chaz wyman wrote:
Religion is simple not the study of consciousness in any sense I can think of.
It could be described as the study of man's consciousness in relation to God's consciousness, among other things.
There are few religions indeed that encourage study of any kind - and none that I can think of that may defined as 'the study of ..." in any sense.
Maybe you have a few examples?
Every religion that I am aware of will encourage the study of the scriptures associated with that religion, the difficulty is to get the most ardent believers to study anything else. Several years ago I tried to start a discussion group in my church with the subject of "Christianity in Literature". The idea was to read secular literature and find content and see how it relates to Christianity. The one restriction was that the reading material should be non-religious literature. It was interesting but too few showed an interest and participation.
More recently our current pastor tried something similar but was useing literature with a decidedly religious theme.
It could be described as the study of man's consciousness in relation to God's consciousness, among other things.
There are few religions indeed that encourage study of any kind - and none that I can think of that may defined as 'the study of ..." in any sense.
Maybe you have a few examples?
Every religion that I am aware of will encourage the study of the scriptures associated with that religion, the difficulty is to get the most ardent believers to study anything else. Several years ago I tried to start a discussion group in my church with the subject of "Christianity in Literature". The idea was to read secular literature and find content and see how it relates to Christianity. The one restriction was that the reading material should be non-religious literature. It was interesting but too few showed an interest and participation.
More recently our current pastor tried something similar but was useing literature with a decidedly religious theme.
There is a range of teaching and learning methods. Rote learning, and getting indoctrinated as the the 'correct' interpretation via the wisdom of the priest or vicar, is not the sort of 'encouraging to study' i was thinking of.
The chief method of learning amongst the flock is indoctrination.
What church did you 'belong to' at that time?
How do you account for the lack of interest?
And back to the point. I still cannot see how religion is the study of consciousness!?!?!
thedoc wrote:Religion is based on faith in that which cannot be proven. Science is based on evidence that can be tested and proven. There is no real conflict, only the made up ones of small minds.
The conflict lies in the times when Faith has been used to do science.
When the Bishop of Durum declares that the storms are because god is angry with gays, for example.
Or when the Pope says that condoms cause AIDS.
Or when a Rabbi repeated gives baby boys Herpes, some dying of the infection, because he performs oral Bris.
That is grounds for lots of conflict, don't you think?
I would say that the examples you give and many more do not truly represent religion, even though those making the statments claim a basis in religion. Being religious will not protect some people from being stupid. It more or less guarantees it My own version of religion could be described as 'Cherry Picking' from Lutheranism and Buddhism, plus a few other odd influences along the way. Reading Joseph Campbell on Mythology has also colored my views on religion.
So what you are saying is that the Pope and the Bishop of Durham do not represent religion?
That's a bizzarre claim.
Are you aware of the New York Rabbi story BTW?
chaz wyman wrote:
So what you are saying is that the Pope and the Bishop of Durham do not represent religion?
That's a bizzarre claim.
Are you aware of the New York Rabbi story BTW?
Not really, if you believe that they have strayed far from what religion is really about. These people are commenting more about politics and control than religion. Religion is about guiding the believer to having a religious experience and these issues have nothing to do with religion.
I am not aware of the Rabbi story, but I'm sure you want to tell me.
chaz wyman wrote:
There is a range of teaching and learning methods. Rote learning, and getting indoctrinated as the the 'correct' interpretation via the wisdom of the priest or vicar, is not the sort of 'encouraging to study' i was thinking of.
The chief method of learning amongst the flock is indoctrination.
What church did you 'belong to' at that time?
How do you account for the lack of interest?
And back to the point. I still cannot see how religion is the study of consciousness!?!?!
Yes the teaching method will vary from one person to another, even in the same congregation. One of our previous pastors was very dogmatic and any teaching he did was indoctrination, but he is gone now. the current pastor is much more open to questions and exploring different ideas about religion.
I was, and still am a Lutheran in the same church, the first attempt ended due to a disagreement on an entirely different matter, and when I dropped out it fell apart, I was sort of the leader of the reading and discussion group.
The current effort is being led by the pastor and other considerations (like having a new church built) seem to be occupying a lot of her time.
As far as Religion and the study of consciousness, it would depend on the particular religion and most western religions do not stress this aspect. However many eastern religions are mostly about consciousness and its relation to God or enlightenment. I do not really see Buddhism as a religion, but many do, so I will include it in the discussion and here, there is a great deal of emphasis on consciousness and how it relates to the spiritual. As I stated my own views are a blend of western and eastern concepts and all of that is seen through Mythology.
Chaz wrote:And back to the point. I still cannot see how religion is the study of consciousness!?!?!
If you see consciousness as the rational thinking mind, then this could be confusing for you. Consider that consciousness is all of the mental aspects that we possess including emotion, awareness, and spirituality.
Eastern religions are very up front about the idea that they study all of these aspects of consciousness, but if you were raised in a Christian culture, this is not as clear. Christianity likes to explain these things in a physical way with a physical god, Jesus, a physical heaven and hell, physical angels and demons. Think of these things as metaphors for different aspects of spirituality or consciousness. Also consider that if the "soul" is not consciousness, then what the hell is it?
If you would like, I can post the thread that I wrote on the dichotomies which gives a brief explanation of how Christianity divided the world into the tangible and intangible. Let me know.
chaz wyman wrote:
So what you are saying is that the Pope and the Bishop of Durham do not represent religion?
That's a bizzarre claim.
Are you aware of the New York Rabbi story BTW?
Not really, if you believe that they have strayed far from what religion is really about. These people are commenting more about politics and control than religion. Religion is about guiding the believer to having a religious experience and these issues have nothing to do with religion.
I am not aware of the Rabbi story, but I'm sure you want to tell me.
Child abuse should be of interest to us all. And this is a repeat offender.
Chaz wrote:And back to the point. I still cannot see how religion is the study of consciousness!?!?!
If you see consciousness as the rational thinking mind, then this could be confusing for you. Consider that consciousness is all of the mental aspects that we possess including emotion, awareness, and spirituality.
Eastern religions are very up front about the idea that they study all of these aspects of consciousness, but if you were raised in a Christian culture, this is not as clear. Christianity likes to explain these things in a physical way with a physical god, Jesus, a physical heaven and hell, physical angels and demons. Think of these things as metaphors for different aspects of spirituality or consciousness. Also consider that if the "soul" is not consciousness, then what the hell is it?
If you would like, I can post the thread that I wrote on the dichotomies which gives a brief explanation of how Christianity divided the world into the tangible and intangible. Let me know.
Gee
You might try to be less patronising.
Just because Buddhism has some interest in psychology, does not qualify the statement; "Religion is the study of consciousness"
Religion IS .. many things, least of all the study of consciousness.
The Rabbis preforming this ritual would only be able to pass the virus if they had it themselves and in these cases the sensable thing to do would be to identify those individuals and stop them from preforming this ritual. But then public officials and religious leaders seldom do the sensable thing, there is a preference for broad sweeping actions that are more for show than effect. The politicians will try to ban the practice altogether, and the church will try to protect all the rabbis in spite of the health risks, the church doesn't seem to care about the children at risk, but only in preserving an outdated ritual.
The Popes statements fits the pattern of condeming any kind of birth control, so these claims are probably just red herrings to divert attention from the real practice of preventing birth control.
chaz wyman wrote:
You might try to be less patronising.
Just because Buddhism has some interest in psychology, does not qualify the statement; "Religion is the study of consciousness"
Religion IS .. many things, least of all the study of consciousness.
Well Chaz;
It was not my intent to be patronizing, but it is difficult to be clear and not patronizing when dealing with a person who pretends denseness. Misunderstanding is a tool that is used extensively by debaters, and I should probably say that I resent it.
You are intelligent, so I know that you are aware of the ages of Buddhism and psychology. It is a little bit difficult for me to accept that Buddhism, which is thousands of years old is studying an interest in psychology, which is barely over 100 years old.
As far as I know there are two studies that could be interpreted as studies of consciousness; one is psychology, rather new; the other is religions, at least 40,000 years old. When I say religions, I mean the religions that are here today and the religions of the past, which would include witch doctors, shamans, theologists, and monks--ALL OF THEM.
Gee
Last edited by Gee on Sun Dec 09, 2012 7:06 am, edited 1 time in total.
Gee wrote:
You are intelligent, so I know that you are aware of the ages of Buddhism and psychology. It is a little bit difficult for me to accept that Buddhism, which is thousands of years old is studying an interest in psychology, which is barely over 100 years old.
As far as I know there are two studies that could be interpreted as studies of consciousness; one is psychology, rather new; the other is religions, at least 40,000 years old. When I say religions, I mean the religions that are here today and the religions of the past, which would include witch doctors, shamans, theologists, and monks--ALL OF THEM.
Gee
Just because psychology was labeled and codified 100 years ago does not mean that people were not studying these processes of the mind before that. There is no reason to believe that Buddhists and even earlier thinkers were not contemplating these issues that now are brought under the study called psychology. People have been looking at the stars for many thousands of years but astronomy is only a recent dicipline of science, whold you suggest that because men did not call it astronomy, people were not studying the stars?
That was my point. Psychology is a new study, but consciousness has been studied for tens of thousands of years, and the people studying consciousness have been associated with religion.
Plato would be an exception as he obviously studied consciousness, but it was predominantly studied by religions.
That is why I said that religion is the study of consciousness.
I hope that I am correct as I am interpreting your challenge, "Give me your best shot.", as a request to outline my thoughts on our positions. I hate one-liners because they are so easy to misinterpret (especially with strangers), but if I am wrong, it is your own damned fault. Yes, I am smiling as I state this. Please read the following and take some time to consider it before responding.
First, I should tell you that I think of consciousness as a communication. It is not a bad way to interpret it because the world exposes itself to us through our senses and awareness of it, and we then communicate that information to our selves by thoughts, images, sensations, and memories in our minds. So the subjective rational mind is an internal communication.
Let us take the example of the man who wrote a book explaining that no one has the ability to know that anyone else is conscious. An obvious lie. Yet it is also a clearly proven truth that our consciousness is subjective and we can only know our own subjective mind. Yet, even knowing this, the man took the time to write and publish a book that apparently no one will read--because we are not conscious. And around and around we go.
Psychology, the Freudian slip, and my own experiences tell me that when words and deeds do not match up, it is the words that are false. So apparently he does know that other people are conscious, no matter what he wrote, so the question becomes how does he know?
Of course one can say that his experiences and conversations with other people would make it clear to him that other people state that they are conscious. But wouldn't that make his "proven truth" a little less true? Or maybe it is still true because language is the proof of consciousness? That would seem to match up with what most people think, and it would work with his theory. It also seems to match up with what you have been stating. But if you took your dog to the vet because he was hit by a car, and you asked the vet if he was alive, and the vet responded that the dog was unconscious but alive, would that mean that when the dog wakes up he will be conscious and able to think and speak? Of course not, as consciousness is not just about thinking and language.
To my way of thinking language proves only that we possess a "rational" mind, or the idea that we are aware that we are aware, or conscious of our consciousness, because we think about it. To state that rational thinking is indicative of consciousness is a gross misjudgment of the reality of consciousness. Consciousness is our awareness, and we are aware of feelings and emotions, instincts and knowledge, dreams and memories, and thoughts. Consciousness comprises all of the mental aspects of our awareness, and most of these aspects do not work through the rational thinking mind--they work through the subconscious.
The rational mind is a latent development in evolution, so thought and language is a latent development. Prior to this development was there awareness? consciousness? knowledge? instincts? emotion? feelings? dreams? I know that my dog has dreams cause he is kind of funny to watch. All of life has some form of consciousness or awareness, and this can be evaluated to show the degree by observing the species. I did a Levels of Consciousness example that was very informal when I was studying consciousness in the SEP to set out guidelines for this breakdown.
So prior to the development of the rational mind, there was the subconscious mind which many species still use. These species communicate and do it through the subconscious mind. We still possess a subconscious mind, so do we also communicate through this part of the mind? Psychology implies that yes we do, we are just not very aware of it because we prefer the direct and directed rational mind.
Prior to "mind" there is awareness. It is my thought that plants do not possess a mind as I have a theory on what causes a mind to form as a single unit, but that is way too much to consider here. The point here is that other species communicate. They do not speak, but they do communicate, and that communication works through the subconscious mind and is a form of consciousness.
So is the subconscious part of the mind also subjective and private? My studies indicate that no, it is not. The conscious rational mind is directed by us, the subconscious mind seems to be more reactionary and relates mostly to emotion and other life. I do not believe that it is private or subjective. This part of the mind is communal, believes in God, interprets awareness, interacts with other life, is emotional, and takes no direction from us. This is the part of the mind that tells the philosopher that people are conscious so they may well buy and read his books.
This post is not even close to a representation of my full concept of consciousness, and it is not written very well; but I am sure that you will find things to object to. Please consider that I saved the scary stuff to explain later, and that I do have reasons for these ideas and theories. I just can't put it all down here and now. But I will try to answer any intelligent considered questions.
That was my point. Psychology is a new study, but consciousness has been studied for tens of thousands of years, and the people studying consciousness have been associated with religion.
Plato would be an exception as he obviously studied consciousness, but it was predominantly studied by religions.
That is why I said that religion is the study of consciousness.
Gee
Less than A thousand years ago and beyond almost everyone who studied anything was associated with religion. Religion was the main repository for all knowledge, and during the dark ages it was the only place where knowledge was preserved. People who were educated were educated by the church, it has only been recently that secular education has been avaliable.