faith, belief, truth and reality, how to?

[juantoo3]

I know what you're getting at here. Is everything really just self-referential? Is reality, dissected with meticulous logic, just whatever we collectively decide it is? Is it all, at base, a bunch of BS we dreamed up? Because if you stare at it really hard under a bright light the bottom just sort of falls out of constructive reality.

I just love these existential crises!

I just find it so difficult to consider it an illusion when I get punched in the nose and my eyes are welling up and my face is on fire with pain. I can't help but think reality exists...just maybe not quite the way we imagine it.

What does reality look like outside of the constraints of social functionalism? Because functionalism- the idea that "the way things are" is the way they must remain, is creating this sense that we have of being hopelessly trapped in a logic bubble from which we cannot escape without annihilating everything we've come to regard as "self." The search for the ultimate singular principal which explains everything is a symptom of our desperate need to shore up the functional model. Without the sense of meaning derived from constantly buttressing our belief in that functional model we have no sense of control.

OK, but I also wonder if things are the way they are because it really is the more practical way...meaning the alternatives suck in comparison. There are social functionalisms that do seem to serve a purpose of cultural cohesion. Then there are other models of functionalism that seem to me bent on self-destruction...even if those immersed in them can't see the handwriting on the wall yet.

But whatcha gonna do?

 

[China Cat Sunflower]

Everything is real. I don't buy literal maya. The fear of maya is part of the social conditioning I was talking about. Formulaic spirituality is closed ended. Dead ended.

Chris

 

[China Cat Sunflower]

OK, but I also wonder if things are the way they are because it really is the more practical way...meaning the alternatives suck in comparison. There are social functionalisms that do seem to serve a purpose of cultural cohesion. Then there are other models of functionalism that seem to me bent on self-destruction...even if those immersed in them can't see the handwriting on the wall yet.

You are stranded at sea with the ten people you care about most, but your life boat only holds nine. Who do you abandon, and why?

...

After you explain I say " but why couldn't you just let Uncle Howard hang on to the outside, or take turns swimming? Why'd you just let him drown?" You'd be stuck with the Nuremberg defense. It's all real, but within the fog of war that is the functional paradigm we all wind up defending flags instead of truths to some extent.

Chris

 

[Nick_A]

You are stranded at sea with the ten people you care about most, but your life boat only holds nine. Who do you abandon, and why?

...

After you explain I say " but why couldn't you just let Uncle Howard hang on to the outside, or take turns swimming? Why'd you just let him drown?" You'd be stuck with the Nuremberg defense. It's all real, but within the fog of war that is the functional paradigm we all wind up defending flags instead of truths to some extent.

Chris

How bout this one. Suppose a warrier going into batle realizes that part of his family is on the other side. He then decides he doesn't want to fight and overwhelmed with grief, puts his weapons down. Then he asks God about this problem and God says the thing to do is to go into battle. What would you think of this God that obviously hasn't heard of Oprah?

 

[juantoo3]

Everything is real. I don't buy literal maya. The fear of maya is part of the social conditioning I was talking about. Formulaic spirituality is closed ended. Dead ended.

Oh, absolutely!

I think that is a primary motivator as to why Native American spirituality resonates with me...it is not formulaic; it is intimate, it is participatory.

 

[juantoo3]

You are stranded at sea with the ten people you care about most, but your life boat only holds nine. Who do you abandon, and why?

I dunno. I want to believe I would abandon myself. I want to believe I have come to a point where I no longer fear death. I'm not anxious to leave this plane of existence, but neither am I concerned about it when the time comes.

Ask me at the moment I am looking death in the eye, and I might have a bit different opinion...

After you explain I say " but why couldn't you just let Uncle Howard hang on to the outside, or take turns swimming? Why'd you just let him drown?" You'd be stuck with the Nuremberg defense. It's all real, but within the fog of war that is the functional paradigm we all wind up defending flags instead of truths to some extent.

Ah, the Nuremberg defense...sticky wicket, eh? Damned if you do, damned if you don't. We all need something to believe in. When our faith is shattered in one belief we grasp immediately for another. It is the nature of our psychological beast...we must have an operating program or we cease to function. Not that the operating program cannot be altered, but that wholesale jettison is not realistic. Even in swapping paradigms, we tend to do so gradually, piecemeal, so that it is not uncommon to hold conflicting components of competing paradigms.

 

[citizenzen]

I dunno. I want to believe I would abandon myself. I want to believe I have come to a point where I no longer fear death. I'm not anxious to leave this plane of existence, but neither am I concerned about it when the time comes.

Ask me at the moment I am looking death in the eye, and I might have a bit different opinion...

Yeah. I'd like to think I'm ready too. But I bet I mess my pants when it happens.

I'd better practice some more!

 

[juantoo3]

How bout this one. Suppose a warrier going into batle realizes that part of his family is on the other side. He then decides he doesn't want to fight and overwhelmed with grief, puts his weapons down. Then he asks God about this problem and God says the thing to do is to go into battle. What would you think of this God that obviously hasn't heard of Oprah?

I would think that G-d manifests in each individual in unique ways. There may well be scores of variations on the theme of "G-d," but still the fact remains that culturally we all tend to gravitate towards reaching out to G-d in some or other manner.

We all want what is right, and just, and skillful, and proper. None of us would willingly give our child a stone to eat when that child is hungry. But what exactly comprises "right" is where we seem to differ.

 

[juantoo3]

Yeah. I'd like to think I'm ready too. But I bet I mess my pants when it happens.

I'd better practice some more!

Yep, you got it!

 

[Postmaster]

The only problem I have with God is the god I seek protection and guidence off is the very same God that allows children to suffer at the hands of pedophiles and sadists. For that alone I can understand why people turn athiests maybe it gives them some humanistic sanity. Anyone got any views on this statement?

 

[juantoo3]

The only problem I have with God is the god I seek protection and guidence off is the very same God that allows children to suffer at the hands of pedophiles and sadists. For that alone I can understand why people turn athiests maybe it gives them some humanistic sanity. Anyone got any views on this statement?

I would venture a guess there are as many answers as there are people.

Every philosophical answer I have heard seems crass and uncaring. Every emotional answer I have heard seems to border on lynch mob lunacy.

I don't have a compelling answer, I only have what I hope is an answer that compels me to be vigilant and at the same time compassionate, to not let my emotions overrule my common sense, to take a good hard look at every situation that impacts on me and mine before reaching a conclusion, while considering those situations that do not impact directly on me and mine as teaching tools and learning experiences and to ignore the frenzy and sensationalism promulgated by the entertainment / news industry. I try hard to temper my tendency towards "an eye for an eye" with the compassion of "do unto others as you would have done unto you."

Justice and mercy is always an uneasy balance.

 

[citizenzen]

The only problem I have with God is the god I seek protection and guidence off is the very same God that allows children to suffer at the hands of pedophiles and sadists. For that alone I can understand why people turn athiests maybe it gives them some humanistic sanity. Anyone got any views on this statement?

God is wisdom and compassion.

Humans are free to chose what to do with their lives. To me, it seems like an easy choice, but obviously it ain't as easy as I think.

 

[China Cat Sunflower]

What I was trying to get at with the lifeboat analogy is that because of the way the question is posed the only possible action given is to abandon one person. That's the functional paradigm. But outside of that are all these other possible actions where poor Uncle Howard doesn't have to die. One could say "well, what could I do? I followed the rules." But the fact of the matter is that the morality which exists within the confines of the "the way things are" isn't moral at all in any truly objective sense. But the rub is that you've got to become a sociopath to see outside the "rationality" of the functional model. I think that this especially applies to matters of belief and spirituality. I personally reject the idea that I have to pick one of the predefined positions in the hollow debate which pits science against religion and vice versa.

Chris

 

[Postmaster]

I would venture a guess there are as many answers as there are people.

Every philosophical answer I have heard seems crass and uncaring. Every emotional answer I have heard seems to border on lynch mob lunacy.

I don't have a compelling answer, I only have what I hope is an answer that compels me to be vigilant and at the same time compassionate, to not let my emotions overrule my common sense, to take a good hard look at every situation that impacts on me and mine before reaching a conclusion, while considering those situations that do not impact directly on me and mine as teaching tools and learning experiences and to ignore the frenzy and sensationalism promulgated by the entertainment / news industry. I try hard to temper my tendency towards "an eye for an eye" with the compassion of "do unto others as you would have done unto you."

Justice and mercy is always an uneasy balance.

Thats a very nice answer thanks but my worry is being morally inconsistent if I believe in God the way that I like to (the omnipotent omnipresent) it makes me morally inconsistent to know that he allows certain crimes to happen. I'm willing to accpet alot of ill fate in this cruel world but what especially hits a nerve is when it comes to children. I think the only real answer one can give to make them morally consistent is to say that pain and suffering is rewarded in the after life, yet why should we suffer here on earth? I prefer not to and still go to heaven is that too much to ask for? Lets face it know one is exampt from pain, death is a painful expereince soon as our organs start to kick in, our mothers were in pain having us, and we were screaming coming in to the world. Yet through man (humans) we can eliminate pain, is it through God or through us?

 

[nativeastral]

Justice and mercy is always an uneasy balance.

too true

quote; chris
Everything is real. I don't buy literal maya

'everything unatural is also natural' - did goethe say that?

l agree as a parent, a human, its difficult to reconcile postmaster what you say about the evil in the world. do you believe in the 'sins of the fathers..?

 

[Postmaster]

God is wisdom and compassion.

Humans are free to chose what to do with their lives. To me, it seems like an easy choice, but obviously it ain't as easy as I think.

True.

I really dont know what to believe anymore you come to a forum like this to find answers and you only make more questions and your original questions are still left unanswered. I still believe in God and miracles maybe it just needs to be fine tuned.

 

[juantoo3]

True.

I really dont know what to believe anymore you come to a forum like this to find answers and you only make more questions and your original questions are still left unanswered. I still believe in God and miracles maybe it just needs to be fine tuned.

Don't you just love it??? All these years I've been looking and I don't think I'm any closer than when I started! And I'm still fascinated! The more I learn, the less I know!

 

[juantoo3]

What I was trying to get at with the lifeboat analogy is that because of the way the question is posed the only possible action given is to abandon one person.

Well, I *did* abandon one person, the choice I made was me.

That's the functional paradigm. But outside of that are all these other possible actions where poor Uncle Howard doesn't have to die. One could say "well, what could I do? I followed the rules." But the fact of the matter is that the morality which exists within the confines of the "the way things are" isn't moral at all in any truly objective sense. But the rub is that you've got to become a sociopath to see outside the "rationality" of the functional model. I think that this especially applies to matters of belief and spirituality. I personally reject the idea that I have to pick one of the predefined positions in the hollow debate which pits science against religion and vice versa.

Way on back in junior high I remember one of our teachers showing a film, I don't even recall the name of the film or what exactly he was trying to get across to the class by showing it. But it was about a German soldier in WWII, supposedly based on a true story (aren't they all? ), who was part of the roundup of some group or other, and when it came time to execute those civilians they rounded up he refused. His officer immediately stripped him of weapons and made a point of removing his uniform, and then stood him at the head of the line for the firing squad. The film ended with the guy getting shot in front of a stone wall.

Like I said, I'm still not sure what the teacher wanted us to take away from that, but what I got out of it is that the Nuremberg defense is a chicken$h!t cop out. We *are* responsible for our actions, regardless of who is holding the gun to our heads (figurative and literal). Which is just a corrollary as to why I don't let others dictate to me what religion should mean. When the time comes, I'm not gonna be just another chicken$h!t saying "I just did what they told me to do..."

Which means, I guess, that I'm a sociopath. I embrace that slur and make it mine...

 

[juantoo3]

Thats a very nice answer thanks but my worry is being morally inconsistent if I believe in God the way that I like to (the omnipotent omnipresent) it makes me morally inconsistent to know that he allows certain crimes to happen.

This is another one of those "ask 6 rabbis" questions...

I used to have similar quandaries bouncing around the inside of my mind.

I can't say for certain, but when I stopped trying to make G-d be what I wanted Him to be a lot of that stopped.

I think too, that a lot of what we are faced with in this existance is trial, is seeing how we will react and respond to adversity. Heaven is earned. The work isn't difficult but it is consistent. As I write this I am mentally kicking myself in the pants for my own failings...

 

[Francis king]

How bout this one. Suppose a warrier going into batle realizes that part of his family is on the other side. He then decides he doesn't want to fight and overwhelmed with grief, puts his weapons down. Then he asks God about this problem and God says the thing to do is to go into battle. What would you think of this God that obviously hasn't heard of Oprah?

lol- he would say... Arise, Oh Prtha, chastiser of the enemy, do not let this cowardice overcome you...