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Pastimes : Let's Talk About Our Feelings!!! -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Rick Julian who wrote (24889)	9/13/1998 1:25:00 PM
From: Rick Julian	Read Replies (3) \| Respond to of 108807

What we live is our imagination. Our outer lives reflect the content of our inner world. What we are, in addition to the essence we were born with, is the cumulative result of all we have experienced in the world from the moment we first opened our eyes and inhaled our first breath -- even from our first moments as sensate fetuses. In order to "make sense" of reality, our minds process the raw data of our experiences, and in doing so create belief systems. As children some are encouraged to see themselves as powerful and capable of affecting the reality they experience.Their adult lives manifest this belief. On the other hand, we all have acquaintences who were conditioned to see themselves as victims of life, and accordingly, their lives reflect this belief. Some go through life saying "I will make this happen, or this happened because I . . ." while others say "What will happen to me now?" There are those who attempt to define life by believing only in what is tangible: by what they see, hear, or touch. "If I can't see/touch/hear it, I won't/don't believe it." This seems to define the most rational and scientific way to live. Yet our very senses betray us: I sit at a wooden desk. It is hard. I hit it with my fist and it doesn't yield. I can't see through it. It is still. Based on visual and tactile data, I conclude this desk is a solid, and further, I will define as solid all other physical objects which possess similar traits. And I will be wrong. All solidity and stillness is an illusion. There is as much space between the atoms which comprise this desk as there are atoms themselves, and so it is with the space between the components of the atoms. And these atoms and their subordinate elements are animated, have velocity, and are never at rest. In believing this desk to be solid and still, I am deceiving myself--my most trusted senses have betrayed me. Take a bicycle wheel and place it on a verticle axis so that it lies on a horizontal plane. While it is still, I can place a stick between the spokes. Begin to rotate this wheel at a sufficient speed and again try to insert this same stick between the spokes. The stick meets seemingly "solid" resistance and is repelled. The spinning wheel behaves as a solid, yet it is in fact not. The world is full of such illusions, yet we delude ourselves with rationale and scientific confidence. Surely science has its value--it has the capacity to provide the theoretical framework, the constructs which allow insights into our perceptions, such as those of the desk and the wheel. But science does not, nor can it ever begin to address the space between the materiale, nor the original and eternal motion that animates the entire universe. Take anything your mind can imagine and deconstruct it. At each moment let the question "Why?" lead you on to more fundamental levels of understanding. You will eventually reach a place where you can reduce no further, and cannot answer "Why?" nor even "How?" At this stillpoint one stands at the threshold of the concept of a Creator. Our senses and minds cannot carry us beyond this threshold. In the face of our ultimate ignorance, only an open, humble heart and faith can gain us any ground.

To: Rick Julian who wrote (24889)	9/13/1998 3:02:00 PM
From: E	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 108807

I want to try to differentiate between the negative statements you have offered about marriage and those Christine has offered about religion. Christine quotes a number of philosophers who assert that religion is nonsense. If this atheist position is understood to mean, "doesn't make anybody happy," of course the position is silly. But rationalist atheists don't assert that. They assert that statements along the lines of "there is a God," bear the same relation to the truth as statements along the lines of "there are teeny folks living in my clenched fist." Your negative quotations about marriage illustrate the figure of speech called "synecdoche," in which a part is used to represent a whole. Bad marriages are used to characterize "marriage." Christine's negative quotations about religion do a different thing, so the two are not good parallels. She is not characterizing all religions by citing a group of them. I would say her quotes are a way of making the argument that all religions, without exception, partake of certain defining (silly and, even when weighed against their anodyne side effects, ugly) characteristics. I hope I haven't taken too great a liberty in offering my explication of Christine's post. I am going to reply to your post beginning "What we live is our imagination" later, Rick. P.S. Nice to meet you!

To: Rick Julian who wrote (24889)	9/20/1998 12:06:00 AM
From: Grainne	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 108807

Rick, your posts are thoughtful and deep, and I am not sure as I sit in the dark here, sort of sleepy and half worried about the exact number of mosquitos who are biting some portion of my flesh at any given moment, that I can do justice to them. So I will try to address small parts of your arguments. I guess I should first reiterate that I think most people NEED religious beliefs, to comfort them and to make sense of the universe and of life. I would not agree that religion's potential is only limited by the quality of those who practice it, because everything I have ever read indicates that the poorer and less educated people are, the stronger their religious beliefs, statistically speaking. First, I do not believe that this group is of lower quality than richer, more educated people. But more importantly, I think that just choosing one belief system over another, or a belief system over atheism, causes divisiveness and brings tribal instincts to the foreground. It is very threatening when you have put a lot of eggs into a basket that is invisible, and someone else comes along and says all your eggs crashed and broke because you didn't have the right basket after all, but their group does. It is even worse if the people who have the better invisible baskets want to kill all of you for heresy!! What is genuine spiritual practice, anyway? It certainly would have to include primitive religious belief systems, paganism, and all the world's religions, not just Christianity. Do you agree with that definition? There is certainly credible research which shows that people who belong to spiritual groups are healthier and happier than those who do not. But what causes these statistical results? Is it the support of a group itself which is therapeutic? Could they all be advocating turning all the fish in the universe blue, and with this purpose be just as centered as they are at enjoying and spreading their religious beliefs? Do people who are lonely and unhappy sort themselves out in their isolation, to skew the statistics? I have always argued that for the individual, any belief system which offers solace and comfort is a benefit. I do think we have reached a point of absurdity, however, when president Clinton USES religion as sort of a front for his bad deeds. He is milking this just as much as he can, trying to hide behind a group of ministers who should really know better, to protect him from the consequences of his behavior. As one former governor pointed out, forgiveness is wonderful, and he forgave the criminals who came before him who had found God. But he did not release them from prison. In 3D reality, even though there can be a spiritual dimension, there are also natural consequences, and Clinton is trying to escape his. Oh, dear, where was I? Marriage? I read E's post, and thought it was just great. I appreciate someone trying to add logic to my ramblings, which get a little emotional sometimes. In any event, marriage is a contract between two people. It can be wonderful or horrible, and like spiritual development requires a great deal of work. The difference I notice right away, however, is that it exists on a material plane--there are two real people who enter into the contract, right here on earth. Religious belief systems, on the other hand, call for suspension of disbelief, faith in things and beings which are supernatural and whose existence cannot be proven. On the other hand, a spouse is often like an old shoe after the novelty has worn off. While comfortable and hopefully a happy experience, there is no debate whatsoever whether the shoe is real or not, and this makes the comparison with spirituality, even in a cynical way, a real stretch.