We are arguing from guiding principles here.
Often the principles on either side of the abortion debate are not that bad, its just they can be (wrongly) treated as absolutely certain axioms where in real life they're more like fuzzy axioms, 80% or 90% valid and useful.
Recognising this, we...
Infinity is not a number (say, after 1 million and 1, then infinity), and eternity is not a duration (say after 1000 years in hell you reach eternity - likewise that's false).
All there can ever be is more and more finite punishment.
Firstly thanks, crackpots usually get ignored.
I have discovered the meaning of life. Ill try and make it interfaith, though I ought to have posted in philosophy.
People of all faiths usually say "mine is the right way" and "yours is the wrong way".
But here is an essence to this.
Mine...
For me philosophically its about rational attraction to being. Personally I like natural beauty for starters, and so I'm attracted to being via that, just as I am a tidy home. I "bond" to existence more closely in comfort than in flight.
Also in terms of creatures, its good to promote caring...
The argument:
For there to be life there must be health.
Health comes on a continuum (from 0 health i.e. dead to 1 maximal flourishing).
It is ontologiclly preferable to be in "better health" than "worse health".
Therefore it is rational (morally appropriate and fitting) to choose health...
I was atheist for a day or two some years ago, and instantly started harping on about how illogical religion was, and how rational atheism was. Either its culture, or a in-wired part of the atheist mind set.
I don't think there is a generic "it" type of thing which causes such attribution as "God" something or other. Like in science, technically isolating a variable - that's not the way.
Rather theism is a mind-set, a priori approaching the world in a certain way with selective attention*, and all...
I am imagining a town called "faith town" and a sign saying "God this way". Faith is the key to the city gates.
Theology is not always Greek style, i.e. rationalistic, sometimes its an experience of religion as a person journeying through existence through the means of a religious life...
And...
Or, being ideal and perfect, its an expression of optimism to believe - as it would be preferable if God did exist. This is the psychological correlate of the famous ontological argument.
Gods love is only one of His attributes, and also God loves only those who believe and do good. So Hiroshima is not really (afaict) an expression of "Thy will be done" spirituality, and therefore not going to merit His pleasure or liking.
Religion is a type of glue to the universe. There will be similarities, due to structural limits. I think the soul, if we have a dehumanisation circuit in the brain ("he's an animal, a reptile...") then there has to be an alternative circuit to engage normally.
When I meditate, and imagine a "bond" or "link" to the universe, like a rope or something, or even the more sci fi and abstract ( I enjoy silvery etheric light), as an analogy for the whole process...I get absorbed in trance more deeply....
More on structural coupling f you've not read Capras great book:
"A living system couples to its environment structurally, i.e. through recurrent interactions, each of which triggers structural changes in the system. A cell membrane continually incorporates substances from its environment into...
Good point. Capras idea is theoretical biology, we are "linked" up to our environment like a train carriage to another. There are many wonderful gurus today, as people seek to replace Christianity I think. Basically my point is looking at cognitive archeology of the roots of the words for...
I think we have a theism transform in the brain, programmable too, so there is a basic structural unit, and cultural input to boot. Making much of the time for all kinds of cool feeling zappy hogwash.