The Debate of God.

[Tiberius]

Any........

You fail science. A SPECIFIC direction must be specified.

 

[godnotgod]

An atheist is God pretending he does'nt exist, LOL.

A theist is God pretending he is someone else, LOL

 

[godnotgod]

yah that really is who we are. That result is unstoppable by you. No philosophical realization will ever divert that result. Ever. Why do you fight fruitlessly against it. It's part of the experience. I'm not unborn. I know from whom I was born. And i expect to die. if I don't, I'll certainly be loud about it. You'll know. But if you also don't die.. you realize I'll have to cut off your head and absorb your Quickening? And I totally will.

...as yours will also be cut off and your Quickening absorbed, as you go round and round in the vicious circle of birth and rebirth.

There can be only One.

The paradox is that there is only One Light, but the lamps are Many.

As long as you believe that 'there is only One', then another 'One' will always come along to challenge you. I will tell you a little secret, though, if you promise to be good: when you authentically realize that you are 'The One', you simultaneously realize that everyone else (and everything else) is also 'The One'. If you still think yourself to be 'The Only One', then your ego is still working overtime. You think you are a Special Case, when, in fact, you are Nothing Special.

"Before Enlightenment, you think it is Something Special;
after Enlightenment, it is Nothing Special"

If you fail to grasp this simple idea, you will go on and on in the vicious circle of the illusory conflict of 'self and other'.

You act as if death is an event that invalidates realization. It does not; in fact, realization is what transcends both life and death, as they are both illusory. But if you still dwell in ordinary consciousness, you think that life and death are 'real' and 'unstoppable'. But a realized person would never attempt to fight death or put a stop to it. What he does is to realize its true nature, which puts a stop to his delusion that it is real. So there is no need to fight or put a stop to anything.

You also talk as if the body is who we are. The body is merely form, and form is merely a temporal appearance, which arises and subsides.

The ego is also a formation, which is temporal, and also arises and subsides.

Your ego dies when your body dies, so neither can be your true nature. Neither can be who you really are. They 'come and go'.

When I refer to true nature as being unborn and deathless, I am not speaking about physical birth, nor physical death. I am speaking about a state of conscious awareness that is non-local (ie; no "I"); one that is beginingless, and therefore, endless. It dwells always in the Present Moment, and has no memory or history. It neither arises nor subsides. It is that which is without face, without personal identity.

 

[godnotgod]

You fail science. A SPECIFIC direction must be specified.

I do believe Quantum Mechanics invalidates that requirement/state.

 

[godnotgod]

"Now, is there a perceiver or only perception?... Is there a thinker, or only thinking? Surely the thinker does not exist first. First there is thinking, and then thinking creates the thinker - which means that a separation in thinking has taken place. It is when this separation takes place that there comes into being the watcher and the watched, the perceiver and the object of perception... if you watch your mind, if you observe a thought, that thought disappears, it fades away; but there is actually only perception, not a perceiver. When you look at a flower, when you just see it, at that moment is there an entity who sees? Or is there only seeing? Seeing the flower makes you want to say, 'How nice it is, I want it'; so the ' I ' comes into being through desire, fear, greed, ambition, which follow in the wake of seeing. It is these that create the ' I ', and the ' I ' is non-existent without them."

"When there is a visual awareness of the tree without any psychological involvement there is no division in relationship. But when there is a psychological response [ie feeling or thought] to the tree, this response is a conditioned response, it is the response of past memory, past experiences, and this response is a division in relationship. This response is the birth of what we shall call the 'me' in relationship and the 'non-me'. This is how you place yourself in relationship to the world. This is how you create the individual and the community. The world is seen not as it is, but in its various relationships to the 'me' of memory. This division is the life and the flourishing of everything we call our psychological being, and from this arises all contradiction and division... When there is the awareness of the tree there is no evaluation. But when there is a response to the tree, when the tree is judged with like and dislike, then a division takes place in this awareness as the 'me' who is different from the thing being observed. This 'me' is the response, in relationship, of past memory, past experiences."

J. Krishnamurti
*****
http://soler7.com/IFAQ/Krishnamurti.html

"Thought itself is the thinker. If you remove the thought, there is no thinker to be found."

(Walpola Rahula, What the Buddha Taught)

 

[PolyHedral]

I do believe Quantum Mechanics invalidates that requirement/state.

Of course it doesn't; QM just specifies all the directions.

Incidentally, the article you posted earlier is nonsense. All of the different ways to formulate the universe still involve the concept of time; some of them just make them emerge out of the interactions of other things.

 

[godnotgod]

Of course it doesn't; QM just specifies all the directions.

So QM is saying that there is more than one direction? Tell that to Tiberius. He wants some direction, LOL.

Incidentally, the article you posted earlier is nonsense. All of the different ways to formulate the universe still involve the concept of time; some of them just make them emerge out of the interactions of other things.

Well, let's see: The article's ideas come from two bona-fide, twice-published scientists working at the Scientific Research Centre Bistra in Ptuj, Slovenia. I hardly think that you, a non-scientist, can poo poo their work as mere 'nonsense'.

 

[Tiberius]

I do believe Quantum Mechanics invalidates that requirement/state.

Explain how.

 

[LegionOnomaMoi]

I do believe Quantum Mechanics invalidates that requirement/state.

Don't confuse the general theory of relativity with quantum mechanics. Not that QM is irrelevant here, but the "relativity" of time and space (at least as I think you are attempting to invoke here) concern GTR, not QM.

 

[cottage]

Reading this thread I keep seeing the assertion that we don't know 'our true nature', which seems to imply that is that there is something corresponding to 'our true nature'. If that's the case then may we ask what it is (without making the response an exercise in circumlocution, please)?

 

[Sadiya]

Today, science is not eliminating God,it is eliminating models of God.

 

[godnotgod]

Reading this thread I keep seeing the assertion that we don't know 'our true nature', which seems to imply that is that there is something corresponding to 'our true nature'. If that's the case then may we ask what it is (without making the response an exercise in circumlocution, please)?

I have pointed to the idea of our 'true nature' from several angles, but you apparently are not reading this thread, or you would have had some idea of it by now.

I will attempt to point once again to it (point, since it cannot really be defined), via of Chinese Taoism, which uses the metaphor of The Uncarved Block for one's true, or original nature. One's true nature, like an uncarved block of wood, has no marks yet upon it, marks that are those which come about through our social indoctrination, and even our biological heredity.

Pu
Pu (simplified Chinese: 朴; traditional Chinese: 樸; pinyin: pǔ, pú; Wade–Giles: p'u; lit. "uncut wood") is translated "uncarved block", "unhewn log", or "simplicity". It is a metaphor for the state of wu wei (無&#29234 and the principle of jian (&#20745.[54] It represents a passive state of receptiveness. Pu is a symbol for a state of pure potential and perception without prejudice. In this state, Taoists believe everything is seen as it is, without preconceptions or illusion.

Pu is usually seen as keeping oneself in the primordial state of tao. It is believed to be the true nature of the mind, unburdened by knowledge or experiences. In the state of pu, there is no right or wrong, beautiful or ugly. There is only pure experience, or awareness, free from learned labels and definitions. It is this state of being that is the goal of following wu wei.

With respect to the discussion, our social indoctrinations includes those concepts we accept without question, such as Time, Space, and Causation, as realities, rather than as temporal overlays onto Reality. Our true natures thus become obscured under the din of social interaction, learning, and exposure to assumed authority.

 

[godnotgod]

Today, science is not eliminating God,it is eliminating models of God.

It needs to eliminate ALL models of Reality, until it arrives at that point where it knows absolutely nothing. It is at that point that it will at last be ready to take the first step into true knowing. Then it's 'science' will be true science, as it will be a complete knowing, rather than the poor fragmented state of affairs it now experiences, which unwittingly continues to place the cart ahead of the horse.

 

[Tiberius]

lol, the day science finds things out by meditation is the day that it is no longer science. Science needs investigation. And every single investigation has shown that your ideas are wrong.

Of course, if you'd like to provide some actual EVIDENCE, I'd be willing to reconsider.

 

[godnotgod]

lol, the day science finds things out by meditation is the day that it is no longer science. Science needs investigation. And every single investigation has shown that your ideas are wrong.

Of course, if you'd like to provide some actual EVIDENCE, I'd be willing to reconsider.

You're the last one who should be demanding evidence, as you whetted our appetites recently, and then conveniently dropped the ball at the last moment.

Science's investigations have shown nothing of the sort, though it likes to think so, encapsulated in its own straight jacket as it is. If anything, science is validating long-standing mystical understanding. Recently, for example, investigators have confirmed that the practice of meditation has grown the cerebral cortexes of Buddhist monks. Science has maintained that the brain produces consciousness, but here we have consciousness creating the brain.

And why is it that prominent researchers such as the Austrian quantum physicist Anton Zeilinger are having conferences with Buddhists as important as the Dalai Lama to present his latest discoveries to?

If the goal of science is to predict and provide data and other useful information, then I am all for it. But if it thinks it is going to use its investigative/analytical techniques to provide a real understanding of reality, then it is only leading itself into greater perplexity,

It is a paradox of life that the very thing we seek is what is causing us to seek, that that very thing is something that we are already in possession of, a gift that has already been given to us, the gift of Higher Consciousness. It is with this awareness that we can gain a complete understanding of reality. With this robust view, what we discover in science would all just 'make sense'. But science wants to gain a foothold via the accumulation of factual knowledge, when, paradoxically, the path to understanding lies in letting go. It is in letting go that one's vision becomes clear, and, of course, clear vision is the very first thing needed before any understanding can come about.

 

[godnotgod]

“The art of meditation is a way of getting into touch with reality, and the reason for it is that most civilized people are out of touch with reality because they confuse the world as it with the world as they think about it and talk about it and describe it. For on the one hand there is the real world and on the other there is a whole system of symbols about that world which we have in our minds. These are very very useful symbols, all civilization depends on them, but like all good things they have their disadvantages, and the principle disadvantage of symbols is that we confuse them with reality, just as we confuse money with actual wealth.”
― Alan Watts

 

[Heathen Hammer]

There is no doubt that the saltiness of the sea is everywhere, in spite of the fact, as you pointed out, that variation in saltiness exists. Universality is the point, and variation of saltiness does not destroy the characteristic of universal saltiness, which you are attempting to use to unsuccessfully destroy the metaphor. Your problem is that you failed to see the validity of the metaphor initially, instead choosing to over-analyze it to find some insignificance that you think invalidates it.

Oh, so it's simply 'being salty' of any actual measurement? In that case even fresh water is salty... but never mind.

But it is not based on what I said, but on your distorted views. If it were not, your comments would have been more informed. I can assure you they are not. Aren't ignorant statements always based on personal judgments and opinions, rather than reality?

Getting a bit frustrated, are we?
My comments are as informed as can be when your statements are full of empty poetry and deepities. I am making decisions and assumptions based on your presentation.

What is preposterous is that you are attempting to interpret the universal through the filter of the specific. Who you are as a conditioned, socialized entity is unique, but your true nature is none of that. Man's true nature is the same everywhere. You are clinging fiercely to your individual sense of "I", but that is not your true nature. There is no "I" component to your true nature.

My true nature is precisely that. You are simply wrong; I am not a cog in your wheel. You presume a number of things about my nature and object when my personality proves you wrong. We are only one in the sense that the atoms of our bodies both came from the same processes. Everything else, we are separate, and we keep proving we are through disagreement. For an example you appear to seek a life devoid of desire and separation; my life is driven wholly by desire, which I will never surrender, and I will maintain my uniqueness unto death, an end I accept.

Iam not asking you who you are; I am asking you to show me that the "I" you claim is real actually exists. Since you cling so fiercely to it, that should be a walk in the park.

You incorrectly claim I am not showing it.

In what other manner to do expect me to show it? At this point you appear to be simply facetiously not seeing the result you asked for, because you disagree with it.

Hence, the question 'before your mother was born'. Birth alone implies 'social', but along with that comes the other part of the equation, which is heredity. True nature is transcendent of both. It is not who you have become via heredity and socialization.

And hence why your request is ridiculous.

It can simply be made, without self-reflection on a 'maker'. There are times when we are involved in an activity in which we are not thinking "I am doing this", and yet, the action is being executed. We frequently and absent-mindedly perform many actions, such as reaching for a drink or food, without thinking "It is I who is reaching for this drink", etc.

Nonsense. Our abiluity to eventually forget each precise motion required for any activity is a result of our evolution as animals. If we had to consciously recall how to breath we would all have perished. It is a function of biology. but if it is a 'question' we are talking about your comparison is not apt. If there is a question, there is a questioner.

Well, there is a presence of consciousness, without an agent of consciousness called "I", that is present. "I" is nothing more than a self-created and self-perpetuated illusion.

So. Are you now ready to answer my question, or do you still want to complicate your initial claim by getting in the way and putting up a fuss?

lol, oh wait I'm complicating things? You're the one positing an essentially disporven idea that you and i are somehow one. If that's true I am schizophrenic, with conflicting personalities. I have answered your question, but your ego does not like the answer.

 

[Heathen Hammer]

Because, you are still looking at the question from the point of view of a unique, individual ego.

That is precisely what I am, and thus, this is an expected outcome.

I fail to understand any of this, and what is 'emo'?

Google is your friend

 

[Heathen Hammer]

...as yours will also be cut off and your Quickening absorbed, as you go round and round in the vicious circle of birth and rebirth.

Exactly, I desire nothing more. If I am defeated then the other was worthy. See, i have no qualms with that, for I will die as a warrior.

The paradox is that there is only One Light, but the lamps are Many.

Sounds great, not borne out by reality.

As long as you believe that 'there is only One', then another 'One' will always come along to challenge you. I will tell you a little secret, though, if you promise to be good: when you authentically realize that you are 'The One', you simultaneously realize that everyone else (and everything else) is also 'The One'. If you still think yourself to be 'The Only One', then your ego is still working overtime. You think you are a Special Case, when, in fact, you are Nothing Special.

But I am special. I was the one that One had to come for.

And if the other came for me, then we are not One, are we? We are adversaries for the same resource, and must reach conflict and resolution. For that is our true nature. This Oneness you wish to perceive is not a cooperation, but consumption. Perhaps in the scheme of things you seek this way of Oneness, but I do not. that lone shows our 'true natures' are different, and are demonstrated to be different. But you wish to persist, despite this.

"Before Enlightenment, you think it is Something Special;
after Enlightenment, it is Nothing Special"

If you fail to grasp this simple idea, you will go on and on in the vicious circle of the illusory conflict of 'self and other'.

I do grasp it, I simply see it as useless.

If your advice is to be egoless, then when someone finds the idea worthless, your ego should get over it; or it's not taking its own advice, is it?

You act as if death is an event that invalidates realization. It does not; in fact, realization is what transcends both life and death, as they are both illusory. But if you still dwell in ordinary consciousness, you think that life and death are 'real' and 'unstoppable'. But a realized person would never attempt to fight death or put a stop to it. What he does is to realize its true nature, which puts a stop to his delusion that it is real. So there is no need to fight or put a stop to anything.

Your conclusion about my take on death is incorrect.

You are free to demonstrate that death is not unstoppable, but you'll fail, alas. Many religions make that claim to ease the fear of their followers. But they never stop the ultimate end, Make whatever assumptions you wish about the 'after' part; but I am still correct.

You also talk as if the body is who we are. The body is merely form, and form is merely a temporal appearance, which arises and subsides.

No I don't.

The ego is also a formation, which is temporal, and also arises and subsides.
Your ego dies when your body dies, so neither can be your true nature. Neither can be who you really are. They 'come and go'.

Or they are the sum total. Since all your assertions lie upon supposed conditions which cannot ever be known by us while we live, you can play pretend in any way you wish, as it is all unfalsifiable. But, then I must ask, why would you want to do this? Why the need to construct something which does not go with what is demonstrated, right here, right now? it does not seem sensible, or useful; how is it so? Why the need to reduce the value of what is; what does one think to gain by doing so?

When I refer to true nature as being unborn and deathless, I am not speaking about physical birth, nor physical death. I am speaking about a state of conscious awareness that is non-local (ie; no "I"); one that is beginingless, and therefore, endless. It dwells always in the Present Moment, and has no memory or history. It neither arises nor subsides. It is that which is without face, without personal identity.

The present moment is still perceived by material senses. For the moment. When we gain a set of new input devices after death, then we can make claims about them. Until that time, you are simply making things up.

 

[godnotgod]

Oh, so it's simply 'being salty' of any actual measurement? In that case even fresh water is salty... but never mind.

Saltiness is the same everywhere, though it may vary in degree of saltiness.

Getting a bit frustrated, are we?
My comments are as informed as can be when your statements are full of empty poetry and deepities. I am making decisions and assumptions based on your presentation.

So sorry you missed the point, and choose to call what I post 'poetry' and 'deepities', which is really the empty statement here. Here is your original statement about my presentation:

"You are positing some beautiful unity...

No, I am not. That I am trying to post something indicating 'beautiful unity' is YOUR interpretation/preconception/distortion.

...with all or some other Eastern concept that has no useful [certainly to me] application nor representation.

What is it exactly that you failed to understand? Or is it that it is 'Eastern' in flavor that immediately puts up a wall for you?

Dream a bout how beautiful Life is if it pleases you

Are you trying to say I am out of touch with reality? That my head is in the clouds? Is that it?

, but in the end your nasal cavity will be filled with munching worms just like all the rest of us.

You are beginning to sound like some brutal people I know who will punch you in the face to show you what 'reality' is. These are the people who are completely out of touch with reality, and live via hardened minds, insensitive, calculating, and cold to the touch. They imagine their callousness as being somehow 'seasoned' in life.

If you really stopped to think about what you are actually saying, you would realize that you are implying that we will all consciously undergo the experience of munching worms, which, of course, is untrue, as we will no longer be associated with our bodies at death. I suggest to you that dangling a piece of red meat in front of my face fails to trigger the response you desire.

Perhaps that is the universal true nature of Man you are seeking."

Now that is the clincher, which showcases your total ignorance, although I will say that the fact that everyone undergoes what is mainly considered an undignified end IS part of the true nature of things, but your attempt to present its shock value as a means of distorting reality fails. It just shows more of your ignorance, as death in the East is seen and understood much differently than in the West, and what you describe is accepted as part and parcel of life itself in a way which understands that there is no real death, and that the true nature of man is beyond both life and death. Really sorry if you cannot grasp this, but that is your fault.

My true nature is precisely that. You are simply wrong; I am not a cog in your wheel. You presume a number of things about my nature and object when my personality proves you wrong. We are only one in the sense that the atoms of our bodies both came from the same processes. Everything else, we are separate, and we keep proving we are through disagreement. For an example you appear to seek a life devoid of desire and separation; my life is driven wholly by desire, which I will never surrender, and I will maintain my uniqueness unto death, an end I accept.

Well now you come full circle back to the original question, which is about your claim that you, as a separate ego, actually exists. OK. I simply wish to know where this 'thing' you call "I" is located.

Why do you think yourself so unique? You are not. We are all the same, except for those temporal characteristics we acquired through socialization and life experience. Those things together are what most of us refer to as "I", but that is not what I am referring to when I talk about our true nature. You asked for a definition, and I am trying to provide one. "I" is not your true nature, but because you have a very strong sense of "I", you really think it actually is. Sorry, but you're wrong, simply put.

The real question here is why you choose to cling so tenaciously to your imagined 'uniqueness'. You sound exactly like Heston with his 'cold, dead hand' stand.

The irony (for you) re: 'desire' is that the more you pursue it, the sooner you will become desireless. I know you don't understand, because right now, its pursuit is something of a mission to you. I think its totally funny.

You incorrectly claim I am not showing it.

In what other manner to do expect me to show it? At this point you appear to be simply facetiously not seeing the result you asked for, because you disagree with it.


And hence why your request is ridiculous.

All you keep saying is that you exist, and that what you think exists is your true nature, but none of that answers the original question. If what you claim is so, it should be quite simple for you to demonstrate the location of this 'self' you claim is so unique, and that is driven by desire, and all the rest of it. What I am telling you is that there is no self that is driven by desire; there is only desire itself. It is not a fact that there is no self for me but there is for you. It is just an illusion that you are a separate ego acting upon the world. I know you enjoy thinking this to be so, but that is a delusion of the mind.

Nonsense. Our abiluity to eventually forget each precise motion required for any activity is a result of our evolution as animals. If we had to consciously recall how to breath we would all have perished. It is a function of biology. but if it is a 'question' we are talking about your comparison is not apt. If there is a question, there is a questioner.

There is only a questioner, when there is self-reflection. Otherwise, it simply does not exist. If the questioner only exists when there is self-reflection, then it is an illusion otherwise. And if there is a questioner of the question, then who is it that is making the claim? Are there now two of you?

lol, oh wait I'm complicating things? You're the one positing an essentially disporven idea that you and i are somehow one. If that's true I am schizophrenic, with conflicting personalities. I have answered your question, but your ego does not like the answer.

I never said you and I are identical. To say that we are all One is simply to recognize the interdependence and interconnectedness of all 'things', and no, this is not poetry, but fact, if you bother to take a look instead of using science as a crutch to provide your answers for you. And just because something is poetic does not falsify it; on the contrary, poetry is a way of stating something real that cannot be stated in terms of logic, reason, or analysis.

Until you can answer my question, I will continue to make the statement that:

'Fundamentally, not one thing exists'.