Unification of Science and Religion

[Nick_A]

Uwot :

What is the difference between 'being' and 'existence'?

Being as I understand it is NOW which is outside the limitations of time and space. In contrast existence is a process occurring within the limitations of time ad space. Therefore NOW IS while existence occurs. I’m not alone in this. It is the basis of the ancient idea of the great chain of being and objective value being a measure of the qualiy of being within NOW. http://www.britannica.com/topic/Great-Chain-of-Being

What do you mean by 'sense'? Are you bothered that life might be senseless?

It isn’t that it bothers me but rather that it is illogical. I have a chess player like mind. The position has to make sense to me. It seems absurd that our virtually infinite universe along with the possibility of other universes has no purpose. The fact that their outer purpose seems to be the perpetual exchange of substances it seems far more logical that for some reason I’m blind to the perception of inner purpose rather than there being no purpose.

You are the first person that I have seen use the term in such a way. At the very least, spell out your terms so that others can make sense of what you are saying.

Simone Weil wrote: Imagination is always the fabric of social life and the dynamic of history. The influence of real needs and compulsions, of real interests and materials, is indirect because the crowd is never conscious of it.

Being asleep in Plato’s Cave means we are under the influence of imagination. This idea is within all the great traditions. For example Buddhism refers to the parable of the Burning House: http://www.age-of-the-sage.org/buddhism ... house.html

It is the same idea. The fallen human condition which results in us living in imagination keeps us involved with the petty and oblivious of the reality of the power of imagination to deprive us of human conscious potential. We become oblivious of the forest because of our obsession with the trees.

How big is your sample?

What difference does it make what I think or have verified? Your sample is you. You either experience it as true or false through impartial attempts to “know thyself” or have the conscious experience of yourself rather than an imaginary one.

All it means is that god is not a logical impossibility.

All this means is that NOW within which existence occurs cannot be verified you. Since NOW by definition cannot be measured, there is no way our intellect which functions by the process of association is sufficient to experience NOW.

“It is only the impossible that is possible for God. He has given over the possible to the mechanics of matter and the autonomy of his creatures.” ~ Simone Weil

[uwot]

This:

Being as I understand it is NOW which is outside the limitations of time and space. In contrast existence is a process occurring within the limitations of time ad space.

Is incompatible with:

The highest quality of being within which existence takes place must include the idea of a scale of objective value.

What do you mean by 'sense'? Are you bothered that life might be senseless?

It isn’t that it bothers me but rather that it is illogical. I have a chess player like mind. The position has to make sense to me. It seems absurd that our virtually infinite universe along with the possibility of other universes has no purpose.

That has nothing to do with logic. You appear to have stumbled across a philosophy forum by accident. It may be that you have something interesting to add, but if you want to be taken seriously, you will have to be consistent with your meaning, and accept that your personal persuasions are not the same as logic.

[uwot]

...perhaps a better way for me to put it is that religions were (probably/mostly/some) founded around the ontology before power structures formed around the ideas almost immediately.

I know a bit about the history of western religion, the ontology is often 'physical'. Creation myths are universal, they all try to explain where the world came from, what it is made of and how it works. But, as Xenophanes noted:

But mortals suppose gods are born,
Wear their own clothes and have a voice and body.
The Ethiopians say that their gods are flat-nosed and black,
While Thracians say that theirs have blue eyes and red hair.
Yet if cattle or horses or lions had hands and could draw,
And could sculpt like men, then the horses would draw their gods
Like horses, and cattle like cattle; and each would shape
Bodies of gods in the likeness, each of their own kind.

The Romans, with their huge empire needed a 'catholic' religion that could appeal to everyone, so the where, what and why became the father, son and holy ghost. This is from an article I wrote for the magazine:

Thales (c.624-c.546BC) was the son of nobles. It was common for rich Greeks to send their young men on educational ‘Grand Tours’ of Mesopotamia (essentially modern day Iraq) and Egypt, much as Eighteenth and Nineteenth Century aristocrats would visit Rome and Athens to broaden their minds (at least, that was the idea).


Even in Thales’ time, Mesopotamia and Egypt were ancient civilizations. Their antiquity was due in part to the ease with which agriculture, and hence large populations, were established and sustained by the regular flooding of the Tigris/Euphrates and the Nile.


The waters’ retreat leaves a film of fertile soil; as the resultant vegetation dies and decays underwater, it produces methane, which can be seen bubbling to the surface, and is a flammable gas. Hence the so-called ‘Greek’ elements – water, earth, air and fire – are all present where humans first settled, and seem to be linked; the belief was that one thing changed into another. Accustomed to things that change and develop being alive, people attributed change in nature to life; it is only a short step to give form to this life in the shape of gods. The creation myths of Mesopotamia and Egypt reflect this. For instance, the Enuma Elisha, the Babylonian ‘Bible’, tells how in the beginning there was no Heaven and Earth: there were instead Apsu, god of fresh water, and Tiamat, goddess of salt water. Their waters joined and from this union came Lahmu and Lahamu, the gods of soil. In Mesopotamia, where fresh water meets the sea, the Tigris and Euphrates rivers deposit enough silt to advance the coast by up to fifty metres each year; as an illustration, the city of Ur was a coastal port four thousand years ago: the site is now two hundred kilometres inland. The Enuma Elisha continues with the marriage of Lahmu and Lahamu producing Anshar, the sky. In Egypt, where civilization arose away from the coast, there was only one water god, Nun, who gave birth to Atum, initially as a mound of earth; Atum in turn created Nut, the sky.


The written Greek creation myth, the Theogeny (c.700 BC), is slightly different. According to its author, Hesiod, it was written on the slopes of the sacred Mount Helicon, where water is more likely to be seen springing from the hillside than dumping the silt it has picked up on its journey. So in this mythology the primordial god – the first to emerge from Chaos – was Gaia, Mother Earth. However, the belief that one thing turned into another, a sort of transmutation of elements, is the same.

If you are interested, you can read the rest here: http://willibouwman.blogspot.co.uk/2015 ... nches.html

[Nick_A]

uwot wrote: Is incompatible with:

John 14: 11

Believe me when I say that I am in the Father and the Father is in me; or at least believe on the evidence of the works themselves.

If you can understand this you'll understand why what I wrote makes perfect sense.

[Hobbes' Choice]

uwot wrote: Is incompatible with:

John 14: 11

Believe me when I say that I am in the Father and the Father is in me; or at least believe on the evidence of the works themselves.

If you can understand this you'll understand why what I wrote makes perfect sense.

Why would you think that something written 1900 years ago about what someone is supposed to have said 2000 years ago is relevant to anything?

[uwot]

uwot wrote: Is incompatible with:

John 14: 11

Believe me when I say that I am in the Father and the Father is in me; or at least believe on the evidence of the works themselves.

If you can understand this you'll understand why what I wrote makes perfect sense.

I don't see the equivalence. One is a metaphysical claim, the other is a contradiction. The claim attributed to Jesus makes sense, I happen to think it is untrue, but regardless; it is no help in understanding you contradicting yourself. You're going to have to do better, Mr A.

[Nick_A]

Acts 17: 28 ‘For in him we live and move and have our being.

Uwot, what could this mean? How could Paul's being exist within the being of our source? If Panentheism is right and the universe is the body of God, then it makes sense. Lesser qualities of being that comprise the body can exist within NOW. We usually refer to NOW as an instant. Consequently all instants are within NOW. God IS; the body exists in obedience to universal laws.

[Nick_A]

Hobbes wrote: Why would you think that something written 1900 years ago about what someone is supposed to have said 2000 years ago is relevant to anything?

All I can say is that it is a good thing that men like Niels Bohr, Schrodinger and Einstein for example were not so dogmatic and were open to the knowledge of the greats of the past. They received a lot of their knowledge from the Vedas rather than preaching blind denial. Thank God for small favors.

http://www.krishnapath.org/quantum-phys ... edantists/

The famous Danish physicist and Nobel Prize winner, Laureate Niels Bohr (1885-1962) (pictured above), was a follower of the Vedas. He said, “I go into the Upanishads to ask questions.” Both Bohr and Schrödinger, the founders of quantum physics, were avid readers of the Vedic texts and observed that their experiments in quantum physics were consistent with what they had read in the Vedas.

[Hobbes' Choice]

Hobbes wrote: Why would you think that something written 1900 years ago about what someone is supposed to have said 2000 years ago is relevant to anything?

All I can say is that it is a good thing that men like Niels Bohr, Schrodinger and Einstein for example were not so dogmatic and were open to the knowledge of the greats of the past. They received a lot of their knowledge from the Vedas rather than preaching blind denial. Thank God for small favors.

http://www.krishnapath.org/quantum-phys ... edantists/

The famous Danish physicist and Nobel Prize winner, Laureate Niels Bohr (1885-1962) (pictured above), was a follower of the Vedas. He said, “I go into the Upanishads to ask questions.” Both Bohr and Schrödinger, the founders of quantum physics, were avid readers of the Vedic texts and observed that their experiments in quantum physics were consistent with what they had read in the Vedas.

The answers that Bohr and Schrodinger that were of any value were found in nature, not the Upanishads or the Vedas. Who are the 'men like" them of whom you speak? Or are you just making noise to make you sound good?
Not that this has any relevance to the thread.

[hajrafradi]

http://www.krishnapath.org/quantum-phys ... edantists/

The famous Danish physicist and Nobel Prize winner, Laureate Niels Bohr (1885-1962) (pictured above), was a follower of the Vedas. He said, “I go into the Upanishads to ask questions.” Both Bohr and Schrödinger, the founders of quantum physics, were avid readers of the Vedic texts and observed that their experiments in quantum physics were consistent with what they had read in the Vedas.

Consider the source, you... you devout fanatic. It's by the Krishnapaths. I need not say more.

I don't know what Vedantism is, but I bet you anything that if it's a religious sect, then Bohr, Schroedinger, et al, never even heard of it, let alone being devout believers or followers of that shit.

These religious shit writers write any shit, and followers keep repeating that shit. AAAAND they expect other people to accept that that shit is real shit.

And I don't mind if I get kicked out of this site for using the word "Shit", because I shall feel I died a martyr's execution in defense of truth from the shit the devout fanatics try to force on others.

All I hope for is some first warning or temporary disciplinary action instead of outright banning.

[Nick_A]

Haj, you can use any word you want as far as I'm concerned. It just means you are being emotional rather than logical. I just picked that site at random since I've read of this before. Here is another site that says basically the same. There are others as well.

http://www.newsgram.com/how-scientists- ... -in-vedas/

Instead of practicing expressions of blind denial, why not try impartial contemplation? maybe these men understood something you don't understand.

[Arising_uk]

...

After reading Nicolescu's Manifesto of Transdisciplinarity, ...

Yours for just 495 GBP used!!!! Or get a new one 999 GBP.
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Manifesto-Tran ... entries*=0

[Nick_A]

Well, being that you posted a link to the book, I may as well post a review. Obviously it isn't for either blind believers or blind deniers but for those with a sincere need for meaning it does offer food for thought.

5.0 out of 5 starsThinking for the 21st Century
By @psychologising on 20 Feb. 2012
Format: Paperback
Many voices in the current era have called - after Einstein - for a new kind of thinking. This short but exceptional book, published in 2002, provides exactly that. Although its author makes no such claims, he does offer the opinion that humanity is currently 'waiting' for something. Perhaps as we comprehend the limits of the planet's material resources, we may be drawing close to understanding the limitations of our own dualistic thinking.
Transdisciplinary thinking appears as not only a new mode of enquiry but also a way of being. Openness, rigour and tolerance are its by-words; all dogma, ideology and closed systems of thought are bypassed. It does not reject disciplinary or multi-disciplinary thinking, but transcends them. It is emerging in response to the increased fragmentation of the man-made world (including specialisation within academia) and the abandonment of the sacred to post-modern utilitarianism. The new thinking is radically different, but has to reflect the complexity of nature that became apparent in the findings of the new Quantum Physics.
As one would expect from its title, the book examines Science, Philosophy, Nature, Psychology, Technology, Gender, Culture, Commerce, the Workplace and Education - all from a Transdisciplinary perspective. I suspect very few could write with such lucidity on so broad a canvas. But the author himself is a Renaissance Man - a theoretical physicist whose intellect is enfolded in a profound spirituality. And, with the exception of one brief passage on 'effectivity' and 'affectivity', Nicolescu's writing style is compelling, with several poetic and oratorical flourishes. Phrases like 'the sacred is actually the essential element in the structure of consciousness' linger long in the mind.
In the Appendices there is a Charter of Transdisciplinarity (with an invitation to sign up on-line) and a very helpful table highlighting the differences between Disciplinary and Transdisciplinary Knowledge.
If humanity does manage to bring about the 're-enchantment' of the cosmos then this book may one day be regarded as one of the most important seeds of the new thinking.

[Arising_uk]

Well, being that you posted a link to the book, I may as well post a review. Obviously it isn't for either blind believers or blind deniers but for those with a sincere need for meaning it does offer food for thought. ...

By taking a shitload of food away from the mouth.

[uwot]

Acts 17: 28 ‘For in him we live and move and have our being.

Uwot, what could this mean? How could Paul's being exist within the being of our source? If Panentheism is right and the universe is the body of God, then it makes sense.

It could mean anything. The point about metaphysics is that you can invent any number of stories that explain the phenomena. If you can create a coherent, logically valid story that is not contradicted by the data, you have done a bit of philosophy. But just because a story 'makes sense', it doesn't follow that it is true. For all I know, panentheism is right; there isn't an experiment I could do to prove it isn't. The same is true of the idealism of Bishop Berkeley, for instance; it is the nature of metaphysics that it 'explains' things that are beyond physics.
I assume you would not characterise yourself as a 'blind believer', so I take it you understand the material. Can you give a specific example of a verse from any 'sacred' text that Einstein, Bohr, Schrodinger or Heisenberg referenced in their scientific work?