Philosophy Now Forum

Reflex wrote: ↑Fri Sep 01, 2017 9:41 pm

Nick_A wrote: ↑Fri Sep 01, 2017 9:22 pm

Reflex wrote: ↑Fri Sep 01, 2017 7:23 pm I agree with the premise that everything is in God. I also agree with Nick that reason begins from the top down, conditioned, of course, by personal experience, natural tendencies (genes) and what have you. However, I am uncomfortable with the idea of "fallen man." It seems to me that while reason must begin at the the top, the cosmic processes are movement from the bottom up AND from the top down. That is to say, man originates in matter and moves godward and God lures man from above. There is no "fall" per se.

I may disagree with Nick in the details, but unlike his critics, I respect his perspective on things and his courage to voice it.

My interest in the complimentary relationship between science and the essence of religion requires a logical universal structure. Panentheism or the idea of God both inside nature structured on the laws of time and space and outside of the limitations of time and space provides a necessary beginning for the structure.

The universe as I've come to understand it, consists of levels of reality reflecting a chain of being and a conscious hierarchy. The earth as a plane of existence is unique in that it potentially connects the mechanical evolution we are aware of with the human potential for conscious evolution.

Man is dual natured. We re born as reacting animals and creatures of the earth with the potential for conscious evolution.

John 11: 11 Truly I tell you, among those born of women there has not risen anyone greater than John the Baptist; yet whoever is least in the kingdom of heaven is greater than he.

Jesus explains the transition. Animal man is born of women and its greatest being is limited by mechanical evolution. The first level of conscious evolution is greater than the height of mechanical evolution.

The fall of man is the reverse. For whatever reason, the essence of an expression of conscious man devolved to become a part of animal man. The potential still exists for animal man to include and acquire a higher quality of consciousness making it possible to return to man’s origin but the human condition has made it such that the animal part has become dominant and strives to preserve its dominance. The great teachings are designed for the minority who feel the benefit of becoming normal and opening to their conscious potential rather than just being governed by their lower natures. Lower natures in this case serve the higher rather than our higher natures being corrupted to serve the lower as happens now.

Cool. I gotcha now. I think we're on the same page. Am I right in saying it's like, as the UB puts it: "When man fails to discriminate the ends of his mortal striving, he finds himself functioning on the animal level of existence. He has failed to avail himself of the superior advantages of that material acumen, moral discrimination, and spiritual insight which are an integral part of his cosmic-mind endowment as a personal being"?

From Paper 160:

The more complex civilization becomes, the more difficult will become the art of living. The more rapid the changes in social usage, the more complicated will become the task of character development. Every ten generations mankind must learn anew the art of living if progress is to continue. And if man becomes so ingenious that he more rapidly adds to the complexities of society, the art of living will need to be remastered in less time, perhaps every single generation. If the evolution of the art of living fails to keep pace with the technique of existence, humanity will quickly revert to the simple urge of living — the attainment of the satisfaction of present desires. Thus will humanity remain immature; society will fail in growing up to full maturity.

Social maturity is equivalent to the degree to which man is willing to surrender the gratification of mere transient and present desires for the entertainment of those superior longings the striving for whose attainment affords the more abundant satisfactions of progressive advancement toward permanent goals. But the true badge of social maturity is the willingness of a people to surrender the right to live peaceably and contentedly under the ease-promoting standards of the lure of established beliefs and conventional ideas for the disquieting and energy-requiring lure of the pursuit of the unexplored possibilities of the attainment of undiscovered goals of idealistic spiritual realities.

Yes we seem to be on the same page. Actually a discussion on the pros and cons of technology in the context of human conscious potential could be interesting and meaningful.

Nick_A wrote: ↑Fri Sep 01, 2017 9:44 pm
F4 is closed. Why? What can be done to prevent the young from losing their attraction to conscious human potential.

I don't know. Trust in the evolutionary process? Evolution may be slow, but it is also effective. Sometimes brutally so.

"The danger is not lest the soul should doubt whether there is any bread, but lest, by a lie, it should persuade itself that it is not hungry" ~ Simone Weil

Panentheism is an awe inspiring awakening idea which should be consciously contemplated. Those like F4 would prefer to kill it before it multiplies.

I agree. One thing I've noticed is that many who claim to be "open-minded" are open only to the already-known. They shun the disquieting uncertainties that come with "the pursuit of the unexplored possibilities of the attainment of undiscovered goals of idealistic spiritual realities."

Reflex:

So, you're a relativist, it's all BS in your view ...

Well, I am a relativist, but a) what I have described is not relativism but skepticism - knowing that we do not know (this is Socratic skepticism, which is not the same as modern skepticism or other versions of skepticism), and b) relativism does not mean it is all BS. Relativism, in my view, is the rejection of absolutes. It is tied to skepticism in that we do not have knowledge of absolutes and so cannot make absolute claims.

… so there's nothing to discuss …

There are many important things to discuss. In line with what I have said above, one of the fundamental philosophical questions is how we can live as best we can knowing that we do not know what is best. This is the other half of Socratic skepticism - it is zetetic skepticism. It is guided by honest inquiry and is not possible if one is not comfortable not knowing .

… and all you have to contribute is criticism.

Of course since you admit that you have not read what I have written you cannot know this. Critical philosophy goes hand in hand with honest inquiry. It is the dialectical method. The examination of opinions in an attempt to determine what seems best, while eschewing the pretense of knowing.

Those who prefer unfettered speculation and those who prefer answers may not agree, but that is something we can discuss. All too often speculation and answers become indistinguishable and what might be is treated as if it is what is real and true.

Nick:

You can discuss what those like Plato, Plotinus, Spinoza and others offer. F4 is closed.

Now now Nicky. You’re just sore that I exposed you and made it painfully clear that you have not understood and misrepresent Plato, Plotinus, Spinoza, and others. You pervert them to fit your views and when it is pointed out you resort to your fallback position, your nonsense about spirit killing.

You keep claiming that Spinoza is a panentheist but have avoided addressing the problem that his God is not transcendent. If you are going to do more than namedrop and present a false facade of unity and agreement, you need to stop pretending and closing your eyes to important differences. Your screed about spirit killing cannot hide your lack of knowledge and misrepresentation of these thinkers. Science and religion cannot be unified by deception and groundless claims.

F4

Nick:
You can discuss what those like Plato, Plotinus, Spinoza and others offer. F4 is closed.
Now now Nicky. You’re just sore that I exposed you and made it painfully clear that you have not understood and misrepresent Plato, Plotinus, Spinoza, and others. You pervert them to fit your views and when it is pointed out you resort to your fallback position, your nonsense about spirit killing.

You keep claiming that Spinoza is a panentheist but have avoided addressing the problem that his God is not transcendent. If you are going to do more than namedrop and present a false facade of unity and agreement, you need to stop pretending and closing your eyes to important differences. Your screed about spirit killing cannot hide your lack of knowledge and misrepresentation of these thinkers. Science and religion cannot be unified by deception and groundless claims.

This is like being accused of exposing yourself by someone who is exposing themselves. What does Spinoza mean by "ONE"? If it is a quality within which the essence of attributes exist as one, it isn't nature but a quality nature or the sum of attributes is within. That is Panentheism

There are many important things to discuss. In line with what I have said above, one of the fundamental philosophical questions is how we can live as best we can knowing that we do not know what is best. This is the other half of Socratic skepticism - it is zetetic skepticism. It is guided by honest inquiry and is not possible if one is not comfortable not knowing .

News isn't the only thing that can be fake. There's also "fake philosophy." You sound terrified of the possibility of being wrong so you take refuge in "not knowing" like a cringing little coward slamming the door in the face of honest inquiry. Doubt and uncertainty always accompany rational propositions, but there's nothing to discuss without presupposing and proposing an Absolute against which things can be measured. Such an Absolute may not be definitive from a finite POV, but it is directionalizing and concrete.

Honest inquiry is not limited to the realm of the already-known. It is the willingness to explore unknown possibilities and the courage to invade new levels of experience and to attempt the exploration of unknown realms of intellectual living. You may call it mere speculation, but how do you know that's all it is? We speculate not for answers, but to experience whatever is true. When reality is perceived as solidly “known” or "unknowable," it engenders no investigation -- and why would it? Take, for instance, Albert Einstein, Isaac Newton, and Galileo as well as teachers like like Gautama Buddha, Jesus, Socrates and Aristotle -- what all these remarkable people had in common is that they went beyond their beliefs and assumptions to a state of genuine not-knowing, not the pseudo "not knowing" in which you take refuge. Evidence of gravity was there all along for Newton, but it took a certain transcendence of his own “knowledge” before he could conceive of it.

Nick: do you think F4 bothered visiting the links I posted?

Reflex wrote: ↑Sat Sep 02, 2017 2:29 am

There are many important things to discuss. In line with what I have said above, one of the fundamental philosophical questions is how we can live as best we can knowing that we do not know what is best. This is the other half of Socratic skepticism - it is zetetic skepticism. It is guided by honest inquiry and is not possible if one is not comfortable not knowing .

News isn't the only thing that can be fake. There's also "fake philosophy." You sound terrified of the possibility of being wrong so you take refuge in "not knowing" like a cringing little coward slamming the door in the face of honest inquiry. Doubt and uncertainty always accompany rational propositions, but there's nothing to discuss without presupposing and proposing an Absolute against which things can be measured. Such an Absolute may not be definitive from a finite POV, but it is directionalizing and concrete.

Honest inquiry is not limited to the realm of the already-known. It is the willingness to explore unknown possibilities and the courage to invade new levels of experience and to attempt the exploration of unknown realms of intellectual living. You may call it mere speculation, but how do you know that's all it is? We speculate not for answers, but to experience whatever is true. When reality is perceived as solidly “known” or "unknowable," it engenders no investigation -- and why would it? Take, for instance, Albert Einstein, Isaac Newton, and Galileo as well as teachers like like Gautama Buddha, Jesus, Socrates and Aristotle -- what all these remarkable people had in common is that they went beyond their beliefs and assumptions to a state of genuine not-knowing, not the pseudo "not knowing" in which you take refuge. Evidence of gravity was there all along for Newton, but it took a certain transcendence of his own “knowledge” before he could conceive of it.

Nick: do you think F4 bothered visiting the links I posted?

I doubt if F4 ever read those links. His mind is made up.

I agree with what you wrote about the great minds being able to become open. However there is a fear of doing so. Consider these two quotes by Simone Weil

“Whatever debases the intelligence degrades the entire human being.”

“The role of the intelligence - that part of us which affirms and denies and formulates opinions is merely to submit.”

You would recognize this as connecting qualities of intelligence. Objective reason begins when subjective reason ends. Yet this is offensive to those like F4 who only recognize subjective reason inadequate for comprehending what the great minds of the past sought to understand.

The ability to submit, to become open, is considered a strength for those like Einstein but a weakness for those like F4. Why? No Oprahisms are adequate to justify this fear.

And yet you show zero sign of having achieved any of the condition you say should be strived for?

You give no techniques, no procedures, no explanations other than the quotes of two to three philosophers about this condition of 'contemplation' nor do you give examples or actual results of what one can achieve with such a state?

Just empty words about how awful everything is and how if we indoctrinate the kids into your theism a certain few will become the enlightened ones but no say about what will happen to the rest of them?

And you want the rest of us to pay for this with our taxes to boot.

Reflex wrote:... Evidence of gravity was there all along for Newton, but it took a certain transcendence of his own “knowledge” before he could conceive of it. ...

Actually no, it took the abandonment of Aristotelian metaphysical ontological logic(roughly what you are prescribing but without your religious bent) as the source of knowledge about the world and the acceptance that actually looking at the world and not making metaphysical assumptions about it but rather applying mathematics and experimentation to find the 'how' rather than a 'why' as an explanation for the natural processes that we see.

Arising_uk wrote: ↑Sat Sep 02, 2017 3:41 am And yet you show zero sign of having achieved any of the condition you say should be strived for?

You give no techniques, no procedures, no explanations other than the quotes of two to three philosophers about this condition of 'contemplation' nor do you give examples or actual results of what one can achieve with such a state?

Just empty words about how awful everything is and how if we indoctrinate the kids into your theism a certain few will become the enlightened ones but no say about what will happen to the rest of them?

And you want the rest of us to pay for this with our taxes to boot.

I'll make it easy for you. Just send money directly to me and avoid the middle man. I'll make sure people get what they deserve.

Nick:

What does Spinoza mean by "ONE"?

After all this you still do not know? It has been stated and restated. There is one substance, God or Nature, with infinite attributes and infinite and finite modes.

If it is a quality within which the essence of attributes exist as one, it isn't nature but a quality nature or the sum of attributes is within.

It is not a quality and attributes do not exist “as one”, they are attributes of one - God or Nature. Nature is not within anything. Nature is not some set of attributes or modes of God. Nature is God.

God, or Nature, Deus, sive Natura: That eternal and infinite being we call God, or Nature, acts from the same necessity from which he exists (Part IV, Preface).

Your misunderstanding seems at least in part to be do to this, which I quoted earlier:

Many errors, in truth, can be traced to this head, namely, that we do not apply names to things rightly.

Nick:

That is Panentheism.

God is not the source of being. God is not other than being itself. God is being itself. God is existence itself. There are not two things God and nature or God and being or God and existence. God does not transcend nature.


Reflux:

You sound terrified of the possibility of being wrong so you take refuge in "not knowing" like a cringing little coward slamming the door in the face of honest inquiry.

Being wrong is not only a possibility it is necessary outcome of not knowing. You apparently know nothing of the Socratic tradition. There is a vast literature on this. I suggest you read some of it before making such uninformed comments.

Doubt and uncertainty always accompany rational propositions, but there's nothing to discuss without presupposing and proposing an Absolute against which things can be measured.

Things cannot be measured against an Absolute if we has no knowledge of the Absolute.

Such an Absolute may not be definitive from a finite POV, but it is directionalizing and concrete.

You may presuppose an Absolute but it is a groundless and unnecessary presupposition.

Honest inquiry is not limited to the realm of the already-known.

Of course not. That is what skeptical inquiry is all about. Inquiry into what is not known.Honest inquiry, however, critically examines its presuppositions. Nothing that anyone is saying here would change at all if it turned out that there was not an Absolute. You would go on saying that we must presuppose that there is and I would deny this. Denying that it must be presupposed, however, is not denying that there is an Absolute. I don't think there is, but I don't know. And unless I know or have some compelling reason to believe there is I see no reason to accept claims that there is an Absolute as true.

You may call it mere speculation, but how do you know that's all it is?

I don’t. What I said is that one should not mistake speculation for truth. That does not mean it is false, just that as speculation it has not been determined to be true.

When reality is perceived as solidly “known” or "unknowable," it engenders no investigation -- and why would it?

I did not say unknowable I said unknown. I think you are confusing different types of skepticism. Knowing that I do not know does not mean knowing that I cannot know.

… not the pseudo "not knowing" in which you take refuge.

And you know of my pseudo not knowing based on what?

Nick: do you think F4 bothered visiting the links I posted?

It doesn’t matter what Nick thinks I did, the truth is I did. One of them I was already familiar with. Neither offered what I take to be reliable scholarly explications of Spinoza. Neither of them provided reliable textual or historical evidence to be drawn on in settling the issues raised here.

Nick:

I doubt if F4 ever read those links. His mind is made up.

On the contrary, I did read those links. As to having my mind made up, I spend hours and hours the last few days reading Spinoza, trying to figure out what he means. I would think that would be evident from the quotes I provided that pinpoint critical issues. That takes careful dedicated work. I could have just cited secondary sources as you did and leave it at that, but I treat secondary sources as secondary. I look from them to the primary source.

I took this as an opportunity to learn more about Spinoza. I would not have bothered if my mind had already been made up. My mind is still not made up. I have been a serious student of philosophical hermeneutics for much of the past forty plus years. One thing I have learned is that there is not a final definitive interpretation of complex texts. That does not mean that all interpretations are equal or worthy of serious consideration. They must be rooted in and supported by the text. They must not explain one part of a text in such a way as to contradict another. This is especially true of a text like the Ethics which is carefully composed as a single whole.

Objective reason begins when subjective reason ends. Yet this is offensive to those like F4 who only recognize subjective reason inadequate for comprehending what the great minds of the past sought to understand.

The only way I know how to comprehend a great mind is to attend carefully to what is said, think about, reconstruct what was said,go back to the text to check whether this is in line with what was said. Read secondary sources, see if what they say is in line with what is in the text. And go through the process over again each time clarifying and expanding on what I find. I allow the text to lead, not my own assumptions, and certainly not the assumption that understanding what is said requires a reliance on questionable distinction about objective and subjective reason. Does Spinoza say this? Where?

The ability to submit, to become open, is considered a strength for those like Einstein but a weakness for those like F4. Why?

There is a difference between being open and accepting your misrepresentation of Einstein and others as anything other than a misrepresentation.

Fooloso4 wrote:

Relativism, in my view, is the rejection of absolutes. It is tied to skepticism in that we do not have knowledge of absolutes and so cannot make absolute claims.

I think that the rejection of absolutes is a matter of what exists. And scepticism is a matter of how we can know what exists.I think that what I have just written is a paraphrase of what you wrote, Fooloso4.

I have an observation with regard to absolutes. Socrates upon his painful chains being removed (Phaedo) said that pleasure and pain are related. However he did not say that they are related as a matter of degree but as a matter of kind like an animal with two heads . I conclude that this whole animal is inclusive of the same animal with head 1. in charge or with head 2. in charge. If an animal has two heads this is analogous to pleasure and pain as necessary parts of nature ; it's not analogous to pleasure or pain as whole animals as an absolutist would have it. Pleasure and pain, and other felt opposites are not absolute but are twin effects of the same cause: that cause is nature as a whole, whether you want to call it "God" or "Nature".

I think I'd draw the same conclusion about absolute good and absolute evil etc.

How do these claims relate to inborn, inherent knowledge of absolute good and absolute evil? Is Socrates contra Plato regarding inborn reasoning ability? I don't think so; pleasure and pain are not reasoned. Do Chomsky's claims about inborn linguistic abilities extend to inborn knowledge of moral absolutes? I don't think so. Reason , at least theoretically , does trump emotions like pleasure and pain. What Spinoza called "adequate ideas" are reasoned ideas to be contrasted with flights of fancy or vague speculations.

Nick and Reflex seem to claim that an awful lot of human abilities including Nick's much vaunted esoteric ability are inherent and absolute not learned and relative. I am wondering how much the neuroscientists can tell us about inborn abilities and whether those finding justify us in relating inborn abilities to natural selections long ago----I think that they would, actually.

We can dismiss the thrawnness++ of Nick and Reflex however there are interesting discussions to be had about relativism and absolutism.

++( 'Thrawn', Scottish adj. twisted, crooked, distorted; (of people) obstinate, intractable, etc)

Nick_A wrote:.... I'll make sure people get what they deserve.

I'm sure you will which is why thankfully you'll never be able to.

Belinda:

We can dismiss the thrawnness++ of Nick and Reflex however there are interesting discussions to be had about relativism and absolutism.

I agree, but if the discussion is with the typical absolutist then it becomes nothing more than unsupported claims about what is and what must be that exists in some transcendent realm accessible only to those with special abilities that transforms subject states of their imagination into objective reality.

Its as if they cannot appreciate the wonder of the universe here and now and so take flight to somewhere above and dig to find something hidden below.

Perhaps this is why they cannot see themselves, they are always looking elsewhere.

And perhaps this is why they cannot see what is in the text, they are always looking elsewhere.

fooloso4 wrote: ↑Sat Sep 02, 2017 1:29 pm Belinda:

We can dismiss the thrawnness++ of Nick and Reflex however there are interesting discussions to be had about relativism and absolutism.

I agree, but if the discussion is with the typical absolutist then it becomes nothing more than unsupported claims about what is and what must be that exists in some transcendent realm accessible only to those with special abilities that transforms subject states of their imagination into objective reality.

Its as if they cannot appreciate the wonder of the universe here and now and so take flight to somewhere above and dig to find something hidden below.

Perhaps this is why they cannot see themselves, they are always looking elsewhere.

And perhaps this is why they cannot see what is in the text, they are always looking elsewhere.

Ya gotta luv it. Given half a chance F4 will assert that Jesus was a secularist. He knows it to be true because he is the only one who knows how to read the Bible. The results of a secular progressive mindset. Behold the future of secular progressive education. It makes one shudder. Finally a BS degree will mean exactly what it implies.

Nick_A wrote:... Finally a BS degree will mean exactly what it implies.

Which will mean that at least you will get a 1st class degree.