Any ideas on why it is so clear to you and yet comes across so vague, confused and/or conflicting for pretty much anyone else?
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God Is a Problem
- Thread starter SalixIncendium
- Start date
"believers" is too broad a term. Christian mystics (St. Francis of Assisi), Jewish Kaballists (the Baal Shem Tov), Islamic sufis (Rumi, Hafiz), groups of Hindus (Ramana Maharshi, Papaji, Ramakrishna, Tibetan Buddist (Milirepa), Native American (followers of the "red road") and many others dedicated their lives to attaining that knowledge.
siti
Well-Known Member
As far as I am aware any "concept" is human-created for human purposes (can you name any non-human concepts?), but that apart...does being a more (or less) explicitly human concept make something more (or less) important for humans to investigate? Apart from "nature" and "reality" (perhaps), can you think of any concept that has been more pervasive in human culture or more expansive in its reach than the concept of "God" or "deity"?
siti
Well-Known Member
That second sentence sounds like another way of saying "finding common ground"...is that a bad thing?
But I really can't accept the notion that people choose to use the word "god" for the purposes of deliberate obfuscation. Its just a generic term for a variety of concepts of deity that allows people to talk about deity even when they don't mean the same thing by it. But that has evolved as a feature of language. The term, being, as it is, a generic one, is necessarily vague, but why is the use of a vague generic term a particular problem? Is the term "mathematics" a problem because it does not in itself identify which particular branch of mathematics it refers in a particular context or discussion? If I am discussing algebra, would it be wrong for me to say I'm talking about mathematics? So why is it a problem to say I'm talking about "God" when I am discussing "Allah" or "Yahweh" or a pantheistic version of deity...or whatever?
Colt
Well-Known Member
No, I have no idea why you are the ONLY person I have ever encountered that doesn’t know what the term means. Have you consulted a dictionary?
god
1 of 2noun
ˈgädalso ˈgȯd
plural gods
Synonyms of god
1
God : the supreme or ultimate reality: such as
a
: the Being perfect in power, wisdom, and goodness who is worshipped (as in Judaism, Christianity, Islam, and Hinduism) as creator and ruler of the universe
Throughout the patristic and medievalperiods, Christian theologians taught that God created the universe …—Jame Schaefer
… the Supreme Being or God, the personal form of the Ultimate Reality, is conceived by Hindus as having various aspects.—Sunita Pant Bansal
b
Christian Science : the incorporeal divine Principle ruling over all as eternal Spirit : infinite Mind
2
or less commonly God : a being or object that is worshipped as having more than natural attributes and powers
specifically : one controlling a particular aspect or part of reality
Greek gods of love and war
3
: a person or thing of supreme value
had photos of baseball's gods pinned to his bedroom wall
4
: a powerful ruler
Hollywood gods that control our movies' fates
Oh yes.
I think that "reality" and "nature" are at least tentatively more self-sustaining as concepts go than "god" or "deity" could ever be.
Reality and nature do not require observers and can be meaningfuly investigated and researched precisely because they are not human creations.
That is in sharp contrast to gods, deities and similar concepts, because those require worshippers, believers and/or theologians of some sort to exist in any practical form.
It could be used that way as a first step towards some form of dialogue, I suppose. But that is not what usually happens.
Attempting to camouflage meaningful divergence behind concepts of deity is definitely awful!
It is a very bad thing when that common ground is fictional or, worse, a mirage of convergence where there is actually mismatch of values and expectations and people just go on pretending otherwise or even actively attempting to convince themselves of what is ultimately a lie.
That is disrespectful towards the adherents, as well as destructive to their moral and religious abilities.
That is very, very Abrahamic, meaning that a huge percentage of humankind has no real use for that.
Heyo
Veteran Member
Nope. That would be the question of an atheist. I'm only secondary interested in evidence (if "god" turns out to be real) or proof (if "god" turns out to be ideal) and primarily interested in an agreed upon definition. And it is incumbent on the believers to provide that definition, as they insist that such an entity exist. And when two believers insist that such an entity exists, they better make sure they are talking about the same thing.
I have to guess that you had not much interest in knowing whether people knew what you meant.
A common enough mistake, but not one that I take lightly.
siti
Well-Known Member
How on God's green earth can a concept be "self-sustaining"?
Reality and nature can be investigated at all ONLY because there are observers...despite our profound faith in the mind-independent physical realism (a philosophical position not an observed reality) that underpins all scientific investigation, we can no more be sure that "reality" actually exists beyond our (individual) human perceptions than we can that there exists (or does not exist) a supernatural reality that created it. The whole shebang (including this conversation and the computer screen you are viewing it on) could be a figment of your own disembodied mind for all you truly know.
Concepts do not require anything save a mind to conceive of them. In any case, you are using a somewhat narrowed concept of deity ...they don't all require worship(pers), believers or theologians... some (such as the deistic concept of deity, require none of those things).
Aupmanyav
Be your own guru
I am a long-time member of IIDB and Secular Cafe (2006), but the current avatara (back as IIDB) is quite uninteresting.
Heyo
Veteran Member
Do you think that helps me when I hear someone talking about "god"?
Do you think that every believer could identify their concept of god in that list?
Do you think that monotheists would agree that there are many gods?
I don't know about that place, but reality and nature do not require validation.
Gods, if they are to be meaningfully spoken about, must be described, given some form of meaning by people with some sort of ability to abstract.
There is quite a difference there.
Fair enough. Solipsism is an idea that exists. It may even be accurate to reality.
But for gods/deities there is no other option.
Deism is a human invention, you know.
Widening deities any more than I do makes then utterly meaningless, IMO.
siti
Well-Known Member
And what level of agreement would satisfy? A simple majority of professed believers? Two thirds? Or just the two you mentioned? To reuse my earlier illustration, would you deny the validity of a discussion about some branch of mathematics because the participants did not exactly agree on the definition of the term "mathematics"?
siti
Well-Known Member
You don't know that...
...or that...
...or that...
All concepts are human inventions...didn't I just say that?
You widen deities? Is that your day job or is it just a hobby? But seriously, I haven't "widened" anything..."God" and "deity" are generic terms (didn't I just say that too?)...they are meant (linguistically, not theologically) to be "wide".
And frankly, to reject all concepts of deity out of hand because "believers" can't agree on a definition that satisfies some arbitrary standard of broadness over specificity (or vice versa) is just intellectual bone idleness - IMO.
If you are not interested in the subject just say "I'm not interested" and if you're ignorant of the subject and happy to remain so just say "I dunno"...but I really don't get why there has to be a plethora of vaguely intelligent-sounding words (to wit - ignostic, igtheist, agnostic strong, weak, Militant...?, apatheist...) that have to be introduced to show that people don't know and don't care about a discussion they nevertheless keep on returning to.
From this discussion so far, I don't think its the believers that have definitional troubles...there seem to be far more varieties of not believing and not caring! And it also seems like the non-believers are the ones in need of affirmation.
For the record, I don't believe (at least not in any of the "off the peg" versions of deity that are available)...but I do care...I think the broad subject of "God" deserves attention and investigation even if it all turns out to be a giant hoax (why would humans foist a non-existent "God" on themselves? Did it confer some survival advantage? Was it merely for the purposes of exploitation - or was it for the protection of the group? And if we have so successfully deluded ourselves about this for about 10K years (at least), what else are we fooling ourselves about?) But I'm certainly not in need of affirmation and I don't feel the need for a label to affix to my lack of my belief.
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I do know that I have no duty to feel responsible in defining reality and nature, @siti
Gods are something else entirely (or fail to be, anyway).
There just isn't anything resembling a core meaning to the word as it stands in common usage now. And that makes it considerably less than useless, frankly.
Gods are something else entirely (or fail to be, anyway).
There just isn't anything resembling a core meaning to the word as it stands in common usage now. And that makes it considerably less than useless, frankly.
Great question.
the intent to continue: Life.
Once started a life 'intends' to survive. Even if requiring an evolution/change.
That is a key process, to comprehend an ongoing (surviving) system.
the living survives, the method of describing them are often suspect. What is super, is the natural perspective.
Do you actually believe that?
Makes perfect sense when observed.
siti
Well-Known Member
But you do define them both implicitly when you discuss them with your own particular view of them in mind. And that's exactly what people who are happy to discuss the concept of God do (whether they are believers or not). Nobody would attempt to force you into defining what you mean by "reality" or suggest that unless you can provide a definition that everyone can agree on, there is no point even discussing the subject.
And yet here you still are posting what - maybe a dozen posts - in a discussion in which you personally have used no less than three neologisms (namely, apatheist, ignostic and igtheist) to describe your lack of knowledge and lack of interest in a concept that you believe to be "considerably less than useless"!
siti
Well-Known Member
Honestly, what difference does it make what I believe? Does someone else believing something make it either more or less rational for me or you to believe it?
What I stated is a fact - reality-as-we-perceive-it is exactly that - a human perception...we truthfully have no way of knowing for sure whether there is really anything more to it than that perception...but for all practical intents and purposes, it makes no difference because even if our entire existence is illusory...we are certainly experiencing it and its a pretty convincing one and whatever it is its the only existence we have access to presently so we are pretty much obliged to go along with it - or take the opt-out clause - but that's not for me - I'm quite enjoying the illusion - if that's what it is - so far.
For the record, although I freely admit that I don't really know whether reality is really real - and probably never will - I do not feel the need to label myself as an "igrealist" or something...and I'm certainly not inclined to reject any discussion of it because we don't all agree on some definition of what reality is...I'm happy just to say "I don't know" and carry on investigating. Ditto with the question of the existence/nature of "God" (if there is one).
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