Philosophy Now Forum

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Feb 24, 2021 9:18 pm

bahman wrote: ↑Wed Feb 24, 2021 9:03 pm I don't believe in God.

But even if such a thing exist why should I love Him?

For who He is. He's the Source of your life, the meaning of your existence, and the sum of all good things there are. There is literally nothing else worthy.

I prefer to be in Paradise and have a big library full of books that tell the truth rather than being in such a rabit hole?

I'm not sure what "rabbit hole" you mean.

Why I should be fallen? I have never chosen like Adam be in fallen world?

Well, that's the thing about sin: it doesn't stop politely at the borders of other people's lives...it affects others. And we are initially victims of that, it's true; but we also become participants in it, by sinning ourselves. In the end, it's a "mess" we're all caught up in.

Which choice?

The choice to connect with God, or to refuse to do so. Because God Himself has made the way for you to get out of this "mess," as you term it. But it's a way you must choose. It cannot be forced on you.

Ohhh, all the story about the spread of sins that is not fair too!

bahman wrote: ↑Wed Feb 24, 2021 9:34 pm Ohhh, all the story about the spread of sins that is not fair too!

When did you ever know sin not to take victims? Fair's got nothing to do with sin, that's for sure.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Feb 24, 2021 10:13 pm

bahman wrote: ↑Wed Feb 24, 2021 9:34 pm Ohhh, all the story about the spread of sins that is not fair too!

When did you ever know sin not to take victims? Fair's got nothing to do with sin, that's for sure.

Of course, it is unfair. We don't punish X because of what Y did.

bahman wrote: ↑Wed Feb 24, 2021 10:21 pm Of course, it is unfair. We don't punish X because of what Y did.

Right. But we do for what Y himself did.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Feb 24, 2021 7:10 pm
Well, that God exists and the objective world exists and has its integrity by way of Him, and then that our concepts are merely human attempts to articulate what is really there, objectively, as given by God.

You may think so. Thinking it doesn't make that true, of course.
You have made up this story because you have the capacity to think. Descartes reminds of such.
Thinking is the function of a very large brain which was made by natures evolutionary process, matter is a bunch of elementary chemicals and the brains thinking mechanism is a useful tool the organic mechanism uses to function and survive sucessfully, life forms are just a bunch of dna replicating molecules. There is no invisible hero called god that had any part of this evolution.

I cannot look for what I know does not exist.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Feb 24, 2021 7:10 pmBut you don't know God doesn't exist. What you know is that you don't know Him -- fair enough, but we might even say, you don't know him yet. That's all.

I know unicorns and fire eating dragons do not exist. There is no yet about it, mythical things will never exist.

All I know is that life as a sentient creature is pain and suffering, there is no reward except the end of these obnoxious sensations.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Feb 24, 2021 7:10 pmWhat assures you there is no "reward"?

There is a reward for pain and suffering, it's called the end of it, when you are no longer experiencing the sensation of pain.
However, the cessation of pain is only ever temporary, the pain and suffering always returns, so it's as if we spend our entire life process trying to avoid pain and suffering, it's a stupid game, it's pure futility. And the reason it's so meaningless is because there is no intelligence running the show, it's all pure impersonal happenstance, hopefully a one off event that will NEVER happen again...

The mind that knows god exists is the SAME mind that knows god does not exist - the mind is a two way mirror.

The mirror itself is a symbolic representation of emptiness itself refecting images inseparable from the emptiness.

The claim for god is said to be proven...in equal and opposite constrast the claim for no god is also proven, simply because claims are appearances of the SAME mind, they are all empty to the core.

And just as there are many accounts for the existence of god made by the mind of man, there are also equal and opposite accounts for the non-existence of god...and those accounts for the non-existence of god are found in the same mind that creates the concept of God.

There is a claim to seek and find...well that goes for the non-existent god...seek and find the non-existence of god and you will find that also...it works both ways.

It's known that there are two side to every story, or two side to every coin...in reality THERE IS NOT
THERE IS ONLY THE COIN / STORY

One cannot repeat itself for one very good reason...go figure.

Dontaskme wrote: ↑Thu Feb 25, 2021 8:29 am

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Feb 24, 2021 7:10 pm
Well, that God exists and the objective world exists and has its integrity by way of Him, and then that our concepts are merely human attempts to articulate what is really there, objectively, as given by God.

You may think so. Thinking it doesn't make that true, of course.

Indeed so.

There is no invisible hero called god that had any part of this evolution.

That's assumptive. You don't know it, but you want to believe it, perhaps. I don't know what test you would employ to prove that to you.

I cannot look for what I know does not exist.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Feb 24, 2021 7:10 pmBut you don't know God doesn't exist. What you know is that you don't know Him -- fair enough, but we might even say, you don't know him yet. That's all.

I know unicorns and fire eating dragons do not exist. There is no yet about it, mythical things will never exist.[/quote]
You don't know whether or not God is "mythical." What tests have you run? I'd be curious as to how you've accumulated such a confidence. Please share.

All I know is that life as a sentient creature is pain and suffering, there is no reward except the end of these obnoxious sensations.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Feb 24, 2021 7:10 pmWhat assures you there is no "reward"?

There is a reward for pain and suffering, it's called the end of it, when you are no longer experiencing the sensation of pain.

Well, if that were true, it's not much of a "reward." It's merely the elimination of a bad thing, not the addition of anything positive.
or itself is a symbolic representation of emptiness itself refecting images inseparable from the emptiness.

The claim for god is said to be proven...in equal and opposite constrast the claim for no god is also proven

Actually, you'll find that the latter cannot be proven. See below.

claims are appearances

Actually, claims are statements about things. They're not "appearances" at all. At most, you could say they are "statements about how things appear"...but whether they appear as they really are, or appear as delusions, is quite a different question.

And just as there are many accounts for the existence of god made by the mind of man, there are also equal and opposite accounts for the non-existence of god.

You should investigate: you'll find that's not true.

Even the most convinced Atheist will tell you he has no "disproof for God." But he'll insist he doesn't need one. He'll insist instead that the mere fact that he, personally, has not seen God, or that somebody he admires (like Hitchens or Dawkins, or Harris...or somebody much smarter than they) is convinced, so he is too. But he'll never say to you, "I have done the scientific tests for God, and have proved there is none," for the very simple reason that he knows that claim is easily proved untrue, and is, in fact, impossible.

There is no invisible hero called god that had any part of this evolution.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Thu Feb 25, 2021 7:53 pmThat's assumptive. You don't know it, but you want to believe it, perhaps. I don't know what test you would employ to prove that to you.

Nothing can know itself, so of course any attempt at knowing the unknowable will be an assumption. All knowledge is an assumption, and all assumptions are beliefs, believed to be real and literal. So what seems to be supposed here is in reality, just artificially placed fiction upon the unknowable, an appearance arising within the unknowable. It's a trickless trick the brain plays with itself, and this has been demonstrated by both scientisists and physicists alike who have spend many years researching the brain mind body mechanism..I do not even have to prove this to you myself, there are multiple sources of information spread far and wide all over the world wide internet.

I cannot look for what I know does not exist.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Feb 24, 2021 7:10 pm You don't know whether or not God is "mythical." What tests have you run? I'd be curious as to how you've accumulated such a confidence. Please share.

I've already explained to you how to test for the actual location of conceptual things. I've said things are thought into existence by thinking about them. Also notice, when there is no thinking present, there's no thing. There's simply left this immediate mysterious sense of being which is unknowable. It's only assumed that the thinking of thoughts is coming from the human body, so does that mean that flesh is able to think thoughts? I don't think so, so isn't that enough proof that thoughts are also this unknowable phenomena. Now, the fact that thoughts are unknowable is maybe why thought then attempts to place a knowing upon the unknowable, but then all we have now is the unknowable placing an apparent knowing upon the unkowable. And this is when the body attempting to know itself starts to get very silly.

There is a reward for pain and suffering, it's called the end of it, when you are no longer experiencing the sensation of pain.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Feb 24, 2021 7:10 pmWell, if that were true, it's not much of a "reward." It's merely the elimination of a bad thing, not the addition of anything positive.

Of course the elimination of a bad thing is the addition of a positive, simply because that's how the thinking process works. Thinking is a dual process, there is an awareness and then there is a thought that awareness is aware of, that is called a duality. So even though the thought and the awareness of the thought are an acausal unitary action, it appears as a duality. So coming back to the dual process that is thinking..the awareness of what is bad can only be known in relation to it's opposite which is positively good. So what happens within the thinking mechanism is that a value is created in the meaning of the word positive good because it has known bad. In reality, the sentient creature spends most of it's alotted time in nature avoiding a bad situation, in favor of the good...it's never the other way around. We only prefer the good because we've placed a higher value on it's presence, it simply means that bad is not there for now.

Babies who have no concept of knowledge soon learn to play the reward game.
Babies and toddlers cry loudly for all sorts of natural reasons...but the toddler especially, will soon learn that it can win a reward, lets say a (chocolate lollypop) when ever it uses it's innate intent enabler by forcing itself to stop crying to get the reward. So that's a situation that brings a positive result for both the parent and the toddler because the parent wants what feels like a bad situation to stop in favor of the good that it will bring. The brain then evolves to favor the reward process born only out of the bad. However, the default position of natural SELF is always neutral, it's neither bad nor good, positive or negative. . those concepts only come into play as a duality, when the sense of a separate self is there, which is what knowledge is.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Feb 24, 2021 7:10 pmor itself is a symbolic representation of emptiness itself refecting images inseparable from the emptiness.

There is simply the sensation of pain, and when that pain is gone there is relief, and it's in the relief when value is placed. But this is all known in the world of duality, the dream world, in reality there is no literal character experiencing pain or relief from pain, except as more thought. All sensations are empty to their core, they are no thing appearing to happen to a thing called you, but only apparently as thought thinks all things including you into existence, albeit illusory.

No thought thing has ever SEEN a ''thought'' nor has a thought thing ever SEEN a ''sensation'' nor has a thought thing ever SEEN 'pain' or 'pleasure' of 'love'..these are all empty concepts KNOWN by the only knowing there is which is unknowable consciousness, another thing not SEEN.

The SELF cannot see or know itself - for there is only SELF - it's ONE reflecting itself as the many - many of the ONE - and ONE thing cannot know it's maker. One's only existence is within it's own self created illusory delusionary illusion. . .aka it's mirror image...an empty appearance. What appears as known is a reflection of the reflector. And the reflector can only be known in it's own reflected image which is always an unknown known. And unseen seen.

What is reflecting is what's reflected. And what is reflected is what's reflecting. Apparently two, but always just ONE.

ONE cannot know anything for one very good reason, IT IS THE KNOWING THAT CANNOT BE KNOWN.

So, if you want to have your God, then you must be willing to accept that God is both good and evil, and that God is all there is happening here.

claims are appearances

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Thu Feb 25, 2021 7:53 pmActually, claims are statements about things. They're not "appearances" at all. At most, you could say they are "statements about how things appear"...but whether they appear as they really are, or appear as delusions, is quite a different question.

Actually IC, think about this very carefully..."statements about how things appear" are impossible to appear without ''thoughts'' thinking them into existence. So in effect, thoughts about truth claims are very much appearances within your awareness that you can objectively know, even though these object based thoughts are not separate from the one who knows them, thoughts are not an object outside of you, they are totally always within you, they are the objects of your desire. Thoughts will always come and go within you, so they are delusions when they are claimed to be the same as the awareness that knows them. ''Thoughts'' are simply not the same as the awareness that knows them, because awareness is not a thing, rather, awareness is no thing aware of a thing, as it becomes identified with thought, which is only an illusory thing, since both awareness and thought have never been SEEN...they are only KNOWN within the dream of duality, as concepts, appearing as opposites..two, but not two. This is the reality of the Nondual world of being.

And just as there are many accounts for the existence of god made by the mind of man, there are also equal and opposite accounts for the non-existence of god.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Thu Feb 25, 2021 7:53 pmYou should investigate: you'll find that's not true.

Even the most convinced Atheist will tell you he has no "disproof for God." But he'll insist he doesn't need one. He'll insist instead that the mere fact that he, personally, has not seen God, or that somebody he admires (like Hitchens or Dawkins, or Harris...or somebody much smarter than they) is convinced, so he is too. But he'll never say to you, "I have done the scientific tests for God, and have proved there is none," for the very simple reason that he knows that claim is easily proved untrue, and is, in fact, impossible.

Like I've pointed out earlier, every piece of knowledge is a conceptual knowledge pointing to the illusory nature of reality, which states clearly to the observer witness the unknowing known nature of it's apparent being. If you do not want to accept this IC ..then that is your prerogative, it's your choice to insist the illusion is real and has a creator and that you personally know this is real and true. That is all your dream IC and so there is nothing that can change that, absolutely nothing, because as I've said, the belief in any known thing or the disbelief in any known thing....comes from the same empty mind which is the ONLY source of knowledge known.

The esoteric knowledge that is Nonduality is very difficult to grasp, and is why it is often rejected. Yet, what it points to is that a mind that creates it's reality is the SAME mind that can uncreate it, because if a thing can be created, then that thing can be uncreated by the same technique.

And lets just be honest and real here. Only the mind is born ..right?

What is born is of the born...of the mind, a mind that has never been seen. An empty mind appearing to itself as full is like a mirror, a mirror can only reflect if it's empty, so all a mirror can do is reflect itself, emptiness can only reflect emptiness back at itself.

Science has already proved that all matter is 99.000% empty space, so we are basically sitting in the same space we are made from, in essence there is nothing to make anything with or from.

Dontaskme wrote: ↑Fri Feb 26, 2021 7:38 am

There is no invisible hero called god that had any part of this evolution.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Thu Feb 25, 2021 7:53 pmThat's assumptive. You don't know it, but you want to believe it, perhaps. I don't know what test you would employ to prove that to you.

Nothing can know itself,

Hmmm...I don't think this axiom is self-evident. If you had said, "No person can know himself," or perhaps, "No contingent being can know itself," I could perhaps agree. But it seems to me the axiom simply assumes the non-existence of God, who would be an exception to it, obviously.

I've said things are thought into existence by thinking about them.

Now, that axiom seems to me self-evidently untrue, in respect to contingent beings like humans. Human being can think a lot of things that never become true at all. But it seems possible to say that God thinks...or rather speaks...things into existence. Genesis 1 says He does.

Of course the elimination of a bad thing is the addition of a positive,

Again, there's no "of course" about that. It seems self-evidently untrue. The elimination of +2 results in 0, as does the elimination of -2. Either way, what you've got is zero, not a positive.

There is simply the sensation of pain...

That's also impossible, as Descartes pointed out. If there "is pain," then there also "is a sensor." There is never just a "sensation" by itself.

The SELF cannot see or know itself

Again, that might apply to human beings. It certainly wouldn't be true of the supreme, trinitarian God. A triune God is totally capable of self-knowledge. Have you ever thought of that before now? In fact, Jesus said, "All things have been handed over to Me by My Father, and no one knows who the Son is except the Father, and who the Father is except the Son, and anyone to whom the Son determines to reveal Him.” (Luke 10:22)

So, if you want to have your God, then you must be willing to accept that God is both good and evil, and that God is all there is happening here.

That would be Pantheism, or Panentheism, or plausibly a form of Taoism, perhaps. I think that's due to their unitarian conception of God. That conception, of course, I don't think is accurate.

Dontaskme wrote: ↑Fri Feb 26, 2021 8:26 am Actually IC, think about this very carefully..."statements about how things appear" are impossible to appear without ''thoughts'' thinking them into existence.

This is not a new idea. But it assumes that human beings, contingent as they are, are the ultimate in knowledge, and that there is no such thing as divine knowledge. So thoughts don't make things "appear" into reality. They simply represent human attempts to speak of things that are already really there.

And just as there are many accounts for the existence of god made by the mind of man, there are also equal and opposite accounts for the non-existence of god.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Thu Feb 25, 2021 7:53 pmYou should investigate: you'll find that's not true.

Even the most convinced Atheist will tell you he has no "disproof for God." But he'll insist he doesn't need one. He'll insist instead that the mere fact that he, personally, has not seen God, or that somebody he admires (like Hitchens or Dawkins, or Harris...or somebody much smarter than they) is convinced, so he is too. But he'll never say to you, "I have done the scientific tests for God, and have proved there is none," for the very simple reason that he knows that claim is easily proved untrue, and is, in fact, impossible.

Like I've pointed out earlier, every piece of knowledge is a conceptual knowledge pointing to the illusory nature of reality,

Again, not so if God exists. Then, "reality" is established by God, not generated by human "thought" or "concepts."

And lets just be honest and real here. Only the mind is born ..right?

? Where do you get this axiom, D?

Nothing can know itself,

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Fri Feb 26, 2021 1:54 pmHmmm...I don't think this axiom is self-evident. If you had said, "No person can know himself," or perhaps, "No contingent being can know itself," I could perhaps agree. But it seems to me the axiom simply assumes the non-existence of God, who would be an exception to it, obviously.

A person is a thing, a thing known. That which is known cannot and does not know. A thing is not a knower. Things cannot know, things are known. This axiom is self-evident to the only knowing there is which is unknowable. ''Knowing'' is ONE. There are NOT two knowers. Every living sentient creature is plugged into the same one consciousness, which is this immediate live living essence, this life itself living itself, all by itself in many different forms.

I've said things are thought into existence by thinking about them.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Fri Feb 26, 2021 1:54 pmNow, that axiom seems to me self-evidently untrue, in respect to contingent beings like humans.

It's only a truth in relation to itself, the one who knows the concept ''human''

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Fri Feb 26, 2021 1:54 pm Human being can think a lot of things that never become true at all. But it seems possible to say that God thinks...or rather speaks...things into existence. Genesis 1 says He does.

That's where the biblical story writer of genesis, a human by the way, misleads and mistakes the Writer with being the same as the Reader. They are NOT the same.

The Reader cannot experience itself as an object, a thing thought. Thoughts can be perceived in many interpretated ways, and mean multiple different thing to the Reader, so what is only ever interpreted can never be absolutely true or a lie, as true or lie are within the story, they are part of the duality of being, they are a fictional story so to speak.

The reader is known only within the story ( thought) as it identifies with the story it is reading. When no story is there, the reader is in obeyance, it's there, but it's not identified with any story. Both writer (story) and reader create one and the other, and are inseparably one in the instant the story becomes known. Self-evidently ONE with itself, and not even with itself, just by itself...all alone ( ONE SELF )

This ONE can be interpreted / KNOWN as being labeled God, or it could be labeled ONE, but as the saying goes ( 'a rose by any other name is still a rose' ) One just means one is conscious it is conscious, there's not two there, there's only one. The named ONE is the 3rd perception, which is an artificial conceptual OVERLAY upon what is always and ever this immediate unknowable ..

Of course the elimination of a bad thing is the addition of a positive,

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Fri Feb 26, 2021 1:54 pmAgain, there's no "of course" about that. It seems self-evidently untrue. The elimination of +2 results in 0, as does the elimination of -2. Either way, what you've got is zero, not a positive.

I'm not talking about math equations IC..I'm talking about the sentient sensation/experience of something known or felt as bad, when the bad is eliminated that is a positive, it's a good outcome, in that it's not bad anymore.

There is simply the sensation of pain...

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Fri Feb 26, 2021 1:54 pmThat's also impossible, as Descartes pointed out. If there "is pain," then there also "is a sensor." There is never just a "sensation" by itself.

The sensation is inseparable from sensor, just as a thing seen is inseparable from the seeing of seen thing. Now we are back to THE ONENESS which is always being pointed to here.

The SELF cannot see or know itself

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Fri Feb 26, 2021 1:54 pmAgain, that might apply to human beings. It certainly wouldn't be true of the supreme, trinitarian God. A triune God is totally capable of self-knowledge. Have you ever thought of that before now? In fact, Jesus said, "All things have been handed over to Me by My Father, and no one knows who the Son is except the Father, and who the Father is except the Son, and anyone to whom the Son determines to reveal Him.” (Luke 10:22)

Again, this all within the conceptual story / knowledge. You are just repeating the same old mantras and not really looking at what is actually being pointed to.

So, if you want to have your God, then you must be willing to accept that God is both good and evil, and that God is all there is happening here.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Fri Feb 26, 2021 1:54 pmThat would be Pantheism, or Panentheism, or plausibly a form of Taoism, perhaps. I think that's due to their unitarian conception of God. That conception, of course, I don't think is accurate.

Funny how Christian Scripture does not explicitly proclaim the doctrine of Mary's Immaculate Conception.

But the Nondualist does.

What do you imagine the Immaculate Conception actually means?

Dontaskme wrote: ↑Fri Feb 26, 2021 2:54 pm A person is a thing, a thing known.

A human person? Then you've got a logical problem: if she is only "a thing known," then the one "knowing" her is only another human, who also has no particular distinction except as "a thing known" by somebody else. And none of them is special or distinguished...so you've got a lot of "knowing" going on, but with no special distinction. In other words, the whole chain is ontologically ungrounded in anything. It's just a strange phenomenon of a bunch of temporally-limited beings thinking about each other.

I've said things are thought into existence by thinking about them.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Fri Feb 26, 2021 1:54 pmNow, that axiom seems to me self-evidently untrue, in respect to contingent beings like humans.

It's only a truth in relation to itself, the one who knows the concept ''human''

I don't think it's a truth at all.

Of course the elimination of a bad thing is the addition of a positive,

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Fri Feb 26, 2021 1:54 pmAgain, there's no "of course" about that. It seems self-evidently untrue. The elimination of +2 results in 0, as does the elimination of -2. Either way, what you've got is zero, not a positive.

I'm not talking about math equations IC.

You should be. They would help you see that it doesn't make sense logically.

The sensation is inseparable from sensor, just as a thing seen is inseparable from the seeing of seen thing.

Yesss...and?

Now we are back to THE ONENESS which is always being pointed to here.

No, we aren't. We haven't concluded that there's only one sensation and only one sensor. In fact, you're presuming more than one right now, at the present moment.

You are just repeating the same old mantras and not really looking at what is actually being pointed to.

How ironic. "Mantras" are elements of the worldview you're trying to advocate, not of mine; and they're considered positive in the pantheistic one. If I were repeating a "mantra," you should be pleased. But in point of fact, a "mantra" is a babble phrase, and I'm adducing reasons for what I say...that's not a mantra.

Funny how Christian Scripture does not explicitly proclaim the doctrine of Mary's Immaculate Conception.

That's a Catholic invention, and that's why. There is no such doctrine in the Bible; in fact, the opposite is taught. Mary herself declared that she, like everyone else, needed a "saviour," salvation from the consequences of her sin. See Luke 1:46-47.

And Mary said:

“My soul exalts the Lord,
And my spirit has rejoiced in God my Savior."

What do you imagine the Immaculate Conceptions actually means?

It means the Catholic hierarchy makes things up, because they claim to believe in "progressive" revelation...meaning, they do not discipline their theology to the Bible, but to the dictates of the Papacy instead. They actually believe they can countermand the Bible, and that's why Catholic practice and the Bible are so often at wide variance.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Fri Feb 26, 2021 1:59 pm
This is not a new idea. But it assumes that human beings, contingent as they are, are the ultimate in knowledge, and that there is no such thing as divine knowledge. So thoughts don't make things "appear" into reality. They simply represent human attempts to speak of things that are already really there.

No it doesn't IC... it's saying human is knowledge, it's saying human does not have knowledge, human is knowledge.

Thoughts appear because they are triggered into appearing by a preceding thought. Thought created 'realities' are very predictable. And this is what is conceptually known as cause and effect duality, when awareness becomes aware it is aware. Knowledge is only known as a reflexive reactive experience when awareness is identifying with thoughts appearing in it's consciousness...aka mind.

Notice, nothing is ever known to be happening unless something is thought about...brought into existence. So conscious awareness is always and ever already present prior to any reflexive reaction to become made known. There is no knowledge of what's always and already there/here .. the world as it is prior to thought has no story / knowledge. A sky or a tree or a river, never tells itself it is a sky or a tree or a river. That knowledge needs a mind to create them, and that's known as a conceptual overlay upon what is already existing unknowingly.

Like I've pointed out earlier, every piece of knowledge is a conceptual knowledge pointing to the illusory nature of reality,

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Thu Feb 25, 2021 7:53 pmAgain, not so if God exists. Then, "reality" is established by God, not generated by human "thought" or "concepts."

There is no reality separate from the concept of reality. What's here/there prior to thought has absolutely no knowledge of itself. Including the knowledge of what is thought, and from where thoughts come from. You cannot just say thoughts come from God, because God is a thought too.

And lets just be honest and real here. Only the mind is born ..right?

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Thu Feb 25, 2021 7:53 pm? Where do you get this axiom, D?

The same place IC got God from.

Dontaskme wrote: ↑Fri Feb 26, 2021 3:25 pm human is knowledge.

I can't make any sense out of this claim.

Notice, nothing is ever known to be happening unless something is thought about

Wow. Is that every obviously false... If that were true, there would be no World. For there was a time when there was no human person to "think about" it.

There is no reality separate from the concept of reality.

Yeah, there is. And you can find it. As Jordan Peterson has said, "Reality is the thing that destroys your stupid theory." That's perhaps a harsh way to put it, but it's helpful -- reality is the thing that persists even when one has a different theory, and is the thing that destroys that theory.

God is a thought too.

No, that's not true. Even you believe it is possible for a person to have a false thought about God. And if that's so, then God Himself is not a thought...because if He were, then whatever one thinks would be true...yet people think different things about God, and many of them are manifestly false and contradictory.

And lets just be honest and real here. Only the mind is born ..right?

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Thu Feb 25, 2021 7:53 pm? Where do you get this axiom, D?

The same place IC got God from.

I'm betting that's not true.

Dontaskme wrote: ↑Fri Feb 26, 2021 2:54 pm A person is a thing, a thing known.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Fri Feb 26, 2021 3:11 pmA human person? Then you've got a logical problem: if she is only "a thing known," then the one "knowing" her is only another human, who also has no particular distinction except as "a thing known" by somebody else.

No, that's not illogical - the one knowing the concept human appears to be re-presenting itself as a human but it is not the human. The human is an object, the concept 'human' is an action of knowing, identification with thought. The one knowing each thought as and when it arises within it, cannot experience itself as the object it knows, because the knower and the known are a presentation in the instantaneous moment, privy only to one knowing, the only knowing there is, which is consciousness itself. There is no other somebody else involved here as you have stated in ''somebody else'' so any distinction between the knower and the known is an illusion, both knower and known are one in the same instant they are known, one with the knowing, the same and not the same, only appearing to be separate and distinct.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Fri Feb 26, 2021 3:11 pm And none of them is special or distinguished...so you've got a lot of "knowing" going on, but with no special distinction. In other words, the whole chain is ontologically ungrounded in anything. It's just a strange phenomenon of a bunch of temporally-limited beings thinking about each other.

That's why reality is likened to a dream, there really is no one knowing itself.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Fri Feb 26, 2021 3:11 pmI don't think it's a truth at all.

The mind can only relate or refer to itself, without the mind for a projection screen, there is no knowledge of I. There is no truth to be known, because truth is always within the dream of separation when the mind is identified with it's contents as being itself, even though the mind is only an empty nothing appearing as something.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Fri Feb 26, 2021 1:54 pm You should be. They would help you see that it doesn't make sense logically.

Two sides of the same coin cannot see each other or know the other side even exists, simply because the two sides are nothing but the whole coin, and there is only the coin. Nonduality does not make sense to the rationally thinking mind which is duality. So yeah, for the logical and rational thinking intellectual, yes, we got a problem. For the smart mind, there is no problem, because the smart mind can see through the illusion of self.

Now we are back to THE ONENESS which is always being pointed to here.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Fri Feb 26, 2021 3:11 pmNo, we aren't. We haven't concluded that there's only one sensation and only one sensor. In fact, you're presuming more than one right now, at the present moment.

No, I am not presuming more than one sensor as you have implied here. Please listen carefully, there is only one sensor and that is consciousness, which is shared by every sentient creature. Sensations are many, but there is only one consciousness conscious of many different sensations which are experienced by every creature because every creature has the capacity to sensor their sensations, while sensations may or may not be present in a creature, the sensor is always present in every creature because the sensor in the human body is the same sensor in every other creatures body.

Funny how Christian Scripture does not explicitly proclaim the doctrine of Mary's Immaculate Conception.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Fri Feb 26, 2021 3:11 pmThat's a Catholic invention, and that's why. There is no such doctrine in the Bible; in fact, the opposite is taught. Mary herself declared that she, like everyone else, needed a "saviour," salvation from the consequences of her sin. See Luke 1:46-47.

And Mary said:

“My soul exalts the Lord,
And my spirit has rejoiced in God my Savior."

That's why the bible is just a story about the human condition, it's written by humans, who believe they are the writers, when in fact humans are just the machine, the vehicle for expression, they are the penning of an idea, which are just thoughts, believed to be theirs sent from some God, when in fact these thoughts are no thing other than pure emptiness itself, appearing as a story/dream.

What do you imagine the Immaculate Conceptions actually means?

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Fri Feb 26, 2021 3:11 pmIt means the Catholic hierarchy makes things up, because they claim to believe in "progressive" revelation...meaning, they do not discipline their theology to the Bible, but to the dictates of the Papacy instead. They actually believe they can countermand the Bible, and that's why Catholic practice and the Bible are so often at wide variance.

And there we have just more empty conceptual story pretending to actually mean something as believed by no thing.