Can the Religious Be Trusted?

[BigMike]

But the truth is, your position is incoherent within its own framework.

My position, such as it is, presents aspects that are untenable or problematic, I admit this fully. I think knowledge systems today present all sorts of contradictions. And I think it worthwhile to examine all if this from the perspective of a master metaphysician.

That is, I am pretty sure, the base of my own shtick: to propose an encompassing perspective.

Alexis,

Admitting that your position is "untenable or problematic" is a step toward intellectual honesty, but it also underscores the very problem I’ve been pointing out: you acknowledge contradictions in your worldview but insist on holding onto it without resolving them. You call for a "master metaphysician" to provide an encompassing perspective, yet you fail to articulate what such a perspective would entail beyond vague appeals to higher realms and undefined "potency."

If your position is self-admittedly problematic, how can you expect anyone else to take it seriously? To claim the need for an encompassing perspective sounds noble, but if that perspective relies on concepts you admit are incoherent or contradictory, what does it really accomplish? It becomes a rhetorical exercise, not a genuine pursuit of understanding.

You seem intent on playing the role of someone standing above the fray, pointing out the supposed limitations of other perspectives while retreating into your own contradictions without addressing them. If the current "knowledge systems" are rife with contradictions, as you claim, then surely your goal should be to clarify and resolve them—not to layer additional contradictions on top in the name of "metaphysics."

So let me ask: what exactly do you propose as the foundation of this encompassing perspective? And how does it address the glaring lack of coherence in your current stance? If your answer is that this is a work in progress or beyond resolution, then let’s stop pretending that your perspective is something more than a placeholder for unanswered questions.

You don’t need a "master metaphysician" to tell you that coherence matters. You need to decide whether your goal is to seek clarity or to defend an incoherent position simply because it appeals to you on some subjective level. If it’s the latter, just admit it—because that’s what you’ve been doing all along.

[Immanuel Can]

Mike has me in his penalty box, so: he ain't readin' my posts (supposedly).

Me too, probably.

I would be surprised if he passed up the drama of telling you he was ignoring you.

I think he mentioned it sometime back...then he was arguing with me again...and now he's not. So I think the drama's been had.

[Immanuel Can]

Mike has me in his penalty box, so: he ain't readin' my posts (supposedly).

Me too, probably.

But it's alright. It was physical causality that put us there, not Mike.

That's what he'd have us believe, yeah. He's a meat machine, lacking autonomy and response ability.

Funny how he keeps acting, responding, exactly as what he sez he's not: a free will frustrated with and by other free wills.

Yes: how can he not realize that? Only by being so ideologically-possessed that he's become truly blind to the obvious, I would say. That's why I've changed from debating with him directly to pointing out his errors to others. I don't think he is willing to be challenged by the facts...not even the obvious facts of his own practices, and not even while he's actually doing those practices.

I think there's nothing he's ever going to allow to dislodge him from his commitment to Determinism, which really seems not at all to be about facts but about the alleged 'goods' he thinks Determinism stands to deliver to him -- things he's mentioned, like freedom from personal responsibility and yet also social justice...somehow. He doesn't even see how Determinism takes from him his own volition, or how impossible it makes any social engineering at all.

Talk about missing the obvious! But if he refuses to see it, that doesn't mean his other interlocutors can't recognize where he's become irrational.

[henry quirk]

Yes: how can he not realize that?

Willfully self-blinding or stone cold nuts.

I won't see it! or I can't see it!

Amounts to the same, either way.

[promethean75]

While BigMike might appreciate the irony of clever quips and rhetorical flourishes, they rarely add anything substantial to the argument, gentlemen.

[Immanuel Can]

While BigMike might appreciate the irony of clever quips and rhetorical flourishes, they rarely add anything substantial to the argument, gentlemen.

We've not given him "quips," Prom; read back, and you'll see. We gave him the facts. Even here, we point out the irrational inconsistency of his actions in continuing to behave as if everybody else is "determined," and yet he's not -- his feelings, his rationales, his arguments still "count," in his thinking, but nobody else's are real.

So that's just self-contradictory, which we've pointed out to him multiple times now.

So we've tried, and given him the substance. He's not interested. We are now interested in the diagnosis of why he's become so irrational. The fact that he has is already well-established.

[Alexis Jacobi]

Devilish, Promethean, simply devilish

[seeds]

...the simplest thing I can do in this particular situation is to reinvoke the words of Terence McKenna...

“Modern science is based on the principle ‘Give us one free miracle and we’ll explain the rest.’ The ‘one free miracle’ is the appearance of all the mass and energy in the universe and all the laws that govern it in a single instant from nothing.”

...and then point out to you [BigMike] that your theory of determinism expects us to grant you the "one free miracle" mentioned in the quote.

However, some of us are simply not that generous (or gullible).

No!....

...The quote implodes the moment he says that science is based of the principle of 'give us one free miracle...' since anything naturally occurring is not a miracle whether or not we can explain it at this or any other time.

I'm sorry, Dubious, but despite your proven ability to accurately point out the problems in someone's argument, you've given away the weakness of your hand by using the term "naturally occurring," which, to me, is nothing more than the blind and mindless meanderings of "chance" dressed up in a mother's apron.

As I posed to BigMike, do you, Dubious, actually believe that this,...



...which came "fully stocked" with every possible ingredient and process necessary to awaken untold billions of unique lifeforms into existence,...

...was a "naturally occurring" phenomenon?

Really???

But, for the sake of argument, let's use the word 'miracle' as employed in the quote. Now what? Does it in any way confute the fact that all the laws that govern as ramifications of this so-called miracle are by that very definition deterministic...whether or not you call it a miracle?

Likewise, for the sake of argument, if I were to concede to you and BigMike that determinism was indeed probably involved in most of the material processes that culminated in the manifestation of the human brain,...

...will you guys at least be open to the "possibility" that the human "I Am-ness" of which the brain has metaphorically "given birth" to,...

...could be an epiphenomenal "something" that,...

...in the spirit of what "strong emergence" allegedly entails,...

...represents something that is "wholly other" than that which it emerged from?

I'm talking about a "self-aware something" that, within the autonomous domain of its own personal mind, possesses the absolute "free will" ability to shape its own personal supply of mental imaging energy into absolutely anything it freely chooses?

Again, you guys can have your determinism up to - but not beyond the point - where the human mind, along with its accompanying "I Am-ness," is, again, metaphorically "born" (strongly emerges) from the quantum fabric of the brain.

Now I know it sounds far-fetched, but what I am speculatively suggesting is that the ontological status of the human mind (relative to the material fabric of the brain) is not unlike what is suggested as being the status of the parallel worlds in the "Many Worlds Interpretation of Quantum Mechanics."

In other words, the emergence of the human mind ("I Am-ness"/soul) from the quantum fabric of the brain is like a new parallel universe that "branches" off of this universe in such a way where the inner physics of the mind is no longer connected to (entangled with) the physics of the universe it branched off of.

In which case, our minds thus acquire full autonomy where the inner "agent" has "free will" control over its own inner dimension of reality without effecting or impinging on the physics of other parallel universes.

(Yeah, yeah, I know, poor ol' Hugh Everett and Bryce DeWitt are probably spinning in their graves right now. But you can't say that I'm not trying to incorporate "science" [albeit "pseudo" science] into my argument. )

When an absurd statement is made it usually proves opposite to its intended effect. Mr. Mckenna should have used fewer psychedelics to swarm his neurons in making the wrong connections.

Well, has Mr. Dubious personally experimented with psychedelics and therefore has first-hand knowledge of that which he warns of?

Furthermore, Mr. Mckenna isn't the only person to express the particular sentiment stated in that quote...



I suppose you'll insist that the person who created that cartoon should stick to cartooning and leave the brainy stuff to the math nerds, right?
_______

But God did not create everything, every event, from nothing but from God itself.

You're preaching to the choir, Belinda, though I doubt that you and I define the word "God" in quite the same way.

There is no miracle but there is system.

The fact that from nothingness there could arise such a thing as "system" (implying order), is the miracle.

And it is that miracle that McKenna is alluding to in the quote I provided.

It is a "miracle"...
(again, "...the appearance of all the mass and energy in the universe and all the laws that govern it in a single instant from nothing...”)

...that BigMike expects us to grant him, for without it, his entire deterministic philosophy falls apart.

Determinism is system. You are not understanding determinism if you think it's nothing more than A follows B.

"A follows B"?

If you meant to say, "B follows A," then you need to take that up with BigMike, for that pretty much sums up the entirety of BigMike's philosophy.

Constant conjunction is analytical thinking, good in its proper context but insufficient for metaphysics.

Again, take that up with BigMike.
_______

[FlashDangerpants]

Me too, probably.

I would be surprised if he passed up the drama of telling you he was ignoring you.

I think he mentioned it sometime back...then he was arguing with me again...and now he's not. So I think the drama's been had.

How many times did he have the drama of suggesting he would leave the forum entirely?

Drama queens gotta drama baby, doesn't matter if it's warmed up leftovers of the last one.

[Alexis Jacobi]

You seem intent on playing the role of someone standing above the fray, pointing out the supposed limitations of other perspectives while retreating into your own contradictions without addressing them. If the current "knowledge systems" are rife with contradictions, as you claim, then surely your goal should be to clarify and resolve them—not to layer additional contradictions on top in the name of "metaphysics."

To resolve the discordancies in understanding between an archaic system of interpretation of the world, and the new system with industrial and science-power standing behind it, is a monumental task.

If I do anything at all it is only to put the conflict into relief so that it can, perhaps, be better understood.

[Immanuel Can]

I would be surprised if he passed up the drama of telling you he was ignoring you.

I think he mentioned it sometime back...then he was arguing with me again...and now he's not. So I think the drama's been had.

How many times did he have the drama of suggesting he would leave the forum entirely?

Drama queens gotta drama baby, doesn't matter if it's warmed up leftovers of the last one.

Yeah, it's kind of like the kid at the playground who suddenly says, "If I can't be on the better team, I'm taking my ball and going home."

[BigMike]

You seem intent on playing the role of someone standing above the fray, pointing out the supposed limitations of other perspectives while retreating into your own contradictions without addressing them. If the current "knowledge systems" are rife with contradictions, as you claim, then surely your goal should be to clarify and resolve them—not to layer additional contradictions on top in the name of "metaphysics."

To resolve the discordancies in understanding between an archaic system of interpretation of the world, and the new system with industrial and science-power standing behind it, is a monumental task.

If I do anything at all it is only to put the conflict into relief so that it can, perhaps, be better understood.

Alexis,

You’ve crafted a familiar tactic here, one reminiscent of Chris Matthews when he dodged a direct question about believing in virgin births: vague appeals to an overarching conflict without ever engaging with the specifics. You talk about putting the "conflict into relief" as if that absolves you of the responsibility to address the contradictions in your own position. It doesn’t.

If resolving the "discordancies" is such a monumental task, then shouldn’t you at least try to clarify where you stand within it? You can’t just wave your hand at the complexity of the issue and use that as an excuse to avoid engaging meaningfully with the arguments presented to you. The fact that the conflict exists is not in question; what’s in question is your refusal to articulate your own position in a way that withstands scrutiny.

You seem content to point out that contradictions exist in "knowledge systems" without grappling with the glaring contradictions in your own worldview. You’ve repeatedly avoided explaining your notion of "potency" or its interaction with determinism in clear terms. Instead, you retreat into abstractions about "metaphysics" and "perspective," which is little more than rhetorical filler if you can’t or won’t provide a coherent framework.

Let’s be honest: your role here isn’t to resolve anything; it’s to maintain an air of intellectual superiority while sidestepping the responsibility of defending your ideas. That’s not clarifying the conflict—it’s perpetuating it. If your goal is to help others "better understand" the issue, then start by clearly defining your position. Otherwise, you’re just dodging, like Matthews, and everyone can see it.

[accelafine]

'It's a miracle'.

Who would have thought that all the mysteries of the universe could be solved with your concise little statement. Its beauty is breathtaking. This is the end of physics

[Atla]

I'm surprised though that many people on this forum are vehemently opposed to determinism, or have no idea what it even is. I thought people learn about it in school. Well they do in continental Europe anyway.

[accelafine]

Yes. It's ridiculous to be 'opposed' to it. It's either a fact or it isn't. Why would they think that changes depending on whether or not they 'like' it?
It's like saying you are 'against gravity' and that gravity isn't true because it sometimes causes inconveniences, or evolution isn't true because it makes them uncomfortable