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Evidence for an imaginary friend
- Thread starter Spiderman
- Start date
In my book, imaginary (friend or otherwise) =/= not real, but setting that aside...
Considering many of my gods are physically tangible things that indisputably exist to even the staunch substance materialists of our generation? And the rest of them are to my mind equally obvious abstract principles that impact our day to day lives? Asking for evidence (however defined) is at best a rhetorical question to me and at worst a stupid one. In polytheistic traditions like mine, your question translates into stuff like "what evidence can you provide that the river is not an imaginary friend?" and "what evidence can you provide that learning is not an imaginary friend?" It's just nonsense.
Considering many of my gods are physically tangible things that indisputably exist to even the staunch substance materialists of our generation? And the rest of them are to my mind equally obvious abstract principles that impact our day to day lives? Asking for evidence (however defined) is at best a rhetorical question to me and at worst a stupid one. In polytheistic traditions like mine, your question translates into stuff like "what evidence can you provide that the river is not an imaginary friend?" and "what evidence can you provide that learning is not an imaginary friend?" It's just nonsense.
This.
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Unveiled Artist
Veteran Member
Well, our beliefs and conclusions in life do come from the mind. I wouldn't say imagination, though. Sometimes you can be so personally attached to a concept it "comes alive."
Like I believe aunt is hanging around
I read books and websites of people who experience the same thing
I talk to people who believe in spirits
Based on prior knowledge I conclude the experiences I have come from my aunt
No one has yet challenged my thinking
Therefore, my aunt actually exists.
Confirmed bias.
This is an example, but I wouldn't say the above is imaginary just people have such fear of death and no purpose they drop their (edit) guard eventually and trust a personified part of life, say love, and interact with it. Imaginary, no. But there are TONS of evidence that supports deities being mind created. You can tell it is when a person gets defensive when challenging their own illusions (lack of better word).
Can we pick our own deity?
Like my deity could be a rock.
Here's a video of my God crushing a skull.
Crushing is the power of my deity.
Deity is such an ambiguous term.
Maybe you should try a specific God, like prove the God of Abraham, Jewish, Muslim, Christian God is not an imaginary friend.
Geoff-Allen
Resident megalomaniac
I thought YOU were my imaginary friend!
Geoff-Allen
Resident megalomaniac
Spiderman
Veteran Member
Well, since your Gods can be seen and touched, you can provide all the evidence that they are not imaginary and do indeed exist outside of your mind.
Many people have deities that cannot be seen or touched.
A lot of the things I deify can't be seen or touched either too, though. Yet it's also common sense that these things exist, to most folks. I also get the impression a lot of folks have a poor understanding of theology in general, but especially in the context of non-Abrahamic theisms. Sometimes I'm just left wondering where folks left their education in approaching literature that I know everyone gets at least something of in public schooling. Do so many folks really blank out on what literary devices are and that these are copiously abundant in religious mythos as it's a way to try and wrap our minds around the greater than and numinous? It seems that way sometimes.
Spiderman
Veteran Member
It seems to me that your deities have thorough provable evidence for existing. Am I mistaken in assuming that? I don't claim to be educated about your spirituality or mysticism. It seems a bit unconventional when compared to so many other spiritualities.A lot of the things I deify can't be seen or touched either too, though. Yet it's also common sense that these things exist, to most folks. I also get the impression a lot of folks have a poor understanding of theology in general, but especially in the context of non-Abrahamic theisms. Sometimes I'm just left wondering where folks left their education in approaching literature that I know everyone gets at least something of in public schooling. Do so many folks really blank out on what literary devices are and that these are copiously abundant in religious mythos as it's a way to try and wrap our minds around the greater than and numinous? It seems that way sometimes.
No, you've got the core of it. That said, as is always the case for "evidence" and "existing," one's mileage may vary. Folks put all sorts of caveats and demands on those two things to make it so their own worldview is validated and others are invalidated. In the end, whether or not a particular thing "exists" or has "evidence" for it is a philosophical exercise and a construct that basically tells us what our own worldview is, not so much what "the truth" of the matter is. It's very common to see folks negate my own perspectives, for example, by insisting my gods aren't gods. For the monotheists, they reject any gods that aren't theirs as "real gods" and the materialists generally don't understand the point of deifying things that to them, are "mundane." Those are all fair objections, honestly.
The sort of animistic/polytheistic/pantheistic perspectives I hold were quite conventional (that is, the cultural norm in the West) until the monotheist hegemony came about. Those perspectives were systematically subverted and eradicated over several hundred years, and now we are in a culture where what was once the norm is called "unconventional." It is what it is, I guess. Change is perhaps the one fundamental constant of the universe.