Desert Snake
Veteran Member
That's fine, we do the same with other concepts. I do the same thing, it's how we get around to communicating an idea as well as possible.
-
Welcome to Religious Forums, a friendly forum to discuss all religions in a friendly surrounding.
Your voice is missing! You will need to register to get access to the following site features:- Reply to discussions and create your own threads.
- Our modern chat room. No add-ons or extensions required, just login and start chatting!
- Access to private conversations with other members.
We hope to see you as a part of our community soon!
God's Will as the Sum of Total Parts?
- Thread starter The Sum of Awe
- Start date
That's fine, we do the same with other concepts. I do the same thing, it's how we get around to communicating an idea as well as possible.
All things that make up it never remain in their same state forever.
Useless might not have been the right word. It's tough to explain, so I hope this example works well: An animal is born and does X (its purpose exposed by the outcome of its life), and once that purpose is fulfilled it dies of natural causes (and the natural causes that caused its end is the sum of all other purposes in existence that led up to this event). It becomes a different thing, a corpse, and with becoming a new thing it has a new purpose: being food for another animal, or else decaying and its decay will effect other environment around it, perhaps cause or support the growth of another plant which has its cycle of purposes too. But if turned too food, it will turn into energy which will then have the purpose of supporting the being it energized, etc. etc.
Hope that makes sense
I have no idea what the universe seeks, or if it seeks anything specific at all. It is similar to asking a human what result we want as a result from what our cells do in our body - it's usually not thought about and it's not under our control, it's just a natural occurrence happening inside the body that happens to support our body.
What I meant by use: The things that made up X will eventually ditch the body after the body is no longer in use, and by natural causes they will be put to use for building yet another body.
That's not a bad way to say what I mean by useful and useless, but I think it leaves something important out: the useless is the entity that has already served its purpose, and the useful is the entity presently serving its purpose. Once this entity cannot go on, then there is no more purpose of it, and the atoms its composed of eventually become used for another entity.
Thanks, most people would never let me get by with that one
Only for lack of a better word. Though I have no idea why I said threaten. I think I probably meant "threaten" as in they prevent the existence of what could be.
Think of it this way - if something cannot go on and it becomes purposeless from then on, and if natural causes did not occur to reuse parts of this purposeless object in order to create new ones with a purpose of their own, the universe would lack an energy source, making it take an extremely long time to generate other entities. Not only that, but the universe would be packed with things that do not interact with other parts of it, and thus change wouldn't exist and creation would not only be slowed, but probably very rare, considering it would have to be composed of its own "atoms" (once again only meant to mean the smallest unit that makes up all things). Perhaps creation wouldn't even happen at all; because if all events are chain reactions of other events, and the universe is made up of more useless things than useful things, there'd be very little interaction with other things, and thus nothing to influence the creation of another entity.
These goals and intentions don't have to be conscious ones, they are simply the outcomes that were determined to be by all existing forces in the universe.
Conscious or not, everything in the universe is interdependent and acts in a way that there's a specific outcome to be reached, but like I said, it doesn't have to be aware of doing it.
I don't think we should believe that unless it helps the person sleep at night. I'm only implying that there is a spark of life in the universe, like a fire in a lantern, and that is part of what makes up its being and personality.
That's totally fine, I'm not looking to convince other people. It's true that it really doesn't matter if the universe acts as a body. I personally feel a strong relationship between nature and I, and by nature I'm not talking just trees and plants etc, I'm talking about reality as a whole. From my experiences and from what I know (and not to forget to include what I think I know), I am confident in viewing reality as one giant organism where the things that make it up interact with each other in such a way that causes short term outcomes that will lead to long term outcomes. Everything influences each other which create the way the universe acts, determines happenings, and make the universe the way it is.
Just to note in order for us to keep in mind what I mean when I say these words:
Useful - Something currently acting. Its actions affect all other things, it contributes to how things currently are and how they will be.
Useless - Something no longer acting. Does not take any actions and so its existence doesn't affect anything else. The useless are destroyed when they become useless, or better yet the useless become useless by being destroyed, so the useless practically is nonexistent, but they do exist in theory.
Purpose - A purpose is the outcome of an entity's actions. A short-term purpose would simply be an outcome influenced by one entity's behavior, while a long-term purpose is the outcome influenced by the sum of all behavior in the universe. The purpose is not inherent, simply determined by the purpose of other actions. Purposes may or may not be done consciously.
Threat - Theoretical. A useless entity would be a threat, because it would prevent the recycling of its parts, and thus preventing anything else to generate from it.
Desert Snake
Veteran Member
Sum of Awe
Did your OP explain your belief/concept? That was quite clear to me.
Did your OP explain your belief/concept? That was quite clear to me.
To dust1n. Apologies for the incredibly long post. I know when I stumble upon walls of texts like that I lose the motivation to reply to them, so you needn't respond to all of it, only the parts you're interested in responding to, unless of course you don't mind
It could see why it may seem that way. While I don't know much about Hinduism, I do know a few concepts that did have a major influence on my beliefs. When I heard of Brahman and non-duality I was surprised on how much I could relate to them. Brahma, Vishnu, and Shiva also have inspired me.
Not so sure about the universe being a body with a will that is the sum of total 'parts'. What are parts? What are things? They are merely a presentation of appearances of phenomena. Personal views are somewhat similar, but see it as the presence of total activity. 'Everything' is the actualization of potentials.
But all presentations together, all since the first, and all til the last, is a single presentation in itself.
But that's the same as describing what the universe 'seeks.'
Who determines what the "purpose" is? (And yes, I meant "who," because we assign purpose.)
How so? I interpreted 'what it seeks' as consciously is acting towards, the result it desires. But it's not exactly desiring anything, it just acts and the goal will be the goal.
Purpose is that which is accomplished in the object's period of being. Some would say that the entity would determine the purpose, but I'd say it's better to view it as everything in existence as determining the purpose of each individual thing, if that makes sense
I believe that consciousness is passive. It's like a person sitting in the auditorium of a movie theatre watching and completely engaged in what is happening on the big screen in front of them. They are so engaged that they have forgotten themselves, they have "stepped into the screen" to become a character in their own story. But they are not controlling the story. Consciousness is a register of what has already happened. They see a story already written.
They and the theatre are not distinct from the universe. What they desire, the universe has already scripted. What they are, in thought and in action, the universe has already made them.
I think purpose belongs to the person who has stepped into the movie and assumed a role. They cannot interpret their actions as anything other than a part of the script, and they are right to do so. To do otherwise would be to fail to "live" in movie terms.