How did the universe come to exist in yours? The Big Bang? How did that originate? Ah ... you have conjectures -- many conjectures as to how nature came into being.
Zen
- Thread starter wil
- Start date
A person believes that what they can see, taste and touch or measure constitutes the total of reality, is just who they are. Reality is far deeper and more nuanced. ImoI asked you first
And yes! Many ideas, some even compatible with each other. I've posted one of them somewhere on here.
wil
UNeyeR1
Zen....breathe...
Who let the dogs out?
Who let the dogs out?
Bloodshot
Well-Known Member
- Messages
- 194
- Reaction score
- 112
- Points
- 43
Yes, I think so too, everything points to this.
We sense only a tiny fraction of what's around us. 3d is an evolved cognitive paradigm allowing us to navigate our slice of the universe, where Newtonian physics are a good enough approximation. So overall a vastly simplified abstraction of the underlying complexities.
By the same token though, if we accept that our perception of the outer world may lead to misinterpretation, we have to apply the same caveats to our perception of our inner world.
Our interpretation of what we experience as agency and consciousness is therefore just as questionable, and should not be held in higher esteem.
Aupmanyav
Be your own guru.
The architects are the four "Fundamental Interactions (Gravity, Electromagnetism, Weak Interaction and Strong Interaction (Fundamental interaction - Wikipedia). They even maintain the system. We know of none other.
Aupmanyav
Be your own guru.
Have been doing that all through my atheistic days. That has stood for me.
(Currently, we are in a vegetarian phase for the month of Shravana, auspicious to Lord Shiva).
My grandson gave us a treat for his first monthly stipend as a law intern (USD 314.63). The fare included mixed lentils (known as 'dal makhani'), paneer (cottage cheese) and veg. 'kofta' (potato).
However, no bar to non-veg. food outside the house.
Aupmanyav
Be your own guru.
Simple but not true. No evidence. Carrot and sword theory (karma) was a social construct. Shamans built upon it.
Yeah, physicalism has no need for any God/Gods/Goddesses.
Aupmanyav
Be your own guru.
That's a good way of putting it. Thank you.
I’ve never disputed modern knowledge of nature. I question the wisdom of assuming that the universe ends there – that nature is the whole of reality.
I'm not a materialist. I know there's more to reality.
Aupmanyav
Be your own guru.
Maybe so, but then these simpler relationships might still not address the central issue.
One might argue that if the system needed constant, empirical 'architect' input, that would be empirical evidence of the architect, so seems unlikely.
That the cosmos is sustained from moment to moment, in a non-empirical manner, is another order of argument.
There are arguments, somewhere along those lines, that posit the system, ie the cosmos, ie experiential reality, is dependent on mind as prior and fundamental to its existence. Philosophical Idealism and Panpsychism balance our Philosophical Materialism.
Looking at the proliferation of denominations today, it's largely because of the vagaries of human nature.
Looking further, into those ideas with a thought-through metaphysics, and then you find a deep coherence of simple concepts.
Ah, you seem to be conflating 'truth' and 'fact', but they are not at all the same thing.
A Fact is a piece of empirical, verifiable data that exists independently of belief. Facts those things that can be observed, tested and confirmed.
A Truth is a broader, philosophical concept that involves inquiry into the meaning, context, or interpretation of facts. It offers an answer to the "why" a thing, whereas science answers "how" a thing is.
That's an interesting opinion coming from yourself.
As I read it, Buddhist commentaries would say such opinions are ill-founded, not understanding the concept.
(Sure, it can be wrongly deployed as carrot-and-stick, as indeed can just about anything, but that's not what the doctrine is.)
As I understand it – Karma is cause and effect, the result of causes and conditions. Rather than carrot-and-stick, there is no moral agent sitting in judgement. Rather, we are responsible for the consequences of our actions.
I'm surprised a materialist would seek to dismiss cause-and-effect.
(I agree that the idea that 'my' situation here and now is the result of 'my' actions in a previous existence is thoroughly dubious, more superstitious than good sense, but that's another discussion.)
Some would argue that to deny karma is to deny causality?
Bloodshot
Well-Known Member
- Messages
- 194
- Reaction score
- 112
- Points
- 43
There are, but I've yet to encounter any framing of this that offers a preferable explanation. All this does is push the hard problem etc into a different domain, it doesn't provide any extra explanatory power.
Aupmanyav
Be your own guru.
Can truth, over-ride fact?
I am sure the Neanderthals also said 'sow good, reap good' (meaning do not keep the whole of the hunt for yourself. Someday, you would also return empty-handed). Some agency had to be found to do that, therefore, the old man in the sky. That is how God was born.
When did I dismiss cause and effect? That is the problem. Theist do not give the cause of existence of God nor the cause why he may have created the universe nor even the issue that why God did not create a world without evil?
Cause and effect theory stands good till the day when and if science discovers that all things arose from 'absolute nothing'.
Yeah, true. Previous or future after-death existence is not supported by any evidence, though assured in many religions. It is thoroughly dubious, more superstitious than good sense (but that is another discussion).
Bloodshot
Well-Known Member
- Messages
- 194
- Reaction score
- 112
- Points
- 43
Any interaction between an external architect and an inhabitant of the architecture would be an input. So any answer to any prayer, any miracle, any manifestation.
Plenty of reports of this sort of phenomenon, ascribed to thousands of different sources.
Bloodshot
Well-Known Member
- Messages
- 194
- Reaction score
- 112
- Points
- 43
I think there's a more fundamental reason why we come up with supernatural explanations.
Our cognitive development places each of us at the centre of the universe. We are almost incapable of imagining a universe without ourself in it.
We thus go to all kinds of elaborate lengths to construct scenarios in which we continue to exist after we die.
Science generally says, we cease to exist, the cosmos carries on happily without us.
Indeed so ... but it is contextual.
Bertrand Russell (agnostic philosopher, 1872-1970) famously shut down the argument with Frederick Copleston (Catholic philosopher, 1907-1994) by declaring "the universe is just there, and that's all," rejecting any Cosmological 'First Cause' Argument, along with the Principle of Sufficient Reason (which posits that everything must have a reason for its existence).
The consensus was that Russell won the debate, dismantling Copleston's arguments while refusing to concede the burden of proof. as an agnostic, he only needed to show that Copleston’s proofs for God’s existence were unconvincing.
Russell refused to engage in what he viewed as meaningless metaphysical questions, which means inevitably, he wanted to argue on his own terms on his oewn ground, and the result was therefore inevitable. Copleston later remarked, "if one refuses even to sit down at the chessboard and make a move, one cannot be checkmated."
The lesson, of course, is from Thomas Aquinas (Catholic 1225-1274):
"... metaphysics can dispute with one who denies its principles, if only the opponent will make some concession; but if he concede nothing, it can have no dispute with him, though it can answer his objections. Hence Sacred Scripture, since it has no science above itself, can dispute with one who denies its principles only if the opponent admits some at least of the truths obtained through divine revelation"
(Aquinas, Summa Theologiae, FP, Q1, a8)
Well, it does rather posit that the domain of physicalism is perhaps insufficient to address the problem.