Philosophy Now Forum

Dontaskme wrote: ↑Fri Mar 19, 2021 7:46 pm Sometimes though, people want what they do not have, and do not want what they do have.

Well, that's certainly true...both times.

Back tomorrow.

Dontaskme wrote: ↑Fri Mar 19, 2021 7:05 pm ... before I was born, I was in my Father as a seed, my Father is alive, and so the seed that would be a potential new life was already embodied in life. But then my Father had to plant the seed to a fertile ground, which is my Mother who is also alive. So that's why I say life can only come from life.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Fri Mar 19, 2021 7:32 pmOkay...but then you've still got a problem. Where did life itself come from?

I think that's why the nondualists speak about that question of ''come from'' as a mystery that cannot be known, that's what they mean by life is a mystery.
Nonduality points to an infinite supply of 'energy' that's always existed, and this energy is neither living nor dead, and that it just is, and that every material thing is a just a unique shape that this energy takes on according to the forms frequency. And that this energy is,was and always will be. In the same context that 'electricity' just is, and that it's neither dead nor alive. We know 'electricty' is what drives our bodies functioning mechanism. But is electricty alive, is it dead. It's known to be dynamic.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Fri Mar 19, 2021 7:32 pmThe Materialist view has to be that it came (somehow, though they cannot explain it) from non-living materials. (Then, of course, they have the recessive problem of the origin of the materials as well, but let's leave that for a moment.) But how do you explain the first life?

I cannot explain anything like that. All I know is that there was something before I personally popped aware, and that same something will be there, after I'm not there anymore.
Revelation 1:8
"I am the Alpha and the Omega," says the Lord God, "who is and who was and who is to come, the Almighty."

So then that got me thinking about how the idea of death is a mystery, that no one can know.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Fri Mar 19, 2021 7:32 pmWell, is death the end? That's a fundamental question. The Materialist will have to say "Yes," since the materials are gone, dispersed into the universe, and the materials are the cause and totality of the entity known as a human being. But what do you say?

What I think death is, ..... I think death is another word for 'extinction', for example: while there are human beings alive and inhabiting the planet earth, those species have the capacity to reproduce and make more copies of themselves. But if the human species ever became extinct like the ''Dodo'' did, then that's what I would imagine death to mean. The meaning of 'Death' for me, applies to the death of a certain species when that species is no longer in existence due to extinction. But that's just my idea, doesn't mean that it's fact or true.

Yes, that's an exact analogy of what I was thinking.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Fri Mar 19, 2021 7:32 pmOkay, good.

Well, it is an interesting problem, isn't it? How is it that the "me," if "me" is everything, can lack knowledge?

Who else is there to be knowing stuff?

And maybe we also ask ourselves, why do you and I have a very strong intuition that there must be Something Else that does not lack the knowledge of what's going on here?

Yes, something definitely knows something here. And this knowing seems to be beyond the comprehension of a thinking species like the human being. Dolphins for example have altogether another completely unique set of dna instructions that form a totally different intelligence to the human being.

I'm not sure why humans seek meaning and purpose, whereas as far as I know, I do not think intelligent creatures like Dolphins seek meaning and purpose to their lives.

But for humans, it's a different intelligence, they want their lives to have meaning and purpose, even knowing all that will be taken from them at their inevitable death.

Here are some interesting quotes to ponder.

'' For life in the present there is no death. Death is not an event in life. It is not a fact in the world. '' ( Wittgenstein )

'' Only the man who no longer fears death has ceased to be a slave '' ( Montaigene )

I do not personally care about dying, because I have come to realise that my deeper essence is of the eternal. Now the question is, where does that realisation knowing come from, it has to be innately known.

That's why I think the ideas of ''firsts'' and ''lasts'' and ''come froms'' cannot be answered, because there is only here the eternal infinite knowing itself infinitely for eternity. < < but the one who knows it is born and will die would not be able to make sense of it's eternal essence, well not until it is realised. .and it is realised because I think the universe had every intention of becoming a self-aware universe.

Dontaskme wrote: ↑Sat Mar 20, 2021 11:20 am

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Fri Mar 19, 2021 7:32 pmOkay...but then you've still got a problem. Where did life itself come from?

I think that's why the nondualists speak about that question of ''come from'' as a mystery that cannot be known, that's what they mean by life is a mystery.

But once again, that would just be a "punt to mystery," which we have already seen is illegitimate. If they are dogmatic that "life only comes from life," then they need a "life-source" that produced the first life.

Nonduality points to an infinite supply of 'energy' that's always existed, and this energy is neither living nor dead, and that it just is,

If this "eternal source of infinite energy" is personal, then it's God. If it's impersonal, then there is no explaining why it ever produced anything, since impersonal agents have no volition whatsoever. It couldn't plan, design, want or create anything at all, ever.

..electricty alive, is it dead. It's known to be dynamic.

Electricity is not dynamic unless it's housed in a designed system of some kind, one that has its own dynamics. Otherwise, it's utterly inert. It never 'wants" to do anything or go anywhere...far less to create things.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Fri Mar 19, 2021 7:32 pmThe Materialist view has to be that it came (somehow, though they cannot explain it) from non-living materials. (Then, of course, they have the recessive problem of the origin of the materials as well, but let's leave that for a moment.) But how do you explain the first life?

I cannot explain anything like that. All I know is that there was something before I personally popped aware, and that same something will be there, after I'm not there anymore.
Revelation 1:8
"I am the Alpha and the Omega," says the Lord God, "who is and who was and who is to come, the Almighty."

That's the right answer, I think. However, the "I" there is, of course, God, not me.

So then that got me thinking about how the idea of death is a mystery, that no one can know.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Fri Mar 19, 2021 7:32 pmWell, is death the end? That's a fundamental question. The Materialist will have to say "Yes," since the materials are gone, dispersed into the universe, and the materials are the cause and totality of the entity known as a human being. But what do you say?

What I think death is, ..... I think death is another word for 'extinction',

Okay, but I don't mean "species death." I mean "your death," and "my death." What do you think they are?

Yes, something definitely knows something here. And this knowing seems to be beyond the comprehension of a thinking species like the human being. Dolphins for example have altogether another completely unique set of dna instructions that form a totally different intelligence to the human being. I'm not sure why humans seek meaning and purpose, whereas as far as I know, I do not think intelligent creatures like Dolphins seek meaning and purpose to their lives.

Right. And they have no culture. Nor do chimps. You can be certain, because even if they only had 1/1,000,000,000th of our ability to produce philosophy or other cultural forms, given the billions of years attributed to the history of the earth, there ought to be clear evidence of it by now...impressive evidence, in fact. We ought to have chimp or dolphin treatises, or cities, or art galleries, or something, because they've certainly had enough time to foreground whatever minuscule contribution to thought they are capable of making, given the billions of years.

So we are the only creatures seeking meaning. We're the only ones that produce culture. We're the only ones that have systematic ethics. And so on. That's a very interesting fact; whatever "Something" is behind this universe, it has made us different from the animals.

I do not personally care about dying, because I have come to realise that my deeper essence is of the eternal. Now the question is, where does that realisation knowing come from, it has to be innately known.

If it were, would not everybody automatically know it?

I think the universe had every intention of becoming a self-aware universe.

Well, think about that claim, though.

"The universe," before it had "become self-aware," had an "intention," you say? How does that make sense? You're going to have to explain how something that was not-yet-personal could decide, without a brain or volition yet, to become aware of itself.

I can't even make that sentence add up.

I think that's why the nondualists speak about that question of ''come from'' as a mystery that cannot be known, that's what they mean by life is a mystery.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Sat Mar 20, 2021 2:56 pmBut once again, that would just be a "punt to mystery," which we have already seen is illegitimate. If they are dogmatic that "life only comes from life," then they need a "life-source" that produced the first life.

Maybe the source of life cannot be know until a self-awareness emerges. Then the only source known would be found in it's own self evidence, in the sense that there is an awareness of I AM so I must be my own source.

So how is a 'consciousness' a self-aware entity, aware of an apparent subject and object divide? Science still does not know the answer to that fundamental question. That's the mystery. The self-evident fact that there is self-awareness in the first place must indicate that God intended for this to happen, where the universe becomes self-aware of a subject and object division through knowledge.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Sat Mar 20, 2021 2:56 pm"The universe," before it had "become self-aware," had an "intention," you say? How does that make sense? You're going to have to explain how something that was not-yet-personal could decide, without a brain or volition yet, to become aware of itself.

When I talk about the universe, I'm talking about the totality of all that is. The absolute.
That's the mystery there again isn't it? HOW DOES the totality have the intention to be self-aware, it just does, simply because self-awareness is happening. So what made it happen? is that a mystery or was it a planned intention all along?


.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Sat Mar 20, 2021 2:56 pm Okay, but I don't mean "species death." I mean "your death," and "my death." What do you think they are?

'your death' and 'my death'...just points to a 'species' that goes by the label 'human'.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Sat Mar 20, 2021 2:56 pmRight. And they have no culture. Nor do chimps. You can be certain, because even if they only had 1/1,000,000,000th of our ability to produce philosophy or other cultural forms, given the billions of years attributed to the history of the earth, there ought to be clear evidence of it by now...impressive evidence, in fact. We ought to have chimp or dolphin treatises, or cities, or art galleries, or something, because they've certainly had enough time to foreground whatever minuscule contribution to thought they are capable of making, given the billions of years.

So we are the only creatures seeking meaning. We're the only ones that produce culture. We're the only ones that have systematic ethics. And so on. That's a very interesting fact; whatever "Something" is behind this universe, it has made us different from the animals.

Yes I agree with everything you have said there. But the human brain got very large, it seems to have a more complicated, sophisticated and higher intelligence that knows pain is bad and suffering is worse, and that in that knowing, it can do something to fix it, and make life more bearable and better for ourselves. We are able to discover purpose and meaning when we can create the kind of world we ideally would love to live in and be happy and at peace with.

I do not personally care about dying, because I have come to realise that my deeper essence is of the eternal. Now the question is, where does that realisation knowing come from, it has to be innately known.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Sat Mar 20, 2021 2:56 pmIf it were, would not everybody automatically know it?

Everybody can know it, if one person can know their eternal nature, then so can everyone else, maybe only when that realisation evolves in them, will they become self-realised, maybe until that self-realisation happens, the realisation is just lying dormat in a latent sort of way.

.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Sat Mar 20, 2021 2:56 pm
If this "eternal source of infinite energy" is personal, then it's God. If it's impersonal, then there is no explaining why it ever produced anything, since impersonal agents have no volition whatsoever. It couldn't plan, design, want or create anything at all, ever.

It's both, impersonal and personal. It's the formless form. It's the pure embodiment of God combined as flesh and spirit, which is just another terminology for formless form.

..electricty alive, is it dead. It's known to be dynamic.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Sat Mar 20, 2021 2:56 pmElectricity is not dynamic unless it's housed in a designed system of some kind, one that has its own dynamics. Otherwise, it's utterly inert. It never 'wants" to do anything or go anywhere...far less to create things.

I understand what you mean.

Maybe the house it uses is the body...the material world being God's body.

Dontaskme wrote: ↑Sat Mar 20, 2021 4:04 pm

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Sat Mar 20, 2021 2:56 pm Okay, but I don't mean "species death." I mean "your death," and "my death." What do you think they are?

'your death' and 'my death'...just points to a 'species' that goes by the label 'human'.

That doesn't make sense. The whole species doesn't die just because one person does.

But the human brain got very large, it seems to have a more complicated, sophisticated and higher intelligence that knows pain is bad and suffering is worse, and that in that knowing, it can do something to fix it, and make life more bearable and better for ourselves. We are able to discover purpose and meaning when we can create the kind of world we ideally would love to live in and be happy and at peace with.

That begs a question, though...why do animals have no culture, no moral development, no search for meaning in their entire billions of years history, even though some have big brains, and some have small.

It's clearly more than a mere quantitative difference, as in "our brains are bigger"; it's a profound qualitative difference, as in "we do some things they have absolutely no awareness of, or ability to do."

I do not personally care about dying, because I have come to realise that my deeper essence is of the eternal. Now the question is, where does that realisation knowing come from, it has to be innately known.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Sat Mar 20, 2021 2:56 pmIf it were, would not everybody automatically know it?

Everybody can know it,

But they don't. So it's not innate. If it were innate, everybody would have it automatically. But, while you and I have it, there are many people who do not, so far as we can detect, and who say they have no realization of it at all.

So either they're lying, or it's not innate at all.

Dontaskme wrote: ↑Sat Mar 20, 2021 4:14 pm

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Sat Mar 20, 2021 2:56 pm
If this "eternal source of infinite energy" is personal, then it's God. If it's impersonal, then there is no explaining why it ever produced anything, since impersonal agents have no volition whatsoever. It couldn't plan, design, want or create anything at all, ever.

It's both, impersonal and personal.

Impossible.

If a thing is even a little bit "personal," then, by definition, it's not "impersonal." That's a true dichotomy, because the one is an absolute denial of the other. So which is it?

If the answer is that it can have volition, plans, intentions, designs, and so forth, then it's personal, not impersonal. If it's impersonal, it can have no such things.

Maybe the house it uses is the body...the material world being God's body.

Then you have dualism. God is one thing, and "God's body" is the physical world. And you say, maybe He only "uses" the world for his "body." Dualism again.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Sat Mar 20, 2021 5:15 pm
That doesn't make sense. The whole species doesn't die just because one person does.
Okay, but I don't mean "species death." I mean "your death," and "my death." What do you think they are?

Death to me, and this is just my personal opinion, you do not have to agree with it. It means something that once existed as a form, but is no longer existing in that form because it's extinct. So to answer your original question I've underlined above. I think when people die, which they obviously do, their materials are ground up by the earth, and then absorbed back into their original and fundamental constitutional elements - but I'm not sure of anything else happening or going on beyond that simple biological understanding... I personally believe God is neither dead nor alive, in the same contextual understanding that points to all material matter, including the invisibles like gravity, wind, the oxygen we breathe, the sky, the space around the earth, all these things that make up the functioning of life are neither alive or dead...they are all just one unitary functioning appearing as the multitudes of many parts.
Anyways, I can only think the way I do, I'm not saying what I think is absolutely RIGHT and TRUE ...I'm saying it's just the way I see everything working. Obviously there are going to be other thinking minds that have their own way of seeing things that will be nothing like the way I see thing. So all I'm doing is putting it out there. No one else is obliged to believe or agree. We've all got our own unique visions, and I know mine can be all over the place, I'm aware it is constantly changing when new data comes streaming into my thought stream. I do my own inner science, but that doesn't mean I reject proper learned scientists and all their hard work, no, I have a deep respect for all the knowledge and discoveries they have brought to light.

But the human brain got very large, it seems to have a more complicated, sophisticated and higher intelligence that knows pain is bad and suffering is worse, and that in that knowing, it can do something to fix it, and make life more bearable and better for ourselves. We are able to discover purpose and meaning when we can create the kind of world we ideally would love to live in and be happy and at peace with.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Sat Mar 20, 2021 5:15 pmThat begs a question, though...why do animals have no culture, no moral development, no search for meaning in their entire billions of years history, even though some have big brains, and some have small.
It's clearly more than a mere quantitative difference, as in "our brains are bigger"; it's a profound qualitative difference, as in "we do some things they have absolutely no awareness of, or ability to do."

It does beg a very big question...WHY are we so different, why do we yearn for a God, and is that yearning an illusion, or is it a real bonafide intention of the universe. I just find it preposterous to imagine that a planet like earth and all it's diversity was a random event.

I do not personally care about dying, because I have come to realise that my deeper essence is of the eternal. Now the question is, where does that realisation knowing come from, it has to be innately known.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Sat Mar 20, 2021 2:56 pmBut they don't. So it's not innate. If it were innate, everybody would have it automatically. But, while you and I have it, there are many people who do not, so far as we can detect, and who say they have no realization of it at all.

So either they're lying, or it's not innate at all.

I believe, if someone like you and I can know it, then every human can know it. If the seed of thought is within just one single human being, then it's in all of them...except for some, that seed has not yet been fertilised ...

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Sat Mar 20, 2021 5:19 pm

Dontaskme wrote: ↑Sat Mar 20, 2021 4:14 pm

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Sat Mar 20, 2021 2:56 pm
If this "eternal source of infinite energy" is personal, then it's God. If it's impersonal, then there is no explaining why it ever produced anything, since impersonal agents have no volition whatsoever. It couldn't plan, design, want or create anything at all, ever.

It's both, impersonal and personal.

Impossible.

If a thing is even a little bit "personal," then, by definition, it's not "impersonal." That's a true dichotomy, because the one is an absolute denial of the other. So which is it?

If the answer is that it can have volition, plans, intentions, designs, and so forth, then it's personal, not impersonal. If it's impersonal, it can have no such things.

Maybe the house it uses is the body...the material world being God's body.

Then you have dualism. God is one thing, and "God's body" is the physical world. And you say, maybe He only "uses" the world for his "body." Dualism again.

Dualism is in the dream, in God's mind. The dream is all that is known conceptually as the body of God.
God is the impersonal impersonating as and through every dream character...and that descriptive, is my nondual understanding, that you might not agree with, but it's the only answer I've got to your response.

Nature is the most perfect way to observe the impersonal, when there is no 'I' nothing is impersonal as in nature. The 'I Am' that is known conceptually is in the dream and the dream is already couched within Nature, or God, or whatever you want to call the beloved.

Dontaskme wrote: ↑Sun Mar 21, 2021 8:26 am It does beg a very big question...WHY are we so different, why do we yearn for a God, and is that yearning an illusion, or is it a real bonafide intention of the universe. I just find it preposterous to imagine that a planet like earth and all it's diversity was a random event.

As do I.

I'm always amazed when I hear an Atheist say, "There's no evidence..." I look around me, and I see that the evidence on every side draws one to the conclusion they don't want you to make. And when I look within, at myself, I find even more evidence of design, purpose and intention. And they say, "There's no evidence"?

A few are more aware. Even Dawkins (for whose views I have little sympathy) freely confesses that “... when you consider the beauty of the world and you wonder how it came to be what it is, you are naturally overwhelmed with a feeling of awe, a feeling of admiration and you almost feel a desire to worship something. I feel this, I recognise that other scientists such as Carl Sagan feel this, Einstein felt it. We, all of us, share a kind of religious reverence for the beauties of the universe, for the complexity of life. For the sheer magnitude of the cosmos, the sheer magnitude of geological time. And it’s tempting to translate that feeling of awe and worship into a desire to worship some particular thing, a person, an agent. You want to attribute it to a maker, to a creator..."

Nevertheless, Dawkins insists one must resist the evidence on this point, and force oneself to believe that which is not so obvious.

I believe, if someone like you and I can know it, then every human can know it

Oh, that that CAN know it, sure. But if it's innate, then they would have, on some level, no choice BUT to know it.

If the seed of thought is within just one single human being, then it's in all of them...except for some, that seed has not yet been fertilised ...

What if we all do have an innate sense of God, but there are some who simply refuse to listen to it? Is that a possibility as well?

Dontaskme wrote: ↑Sun Mar 21, 2021 8:48 am ...The dream is all that is known ...

But wait: if something "is known," as you say, then you have two things again, the "knower" and "what she knows." That's at least dualism again.

Then there would be the question of what it is that generates the "known" that the "knower knows," since it cannot be the "knower" herself, for if it were, she would already "know" it...so now we've got three...

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Fri Mar 19, 2021 7:46 pmDid you ever read what C.S. Lewis wrote about his own early experiences as a devout Atheist, in the days before he became a Christian? This is what he said:

“I was at this time living, like so many Atheists or Antitheists, in a whirl of contradictions. I maintained that God did not exist. I was also very angry with God for not existing. I was equally angry with Him for creating a world.”

Sorry mannie, I forgot about this question, I remember reading it, but just forgot to respond, so here goes...

I haven't read anything from C.S. Lewis, although I know him to be a British Author.. but I do wholly resonate with that quote, for sure, I've felt the same many times, still do. I actually think he hits the nail right on the head there, so true.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Sun Mar 21, 2021 1:48 pm

Dontaskme wrote: ↑Sun Mar 21, 2021 8:48 am ...The dream is all that is known ...

But wait: if something "is known," as you say, then you have two things again, the "knower" and "what she knows." That's at least dualism again.

Then there would be the question of what it is that generates the "known" that the "knower knows," since it cannot be the "knower" herself, for if it were, she would already "know" it...so now we've got three...

Hmm,

Now stop it, you are making me think too hard now, that's good though, I like that your responses force me to think really hard.

I'll come back to this.