possibility, but not a certainty.  That is…you have FAITH they are true.  You are demonstrating the trait that you abhor in atheists….emotional denial. When I have accused you of this, you have denied it….but it seeps through all your writing.  You are heavily invested in seeing the world from the perspective you have assumed.  This is fine…just admit that you have made a choice for all the reasons you have listed, but also because it pleases you.

You are obviously enchanted by the allure of “self-transcendance”....or maybe “self-willed evolution”, on a personal level. Does this belief necessitate a God or a Source?  Couldn’t atheists be just as commited to the same ideal?

Another of your pearls, Saralynn. Sometimes you really do shine. I still think you should have been a writer.

You hit the nail on the head. N/A needs to be honest with himself. I can deal with honesty. What I hate is self-delusion dressed up as superiority.

N/A’s is an arrogance that cries out for deconstruction. Or, if that’s not possible, demolition.

saralynn - 18 August 2012 10:46 AM

@Nick: It doesn’t make sense. the only reason it has become acceptable is to deny a conscious source for creation. How long would it take robots of different types to appear by chance and interact with each other? The chances of it ocuring make it an impossibility. yet this is what we are supposed to believe. Forms of life came to exist for no reason other than chance and these forms interact and reproduce for no reason other than chance.

I share this thought, but it can’t be defended.  It would be true in a closed system, but the Universe may be eternal and infinite, plus mult-layered.  In that case, robots appearing and interacting by “chance” is not impausible. You know….the old “if an infinite number of monkeys bang on a piano throughout eternity, one of them is going to end up playing Beethoven’s Fifth.”

But, as I said, I agree with you that the laws of the Universe suggest an intelligence of some sort.  However, I recognize that this is not a fact, but an article of faith.  I would have no problem with you, Nick, if you admitted that all these metaphysical ideas which thrill you so much are a hope and a possibility, but not a certainty.  That is…you have FAITH they are true.  You are demonstrating the trait that you abhor in atheists….emotional denial. When I have accused you of this, you have denied it….but it seeps through all your writing.  You are heavily invested in seeing the world from the perspective you have assumed.  This is fine…just admit that you have made a choice for all the reasons you have listed, but also because it pleases you.

You are obviously enchanted by the allure of “self-transcendance”....or maybe “self-willed evolution”, on a personal level. Does this belief necessitate a God or a Source?  Couldn’t atheists be just as commited to the same ideal?

Sara, you don’t seem as closed as some others here. This is why I cannot see why you insist on only two options: belief (faith) and denial. You seem closed to the idea of being open to a potential. In older times such contemplation was respected. It doesn’t seem so in these times where people have been conditioned to either believe or deny.

I am open to the concept of the cyclical process of involution and evolution since nothing else makes any sense. Of course it cannot be proven to humanity in general. It can only be verified for oneself through efforts at self knowledge and acquiring the quality of consciousness to experience these complimentary flows of involution and evolution as they take place within our being.

I accept the hypothesis as the most reasonable one I’ve encountered and experienced enough to suggest its probable truth but this is not to say I believe it to the extent of denying others. So far I do not know of a better explanation for our universe and possible multiverses. I simply don’t as of yet have the quality of consciousness yet able to verify it.

I do not see what is so difficult about being open to the mysteries rather than insisting on belief or denial but people have been proven closed even to the potential for a supernatural part of our mind revealing a quality of reality not sensed by our animalistic senses.

But it is what it is. all I can do is be encouraged that not everyone is this way. There is a minority in the West still capable of being open as is recognized in the East through the practice of detachment and conscious attention.

You are obviously enchanted by the allure of “self-transcendance”....or maybe “self-willed evolution”, on a personal level. Does this belief necessitate a God or a Source?  Couldn’t atheists be just as commited to the same ideal?

I am more enchanted with the potential for our species. That is where its real value is. Humanity is more important than me.

How is a attaining a conscious perspective possible if it doesn’t already exist? If it already exists, what is the highest level of inclusion that would define the highest conscious perspective or level of inclusion . It must be the dreaded ineffable G word. Panentheism refers to the universe as the “Body of God.” What is not of the body and the quality of Isness the body exists in would be the highest level of inclusion. The question becomes what Man’s conscious potential is within this universal body.

An atheist may be turned off by the G word and personal God concepts but be experiencing higher influences just the same.

Those like Jacob Needleman and Simone Weil when they were atheists had an open mind so did not feel it necessary to deny to preserve beliefs. They understand how meaningful concepts are so easily corrupted.

“History is full of such things: ideas which are an awakening force in their complete form and in the proper context, becoming a soporific or even a destructive influence when only a piece of them is used or understood”. Jacob Needleman

“But for religious feeling to emanate from the spirit of truth, one should be absolutely prepared to abandon one’s religion, even if that should mean losing all motive for living, if it should turn out to be anything other than the truth.” Simone Weil, Need for Roots, Routledge, 2003. page 247

People like this neither blindly believe or deny but rather strive to be open. Their attitude is rare in these times where it is more fun to defend belief or denial for the purpose of self justification.  IMO their attitude is as objectively beneficial in the West as it is rare

More waffle.

Die fröhliche Wissenschaft (Rob) - 18 August 2012 12:21 PM

More waffle.

This is why PR should be dedicated to King George

I desire what is good. Therefore, everyone who does not agree with me is a traitor. King George III

Who knew better than King George how to deal with these triatorous waffles those like Rob continually expose?

The next time you have waffles for breakfast and are enjoying them, you may be supporting me. Be very wary of your waffles. They may not be as they seem.

http://www.joyofbaking.com/breakfast/Waffles.html

Rob: More waffle.

N/A: This is why PR should be dedicated to King George:

I desire what is good. Therefore, everyone who does not agree with me is a traitor. King George I

Who knew better than King George how to deal with these triatorous waffles those like Rob continually expose?

The next time you have waffles for breakfast and are enjoying them, you may be supporting me. Be very wary of your waffles. They may not be as they seem.

http://www.joyofbaking.com/breakfast/Waffles.html

Ah, N/A, the king of waffle. You sound just like king George III. Or better, his sillier, profligate son. At least George III had a medical condition that accounted for his nonsense. What’s your excuse?

Nick_A - 18 August 2012 09:33 AM

Necessary understanding in this case means the unification in the pursuit of self knowledge of what we ARE in relation to higher consciousness and what we can DO in relation to societal interaction. The concern for what we ARE is the domain of the essence of religion. What we can DO in the mechanical world is of interest to science.

For someone who often accuses atheists of embracing dualism, this stratification of the human condition into “what we ARE in relation to higher consciousness” and “what we can DO in relation of societal interaction” seems very much like a two-sided perspective. Of course your aim at unification would still, in essence, preserve the duality; while our aim at arriving at the “oneness of being” involves the rejecting of those perspectives which enable the duality to exist. So out of necessity (and pure common sense) we must annihilate all reference to the supernatural (or as you describe it “what we ARE in relation to higher consciousness”).

So what looks like a destruction to you, is in fact a fulfillment of the oneness of being.  You are afraid that without an attachment to the Source, we will become like mechanistic zombies, but that hasn’t happened, has it?  There never was a source to begin with, the term ‘Source’ is just a word for a make believe notion that fills the explanitory gap for those who cannot understand science and for certain have no grasp whatsoever of the theory of biological evolution.

They are out of balance. Scientific and technological knowledge is rapidly advancing. Self knowledge of what we ARE is diminishing into imagination. This imbalance invites our destruction as a species. It is necessary understanding to me and woo to you. Where I would rather contemplate the human condition and the mens for dealing with it, you would rather brush your teeth. This is our difference.

Are you saying that you never brush your teeth?

: N/A: the human condition and the the mens for dealing with it…

A Freudian slip? Maybe something supernatural slipped in there, N/A.

No problem with the mens rea.  Your bullshit is intentional. The actus rea will always be a problem for you, though. Can’t follow through.

@Nick:  Sara, you don’t seem as closed as some others here. This is why I cannot see why you insist on only two options: belief (faith) and denial. You seem closed to the idea of being open to a potential. In older times such contemplation was respected. It doesn’t seem so in these times where people have been conditioned to either believe or deny.

I am open to the concept of the cyclical process of involution and evolution since nothing else makes any sense. Of course it cannot be proven to humanity in general. It can only be verified for oneself through efforts at self knowledge and acquiring the quality of consciousness to experience these complimentary flows of involution and evolution as they take place within our being.

I accept the hypothesis as the most reasonable one I’ve encountered and experienced enough to suggest its probable truth but this is not to say I believe it to the extent of denying others. So far I do not know of a better explanation for our universe and possible multiverses. I simply don’t as of yet have the quality of consciousness yet able to verify it.

I do not see what is so difficult about being open to the mysteries rather than insisting on belief or denial but people have been proven closed even to the potential for a supernatural part of our mind revealing a quality of reality not sensed by our animalistic senses.

But it is what it is. all I can do is be encouraged that not everyone is this way. There is a minority in the West still capable of being open as is recognized in the East through the practice of detachment and conscious attention.

You are obviously enchanted by the allure of “self-transcendance”....or maybe “self-willed evolution”, on a personal level. Does this belief necessitate a God or a Source?  Couldn’t atheists be just as commited to the same ideal?

I am more enchanted with the potential for our species. That is where its real value is. Humanity is more important than me.

How is a attaining a conscious perspective possible if it doesn’t already exist? If it already exists, what is the highest level of inclusion that would define the highest conscious perspective or level of inclusion . It must be the dreaded ineffable G word. Panentheism refers to the universe as the “Body of God.” What is not of the body and the quality of Isness the body exists in would be the highest level of inclusion. The question becomes what Man’s conscious potential is within this universal body.

An atheist may be turned off by the G word and personal God concepts but be experiencing higher influences just the same.

Those like Jacob Needleman and Simone Weil when they were atheists had an open mind so did not feel it necessary to deny to preserve beliefs. They understand how meaningful concepts are so easily corrupted.

I am open to possibilities to such a degree that I am burdened by them.  I don’t sit on the fence and look at two sides.  I look north and south, east and west, up and down, and all points in-between.  Sometimes I think as you do; sometimes I’m an atheist, sometimes I’m a Swedenborgian, sometimes I am a Jew, sometimes a panentheist, sometimes I believe in reincarnation, and so on.  Presently I’m a Sufi.  I do think you are being disingenuous when you claim not to be emotionally invested in your belief system.  You insist that it is because “it is the only thing that makes sense”, but that is because it is logically consistent with that which you want to believe. 

You are assuming that meaning is revealed and “truth” is discovered; but it is much more likely that we impose meaning on something that is inherently neutral. 

My faith….and your faith….is that this is not so.  Also, that it is imperative to overcome our reactive inclinations, our self-centered narcissism, and our deluded habits of faulty thinking so that we can not only become as free as possible, but as useful as possible.  But the fact is that this drive we share is not dependent on any particular belief system and many atheists, especially on this site, are motivated by the same impulse.  The only difference is they refuse to make up reasons to explain it….which, if you think about it, is quite heroic.

Me…I prefer a story…a theme…an “idea”....which is motivating and enables me to schlep up what seems to be , at times, a mountain of difficulties.  But…I never forget that the story I’ve adopted is within a much bigger story that is impossible for me….or anyone… to comprehend.

I’ve decided that it doesn’t matter what the Hell anyone believes as long as it results in not only greater awareness, but what I consider to be perennial values, such as courage, fidelity,generosity, restraint, tolerance, forgiveness and compassion.  My faith is that it matters.  That’s about all I can say.

Saralynn: My faith is that it matters.  That’s about all I can say.

If I can be said to have any sort of faith at all,  that is mine, too, Saralynn. Some things do matter. Universaly so. That is where I part company with moral relativists.

To claim to have a personal faith that is all “mine”, while continually and unabashedly condemning religion and belief in God and the existence of God and anyone who claims to have experienced God, is like having the smallest dick on earth and claiming to be a porno star.

I am convinced that most people on PR just write whatever pops into their heads at the moment, and the more wine or beer they drink, the more popping they experience.

Here is another metaphysical principle that you “thinkers” continually violate:

NO TWO CONTRADICTORY STATEMENTS CAN BE WRITTEN IN THE SAME SENTENCE AND BOTH OF THEM BE TRUE.

Interesting how nut cases use upper-case to highlight the most nonsensical of their ravings?

BM, of metaphysical principles you have not the slightest idea. You ought to put the cork back in the bottle. You just get sillier and sillier. And when you’ve put the cork back in the bottle you might want to think about getting off porn sites. Your obsession with porn is disgusting. You sin too much.

But thank you, anyway, for your post.

Life’s about learning, a process, a journey rather than a destination.

Perhaps my greatest weakness and regret during an otherwise successful and enjoyable journey has been that I have not become completely immune to praise. I’m getting better but I doubt I shall ever be able to give it up entirely. So I can still thank you for your inadvertent praise,BM. You unwittingly help me see the continual need for vigilance. You highlight the moral imperative to accept reality in our quest for truth, however unpalatable reality may be. What’s needed is a strict and complete rationality, a reasonableness untainted and unfettered by supernaturalist nonsense.

Thanks again for your post and praise. You may not see it but you are useful to recovering ex-theists. They look back and see you. Then turn and run from your dark, malignant nonsense, happy and relieved that they saw the truth in time to avoid becoming another BM, a soul lost for all time. They are grateful to have attained that joyful wisdom, die fröhliche Wissenschaft that saves people from a dismal fate like yours.