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Is the mind too clever and cluttered with rational thought to know God?

Willamena

Willamena

Just me
Premium Member
Guitar's Cry said:
Have you read Georg Hegel or (early) Karl Marx?
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Um, no. Just Dogen. :)

Guitar's Cry said:
One of their ideas is that we imbue things that we create with a part of our self; we see ourselves reflected in the objects we discover. For them, this was a part of the "master/slave" relationship (possibly showing some of their reflection).

How much of our own selves gets reflected in everything we view? By rationalizing, we seem to move away from--or simply forget--that in this mass of tangled things there is a pattern being drawn that starts from the matrix of ourselves.

Even if we have created God as only an abstract metaphor to explain the order of that pattern, our relationship is cast on its surface. We just need to wipe away the clutter sometimes. :)

Or, as Dopp used to say, clean our mirror.
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I don't know quite what to make of that. Would you agree that the things we view are as much relfected in our selves? Who is the master then, and who the slave?
 
sandandfoam

sandandfoam

Veteran Member
Guitar's Cry said:
Well, rationality is detailed categorization. Being clever appears to be how good a person is at making connections.

By removing these, we are going back to something more essential, less defined, and more visceral.

Is God found there? Something more basically human may be, and our relationship with God may depend on understanding our "basic self" more.

These appears rather vague, but since the concept of God has been a powerful force in my life, I must assume a relationship with a concept, and part of that relationship is seeking the metaphorical truth between what my "self" is, and "God."
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Back again :). I find this fascinating to think about.
I think it's a very interesting suggestion you make about the nature of rationality. I have been considering Wittgensteins suggestion that most categories are indefinable.
I think the distinction that concepts are things in the mind and categories are the things in the world which the concepts are about is a useful one.
I think that psychological essentialism is on the ball. The idea that people categorize things according to what they believe are the essential properties (essential properties = properties whose absence makes a thing no longer that thing) of those things strikes me as correct. It is also supported by research (e.g. Gelman and Wellman 1991).
Psychological essentialism asserts that while most people will not know what a category's essential properties are they will still believe the category has some, experts may know (or think they know) the essential properties of a thing - but this is subject to revision. I think this makes the concept of cleverness seem rather like the emperors new clothes.
What if "unknowable" is worthy of the title?
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I think it is
 
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Wandered Off

Wandered Off

Sporadic Driveby Member
Your original question was around knowing, while your response to my answer was around believing, which is why I got addled.
 
Willamena

Willamena

Just me
Premium Member
Wandered Off said:
Your original question was around knowing, while your response to my answer was around believing, which is why I got addled.
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I can think of a number of appropriate contexts in which "knowing God" can be equated with "believing in nothing" (and only one of them atheistic).
 
Guitar's Cry

Guitar's Cry

Disciple of Pan
Willamena said:
I don't know quite what to make of that. Would you agree that the things we view are as much relfected in our selves? Who is the master then, and who the slave?
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I would agree. The reflected self is also a thing to be reflected back.

The master and the slave are probably interchangeable according to perspective.
 
Ben Dhyan

Ben Dhyan

Veteran Member
"Is the mind too clever and cluttered with rational thought to know God?"

Yes, but not because it is too clever, but because it is not sufficiently so!

So long as it persists in trying to 'know' God by looking at the its reflection, it's like a dog chasing its tail.

THIS which is seeking is THAT which is sought, and THAT which is sought is THIS which is seeking. 'All Else is Bondage; Non-Volitional Living' - Wei Wu Wei...
 
D

Deist David

A serious Deist!
I'd more of thought that the mind is full of irrational thought and clutter, rather than rational.

There's little doubt that the human mind lacks a natural discipline, at least at this stage in it's evoluton, with a tendancy to act a little hyperactively.

I believe much of this is due to our diet and environment in this age. From a neuro-biological perspective, our brains are running on low levels of key amino acids, which are the precursors of the neurotransmitters that aid good, focussed concentration.

Basically, we may ALL be a little pre-disposed to Attention Deficit Disorder in this age! :)

BUT......... I don't believe any of this stops us from considering God as those considerations are in my opinion based on reason. So, even the most cluttered mind can utilize the gift of Reason, and reach a conclusion of belief in God.
 
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