Philosophy Now Forum

ken wrote:But is not theist's idea/definition of God exactly what you are proposing also, that is, God is within everything?

That is what I heard in religion classes ever since i was very young.

Yes, that's what I've usually heard too. So I'm asking theists why anything would NOT be of God WHICH they commonly claim when they judge non-theists or bad behavior. Why aren't non-theists a reflection of God as well? Theists also typically don't want to attribute anything unpleasant to their idea of God. God isn't "THAT"! How does that denial fit into the logic that God is in all, or that God created all?

How does a sundial work?

It's not the shadow of the sun, but the shadow of the brass. If the light was distributed evenly, there would be no shadow.

LW:
From what I've seen, you're a theist -- you just don't know it.

Greta wrote:
If you are a dog, then yes, you need not explain yourself. I am impressed at how well you type with your paws.

Yeah, God has such a great sense of humor huh? ..no one knows he's really a dog, although he does leave his pawprints all over the place as a clue.

Again, I repeat, there is no dog, there's only ''no thing'' appearing as a thing /aka known conceptual dog. There is no person typing, there's just the typing, no thing is typing, concepts don't do anything. Doing is done but there's no doer thereof...any claim of a personal doer is the illusion. You have no idea what is doing, only what is done, and what is done can't be the doing, there is only doing. Man comes to know through thoughts after the action, word or thought happens. This implies that man is not the doer, speaker or thinker, though they do happen, albeit illusory.

Greta wrote:Our interaction makes clear that's that's not true - you are other than me and vice versa. If I am you and you are me, why do we disagree on many things?

There is no thing interacting with another thing, this is oneness interacting with itself, that there appears to be two of us is the illusion.
Read more nondual literature if your looking for clarity on the absurd notion of ONENESS that is real true reality.

Greta wrote:This is just a matter of ground states determining the potentials and limitations of future states. So the slight variations of temperature in the CMB resulted in the arrangement of galaxies today. Spores, seeds and eggs are life's "ground zero", their DNA and resource allocation/access defining the nature of subsequent emerging forms.

So, as the universe cools, that allows for fractal emergence. Emergent entities will naturally inherit characteristics from the "parent" entities.

Okay thanks for the elaborate description of what you only think is true, it's quite an impressive story, but it's just that, it's just something imagined appearing to be something understood by a someone, but it's all fiction appearing from nothing....looking all pretty on the surface level with pretty much nothing of any shape form or substance underneath it causing the prettiness.

Greta wrote:I take it you are not referring to acoustic holograms ...? http://gizmodo.com/scientists-made-beau ... 1786907747

No, I'm referring to images of the imageless.

Greta wrote: Language is not just about sounds and forms, but structure and meaning.

That which appears to have meaning has no meaning, therefore meaning is for no one, except imagined.

Greta wrote:I have some idea what you are trying to say and I don't disagree, but I think you wildly overrate the value of dialling into the present moment. I went through my "eternal now" phase (as many do) and it proved counter-productive. It's an irony of evolution and our senses that we largely seem to need to be "out of touch" with reality in order to live well and happily, with only occasional forays into something more akin to actual reality.

To perceive reality as it really 24/7 is would be akin to being utterly blinded and deafened (at least) by a cacophony of light and sound and unable to function. We are insulated by the filtering of our limited senses, which keep the environmental inputs manageable.

I've no idea what you are talking about, but the minds filter is the dream of separation, it's an illusion, like any dream. No one is dreaming reality. It's just appearing out of the infinite void, but that doesn't mean the dream is not happening, it's just not happening to a someone..Like I keep repeating..

Greta wrote:That's just material fundamentalism and not the reality (although imagining being made of light can be a powerful mediation tool). Obviously atoms are not just "light" (electromagnetism) but emergent forms at the boundary of what we refer to as "matter", ie. compressed and specifically ordered energy. Atoms bond to form molecules, molecules form molecular compounds, molecular compounds form cells and so forth. Each is related - as you suggest - but they are not the same.

Appearances can appear to look different on the surface level of the mind that constructs them, but on closer inspection, the one looking at each appearance is the same one looking inseparable from the appearance, therefore any difference in the appearance of the looker is illusory.
The rest of your story sounds very impressive, very text book ...again I have to answer by saying no one ever wrote these text books, they are appearances appearing to be written by many authors, but only one reader is present. The story can never be separated from the book, the chapters indeed are many, but the book is only ever one...(meta speaking of course!)

Greta wrote:If you give birth to a baby, how real is that interaction? If you are mugged, how real is that interaction?

Yep, it's pretty real all right, but I have no real idea what it is I'm am interacting with, so I'll make just about any story I can about it to make it look convincing. Again, you are missing the point. Interaction requires two, so it's an illusion, read nondual literature until you understand what I'm trying to show you regarding the notion of oneness.

Greta wrote:You can call all this stuff "illusions" till you are blue in the face and no one will believe you because they know it's real, with real cause and effect consequences. Ultimately, it's cause and effect that determines reality from illusions.

Oh yeah, the old cause and effect trick, hmm, let me see.... The important point to understand about motion is that the force or energy that causes motion has no cause.Therefore, that which has no cause cannot possibly have an effect. See if you can find the original cause, then I might just find it in me to believe what you are saying is true. I'm not sure that can be determined by an imaginary entity known as human. You see the forces that make up a human is not actually human...so good luck with finding the cause of force or energy that causes causality. Report back to me when you have your findings, I've been waiting all my life to see this.

As for knowing it's real, who is this ''THEY'' that knows real? ...First of all you have to figure out if this knowing actually belongs to any other thing outside the knowing itself...only then will it be believed, and that will still be by no one. For you would also have to figure out who the believer is..it kind of gets a little bitty more tricky from there on in....so good look with your search.

Lacewing wrote:

ken wrote:But is not theist's idea/definition of God exactly what you are proposing also, that is, God is within everything?

That is what I heard in religion classes ever since i was very young.

Yes, that's what I've usually heard too. So I'm asking theists why anything would NOT be of God WHICH they commonly claim when they judge non-theists or bad behavior.

I can NOT speak for theists because 'I' am not that, but if theists claim God is within everything, then they can not also claim God is not within everything.

Lacewing wrote:Why aren't non-theists a reflection of God as well?

I have not heard this claim before. But my reply would be the same as well.

Lacewing wrote: Theists also typically don't want to attribute anything unpleasant to their idea of God. God isn't "THAT"!

But if they claim God is within everything then they can not claim anything opposing that as well.

Lacewing wrote: How does that denial fit into the logic that God is in all, or that God created all?

For a theist to deny God is not in all after one says God is in all obviously does not fit.

What I found, though, is a definition of God that does fit perfectly, for Me, and could fit perfectly for all. But I am certainly not a theist so I do not speak for them nor anyone else. I only speak for Me. The definition of God that I have, which could fit perfectly for all, also fits perfectly to answer this apparent conundrum.

By the way from a theist's perspective that 'God created all' is really rather ridiculous, although 'God creates all' makes far more sense and fits perfectly with all religions and could fit perfectly with ALL.

Dontaskme wrote:

Greta wrote:
If you are a dog, then yes, you need not explain yourself. I am impressed at how well you type with your paws.

Yeah, God has such a great sense of humor huh? ..no one knows he's really a dog, although he does leave his pawprints all over the place as a clue.

Again, I repeat, there is no dog, there's only ''no thing'' appearing as a thing /aka known conceptual dog. There is no person typing, there's just the typing, no thing is typing, concepts don't do anything. Doing is done but there's no doer thereof...any claim of a personal doer is the illusion. You have no idea what is doing, only what is done, and what is done can't be the doing, there is only doing. Man comes to know through thoughts after the action, word or thought happens. This implies that man is not the doer, speaker or thinker, though they do happen, albeit illusory.

Here we go again. There's no this and no that. It's an an illusion.

No, there IS a dog. There is a dog in my family. She is not a concept but a living, breathing little personality. She is absolutely no illusions.

Where do you get these wacky ideas?

Dontaskme wrote:

Greta wrote:Our interaction makes clear that's that's not true - you are other than me and vice versa. If I am you and you are me, why do we disagree on many things?

There is no thing interacting with another thing, this is oneness interacting with itself, that there appears to be two of us is the illusion.
Read more nondual literature if your looking for clarity on the absurd notion of ONENESS that is real true reality.

I hate to break this to you but you are 13.8 billion years too late. The universe has not been a "oneness" for that long. It's is now a massive multiplicity. That the universe is all one thing is obvious, yes, but to ignore all the other aspects of it is simply raw fundamentalism. Creating this "small, manageable universe" in your head without all the associated complexity might work for you, but it is simply not reality, rather the blandest and most indistinct of sketches of reality.

Dontaskme wrote:

Greta wrote:This is just a matter of ground states determining the potentials and limitations of future states. So the slight variations of temperature in the CMB resulted in the arrangement of galaxies today. Spores, seeds and eggs are life's "ground zero", their DNA and resource allocation/access defining the nature of subsequent emerging forms.

So, as the universe cools, that allows for fractal emergence. Emergent entities will naturally inherit characteristics from the "parent" entities.

Okay thanks for the elaborate description of what you only think is true, it's quite an impressive story, but it's just that, it's just something imagined appearing to be something understood by a someone, but it's all fiction appearing from nothing....looking all pretty on the surface level with pretty much nothing of any shape form or substance underneath it causing the prettiness.

A groundbreakingly shallow response.

Greta wrote:
Here we go again. There's no this and no that. It's an an illusion.

No, there IS a dog. There is a dog in my family. She is not a concept but a living, breathing little personality. She is absolutely no illusions.

Where do you get these wacky ideas?

Same place you got your idea there is a dog. Who told you there is a dog? who knows dog?

Who who who ...who lets the dogs out??


Ask a dog are you a dog. Will the dog understand? what does the dog hear?



The dog doesn't know it's a dog, that's what I'm trying to say...human language creates the illusion of separation that's all.
The illusion that there is you and there is the dog..this is simply an illusion.

Greta wrote:I hate to break this to you but you are 13.8 billion years too late. The universe has not been a "oneness" for that long. It's is now a massive multiplicity. That the universe is all one thing is obvious, yes, but to ignore all the other aspects of it is simply raw fundamentalism. Creating this "small, manageable universe" in your head without all the associated complexity might work for you, but it is simply not reality, rather the blandest and most indistinct of sketches of reality.

But how do you know that, who told you?

Greta wrote:A groundbreakingly shallow response.

No, it's actually quite a deep response, it's yours that's shallow - but that's what the mind is, it's only surface level of a much deeper reality.

Lacewing wrote: What list, Walker? Where have I started a list? All I said in my OP was: "It makes the most sense to me that the idea of “God” must include and reside in ALL equally" -- and I explain why that makes sense to me. Then I ask why it would not be true. I am not claiming there is a god. I am questioning the idea/definition of God, as presented by most theists.

Whatever else you've concluded is coming from your own head.

You're a good sport and don't believe them if they tell you otherwise.

Now, this is relevant to your enquiry.

When you think about it, when mans’ experience suggested flat earth, the assumption of round earth required that known facts conform to the assumed reality of round earth. This created new paradigms such as the relativity of up and down, and perhaps a new understanding of old facts, or perhaps we can say a deeper understanding what was once not known so well, if at all.

Same with God talk. Lacking knowledge, an assumption of God makes facts conform to the assumed reality of God, and this assumed reality becomes an absolute, purely for the intellectual exercise of rational consideration, or else a more holistic contemplation.

This is the way of things.

God need not be the only premise that focuses conceptual attention, although logic indicates that since most folks take their lives seriously, all this God-talk throughout the history of mankind consists of something more than stupidity, thus making God contemplation worthy of one's time, if for no other reason than to place one's locus of attention in the universe.

For the purposes of rationally considering the implications and feasibility of a round earth, the inquirer does not cling to insistence of flat earth. To rationally consider the implications and feasibility of God, the inquirer lacking knowledge does not cling to the insistence of no God. To do so is attachment, attachment leads to ignorance, ignorance leads to fear, and so on, as the Yoda tells us.

Walker wrote:For the purposes of rationally considering the implications and feasibility of a round earth, the inquirer does not cling to insistence of flat earth. To rationally consider the implications and feasibility of God, the inquirer lacking knowledge does not cling to the insistence of no God. To do so is attachment, attachment leads to ignorance, ignorance leads to fear, and so on, as the Yoda tells us.

This is funny... I think you've got it backwards. To think beyond the rigidity of a god is a broader view. To be able to see love and perfection and acceptance in all -- and to appreciate a natural connectivity and oneness of all -- is not a rigid view. This is why I ask theists questions about the logic of their beliefs... which are often exclusive, divisive, inconsistent, and unanswerable because they make no sense. I grew up in the Christian church, so I have fully considered the implications and feasibility of God. I saw a lot of people wanting to believe... hypnotically believing... and many actually believing, for one reason or another. People can and will believe whatever they want... whatever serves them. I tried to believe too, and was sure I did at times, but something stronger in me knew that it really didn't make sense to me. What I saw beyond it, made much more sense.

I experience a lot of what (it seems) theism strives for, but without the limiting "story" full of idol/idea worship and manmade beliefs that twist and obscure and control and evade. I've sailed to the perceived edge of the Earth and beyond... and I did not fall off. Now I sail among the stars and dance with them. Your notions/conclusions may be hypnotic to you, but they are not to me.

Greta wrote:Here we go again. There's no this and no that. It's an an illusion.

Dontaskme wrote:No, there IS a dog. There is a dog in my family. She is not a concept but a living, breathing little personality. She is absolutely no illusions.

Greta wrote:Where do you get these wacky ideas?

Dontaskme wrote:Same place you got your idea there is a dog. Who told you there is a dog? who knows dog?

Who who who ...who lets the dogs out??

Ask a dog are you a dog. Will the dog understand? what does the dog hear?

The dog doesn't know it's a dog, that's what I'm trying to say...human language creates the illusion of separation that's all.
The illusion that there is you and there is the dog..this is simply an illusion.

So why didn't you say the last paragraph instead of trolling with "there is no dog".

Your argument is still unhinged - "since a dog doesn't know it's called a dog (which is not true) then there is no dog". FFS.

Lacewing wrote:

Walker wrote:For the purposes of rationally considering the implications and feasibility of a round earth, the inquirer does not cling to insistence of flat earth. To rationally consider the implications and feasibility of God, the inquirer lacking knowledge does not cling to the insistence of no God. To do so is attachment, attachment leads to ignorance, ignorance leads to fear, and so on, as the Yoda tells us.

This is funny... I think you've got it backwards. To think beyond the rigidity of a god is a broader view. To be able to see love and perfection and acceptance in all -- and to appreciate a natural connectivity and oneness of all -- is not a rigid view. This is why I ask theists questions about the logic of their beliefs... which are often exclusive, divisive, inconsistent, and unanswerable because they make no sense. I grew up in the Christian church, so I have fully considered the implications and feasibility of God. I saw a lot of people wanting to believe... hypnotically believing... and many actually believing, for one reason or another. People can and will believe whatever they want... whatever serves them. I tried to believe too, and was sure I did at times, but something stronger in me knew that it really didn't make sense to me. What I saw beyond it, made much more sense.

I experience a lot of what (it seems) theism strives for, but without the limiting "story" full of idol/idea worship and manmade beliefs that twist and obscure and control and evade. I've sailed to the perceived edge of the Earth and beyond... and I did not fall off. Now I sail among the stars and dance with them. Your notions/conclusions may be hypnotic to you, but they are not to me.

Have you been hypnotized before?

In applying the round-earth attitude-of-understanding to the thread premise that all is God, “all” must be defined.

Are you saying that all is only what can be directly perceived in the present moment? If so, then God is All can be defined more-or-less conventionally, that is, as each thing being an individuated, unique expression of the same thing.

For example, each wave is unique but similar, and each wave is also an individuated expression of the ocean, or God. The ocean is a form comprised of all wave forms and so, can be differentiated as God, since an individual wave does not contain the minute, particular characteristics of all waves but does contain some characteristics of the ocean, as does a drop. However, a drop feels itself separate from the ocean, as does a drip feel separate from the pool, though ultimately it is not when one begins to examine the nature of boundaries.

Or, are you saying that in addition to “all” being defined as what’s directly perceived, “all” also includes the imagined that is not directly perceived, such as the food market imagined to exist but is currently too far away to directly perceive with any of the five senses, which includes the smell of fresh rolls in the morning. If so, then the purely abstract of logic dictates that the imaginings of less probable things, such as unicorns, are also God.

Greta wrote: Your argument is still unhinged - "since a dog doesn't know it's called a dog (which is not true) then there is no dog". FFS.

I'm not arguing, I'm simply exposing lie for truth.

The concept ''dog'' is known, but not by the dog. Concepts are known by the only knowing there is one with the knowing. The known cannot know since the known doesn't exist separate from the knowing one.

Don't forget to empty the bucket of fuck it's now and again... wouldn't want to drown in your own dirt...albeit illusory.

Greta wrote:
I hate to break this to you but you are 13.8 billion years too late. The universe has not been a "oneness" for that long. It's is now a massive multiplicity. That the universe is all one thing is obvious, yes, but to ignore all the other aspects of it is simply raw fundamentalism. Creating this "small, manageable universe" in your head without all the associated complexity might work for you, but it is simply not reality, rather the blandest and most indistinct of sketches of reality.
.

Time is an illusion. Here is the eternal now. The past doesn't exist, and the future never comes. This is obvious, we all know this. Eternity is here right now. This is it.Everything that appears here is that one everything all at once. The big bang is happening right now.

Dontaskme wrote:

Greta wrote: Your argument is still unhinged - "since a dog doesn't know it's called a dog (which is not true) then there is no dog". FFS.

I'm not arguing, I'm simply exposing lie for truth.

The concept ''dog'' is known, but not by the dog. Concepts are known by the only knowing there is one with the knowing. The known cannot know since the known doesn't exist separate from the knowing one.

not "argument" as in arguing, "argument" as in:

Argument:
2. a reason or set of reasons given in support of an idea, action or theory.
"there is a strong argument for submitting a formal appeal"
synonyms: reasoning, line of reasoning, logic, case; More

You don't know what's known by dogs. They might understand the concept better than you realise. That was Nagle's point in his famous essay "What is it like to be a bat?" Answer: we don't know. The capacity to understand concepts and the capacity to articulate that understanding in a way that humans can understand are different abilities. There is a long way to go before we can understand what's really going on with other species - or each other.

Dontaskme wrote:Don't forget to empty the bucket of fuck it's now and again... wouldn't want to drown in your own dirt...albeit illusory.

If my dirt is only an illusion, no wuckers. Not sure there should be an apostrophe in "fuck its", though, although in an odd way it's more clear.

Greta wrote:

You don't know what's known by dogs. They might understand the concept better than you realise. That was Nagle's point in his famous essay "What is it like to be a bat?" Answer: we don't know. The capacity to understand concepts and the capacity to articulate that understanding in a way that humans can understand are different abilities. There is a long way to go before we can understand what's really going on with other species - or each other.

Not really a long way to go at all, the understanding/realisation is always right here right now available always.

GRETA LET ME JUST TRY AND EXPLAIN TO YOU Again!! WHY THERE IS ONLY ONENESS WITHOUT A SECOND...AKA NO ''OTHER''

Greta I'll get to the '' You don't know what's known by dogs'' bit later, so hope you'll find the patience to stay with me.

One cannot know itself because it's already being itself, experiencing itself NOW. The one trying to know itself is illusory because it's already the known. No thing, which is not really a thing can know itself not until it looks in the mirror.. become known to itself...that mirror is known as ''other'' aka it's reflection. It aka no thing awareness can only know itself as a reflection, an illusory self.

There has to be a reflector present or else no thing aka reflection can ever show.... although the reflection needs the reflector, the reflector does not need the reflection.

For example: a dog is known, but what is known cannot know what's knowing.. there is no separation between the knower and known.This is impossible, the knower is inseparable from what it knows, it's always one with the knowing in the instant. The known can't know the knower, no more than the seen can see what's seeing it.

You are this silent still unchanging ageless Awareness watching yourself being born, moving and changing, and ageing until death arrives. You do this just for the experience of being a live separate character, like the character in a movie. And just as nothing in a movie ever really happened, so too nothing of your character in the play of life ever happened, it only appeared to happen. A night time dream is no different to the dream of waking life. And just as there is no movie without a screen, there is no life without awareness.

Sorry for long response, it's just that it takes a lot of explaining.....please feel free to debunk these ideas to yourself.



The 'You' doesn't know any thing, the 'You' is the known as and when 'You' arise on the screen of awareness one with the knowing. The knowing is not a thing, things arise in the knowing, known in the instant one without a second...meaning the knower cannot be known by what it knows...it is always one with itself. Therefore there is no knower or known apart from the immediate knowing which is eternity now in action.. aka known to itself as the I Am or You or Pure Awareness or Beingness, or God...or what ever you want to call it...and this is what's experiencing itself right now the only place and time there is. Creation only happens now, but as each now is passing away ..at the same time a new now is being born giving the impression of an endless living movie. But as I've said, each new now is dying in the exact same moment so that's why life is likened to a dream.

Consciousness experiencing itself as a human or an animal does so as and through the body/mind mechanism, but the body/ mind mechanisms are not human or animal, those are just concepts known by the consciousness experiencing itself as each concept arises one with the knowing known in the experience of ''other''.. ie: the concept), the idea of ''other'' is only ever an appearance of its one same self, therefore ''other'' is illusory.

There simply is no human or dog, there is only consciousness having the experience of human or dog as a concept known. Consciousness is not an experience had by a dog or a human. As consciousness is all there is, consciousness is not an experience. It cannot experience itself, it is the experiencing...it's only and ever one with itself.

While consciousness is not actually conceptual, it is not a thing, but is that which is aware of itself as a thing,it's no thing appearing as some thing. Same one. It's like a mirror, the mirror just reflects what ever appears in it, what appears in it, is inseparable and sourced in the mirror, the mirror is always and ever eternally one with itself.

Consciousness cannot experience consciousness it's not an experience. It is the experiencing. It's experiencing itself as all things simultaneously. There is no thing outside of this consciousness experiencing itself arena to know another experience, because there is no experiencer apart from the experience.

If the dog was separate from the human there would be two consciousnesses which is impossible, therefore, the dog and the human is an idea (appearance) aka an experience of consciousness experiencing itself, one without a second. A human or dog does not have consciousness, consciousness has them.

Thanks for trying, DAM, but I don't share your faith.

Maybe it is all one consciousness having a game of life as you and the mystics suggest, but I don't think it's that simple. Some years ago I chatted with a God believer online who was saying that the perfect and immortal soul goes through the adventure of life, but with death all the soil and dirt of life is washed off and the perfect soul is revealed again.

It seemed to me a rather cruel and pointless system. If a soul is perfect before life and comes away unchanged afterwards, why go through all the agonies of life? As far as I can tell, growth and development is key. Thus the Grand Deity may not exist at all in this young universe, still in development and at this stage only a potential of what life can conceivably become in a trillion years' time. Or, if time is fractal (speculative theory) then the final form of the universe would be reaching back in time and pulling us forward :)