Why Didn't the Universe Always Exist?

[firedragon]

Well, then I missed them. Care to give them again?

If you read up on the conversation you entered into you should know.

Not actually. His point dealt with how science changes paradigms and the fact that evidence is required for such changes and takes time to acquire is directly relevant to his point.

Absolutely irrelevant.

 

[AdamjEdgar]

The bible says,

In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.

It also says,

and he made the stars also

It would seem to me that there are two ways to look at it:

1. There are multiple "universes in existence" where we are bound to our own universe and as a result of sin, we cannot observe any other. Or,

2. The second passage above doesn't specify when the stars were made, just that it's telling us he made them too.
We know that the focus of day 4 is the creation of sun and moon, not the stars.

 

[Pogo]

Of course scientists do understand. It's the dogmatic evangelist who does not.

Nice try. care to explain?

 

[muhammad_isa]

Nice try. care to explain?

It's self explanatory.

 

[Pogo]

The bible says,

In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.

It also says,

and he made the stars also

It would seem to me that there are two ways to look at it:

1. There are multiple "universes in existence" where we are bound to our own universe and as a result of sin, we cannot observe any other. Or,

2. The second passage above doesn't specify when the stars were made, just that it's telling us he made them too.
We know that the focus of day 4 is the creation of sun and moon, not the stars.

Or none of your interpretations of ancient writings are particularly significant to what has been observed in the last few thousand years.
Your turn.

 

[Pogo]

It's self explanatory.

No, the assumption that the evangelist is totally ignorant seems to be yours.

 

[Ben Dhyan]

Thanks for that, but I still don't see anything substantive there and no reason to investigate this area further. I have yet to read about any concrete benefit or useful insights gleaned from anybody who uses that kind of language. It's always just poetry to me: "the manifestation/incarnation/evolution of God through the elemental, mineral, plant, animal, human, angelic, archangelic, etc., kingdoms to realize Itself." How about we just say that the universe evolves and leave out the gods and archangels?

Whatever your reasons for devoting so much time to such meditations is not coming through. You said that there was no benefit to it, but I can't believe you do it without some kind of reward or return, yet you don't articulate what that is and I can't detect any clue as to why you do it or why you would recommend others do it

Concepts like archangels and gods are just meant to represent a higher order of evolution, or do you believe your/the human condition is the highest universal evolutionary state possible?

I have explained, but you apparently do not get it. There are higher evolutionary states than the human, and those souls who strive to realize it will eventually succeed, but not without some failures first, but those souls otoh who spend their incarnate life unaware of the higher 'calling', will continue to reincarnate in the human kingdom until they are ready to move on.

 

[Pogo]

Concepts like archangels and gods are just meant to represent a higher order of evolution, or do you believe your/the human condition is the highest universal evolutionary state possible?

No I get to use this again to explain your misunderstanding of evolution.

I have explained, but you apparently do not get it. There are higher evolutionary states than the human, and those souls who strive to realize it will eventually succeed, but not without some failures first, but those souls otoh who spend their incarnate life unaware of the higher 'calling', will continue to reincarnate in the human kingdom until they are ready to move on.

No you have asserted a situation totally at odds with all the evidence of evolution that apparently only exists in your imagination.

Anyhow here is a website to maybe help you understand the basics.

Evolution 101

evolution.berkeley.edu

 

[Ben Dhyan]

No I get to use this again to explain your misunderstanding of evolution. View attachment 96900


No you have asserted a situation totally at odds with all the evidence of evolution that apparently only exists in your imagination.

Anyhow here is a website to maybe help you understand the basics.

Evolution 101

evolution.berkeley.edu

Ahem, atheists don't have a clue about this subject because they are not even aware of their own underlying spiritual nature yet.

Now, this is not an argument as your limited understanding is what it, and will stay that way until evolution takes you further.

To help you along the way, try to keep asking yourself, "what am I in the context of all that is"? Do not look for a conceptual answer, just observe the machination of your mind as the soul tries to make contact.

 

[Pogo]

Ahem, atheists don't have a clue about this subject because they are not even aware of their own underlying spiritual nature yet.

Now, this is not an argument as your limited understanding is what it, and will stay that way until evolution takes you further.

To help you along the way, try to keep asking yourself, "what am I in the context of all that is"? Do not look for a conceptual answer, just observe the machination of your mind as the soul tries to make contact.

What is the point, when you use a word we have in common, you have your own definition that is yours only and to that you add all your words that have meanings only to you.
Even if you were right about anything you say it would be of no value to anyone else since it is all entirely your own internal conversation that just happens to have some letter collections that are common to other organisms.
Good bye, I have reality to deal with and not your version, the one that I can relate to others with.

 

[Ben Dhyan]

What is the point, when you use a word we have in common, you have your own definition that is yours only and to that you add all your words that have meanings only to you.
Even if you were right about anything you say it would be of no value to anyone else since it is all entirely your own internal conversation that just happens to have some letter collections that are common to other organisms.
Good bye, I have reality to deal with and not your version, the one that I can relate to others with.

God bless.

 

[It Aint Necessarily So]

atheists don't have a clue about this subject because they are not even aware of their own underlying spiritual nature yet.

Here is the arrogance your religious beliefs tell you that you are entitled to. You have no special knowledge or inside information.

Concepts like archangels and gods are just meant to represent a higher order of evolution

If you want to be understood, use plain language - not poetry.

I have explained, but you apparently do not get it. There are higher evolutionary states than the human, and those souls who strive to realize it will eventually succeed, but not without some failures first, but those souls otoh who spend their incarnate life unaware of the higher 'calling', will continue to reincarnate in the human kingdom until they are ready to move on.

You've explained nothing to me. You've just made assorted assertions and expressed assorted opinions.

You still haven't given me a reason to think those words are meaningful. It sounds like fluff to me. I'd be more than happy to consider any specifics you can provide, but this kind of language has no value or meaning to me. Like I said before, it's poetry to me. It doesn't refer to anything specific.

 

[Ben Dhyan]

Here is the arrogance your religious beliefs tell you that you are entitled to. You have no special knowledge or inside information.

If you want to be understood, use plain language - not poetry.

You've explained nothing to me. You've just made assorted assertions and expressed assorted opinions.

You still haven't given me a reason to think those words are meaningful. It sounds like fluff to me. I'd be more than happy to consider any specifics you can provide, but this kind of language has no value or meaning to me. Like I said before, it's poetry to me. It doesn't refer to anything specific.

How would you know if you do not spend your life in religious practice?

You are an atheist, and thus you do not understand the reality represented by the religious concepts I use. For example, have you experienced the state of spiritual transcendence? If not, there are no words I could use that could convey that reality, you would have to experience it to know.

Ok, you may call it poetry and that it is of no interest to you, there is no problem with that, each to their own, but you should understand that the reason you don't understand is not because it seems like poetry, but rather you have no interest in practicing religion to find out if it is true, at least until now.

 

[Polymath257]

How would you know if you do not spend your life in religious practice?

By testing the ideas to see if they work in practice. By looking at the logic and seeing if it works.

You are an atheist, and thus you do not understand the reality represented by the religious concepts I use. For example, have you experienced the state of spiritual transcendence? If not, there are no words I could use that could convey that reality, you would have to experience it to know.

Yes, I have. I also realized it was a brain state that was abnormal. It was an incredible experience, but I don’t believe it was more than a personal experience showing my own fallibility. Oh, it was very real at the time. But a bit of thought shows it wasn’t true.

Ok, you may call it poetry and that it is of no interest to you, there is no problem with that, each to their own, but you should understand that the reason you don't understand is not because it seems like poetry, but rather you have no interest in practicing religion to find out if it is true, at least until now.

I have looked into various religious belief systems and have found them useless for finding truth. Poetry is not the way to truth. Meaning, perhaps, but not truth.

 

[Polymath257]

If you read up on the conversation you entered into you should know.

Care to give a reference? Where did you give this information?

Absolutely irrelevant.

No.

 

[Ben Dhyan]

By testing the ideas to see if they work in practice. By looking at the logic and seeing if it works.

Yes, I have. I also realized it was a brain state that was abnormal. It was an incredible experience, but I don’t believe it was more than a personal experience showing my own fallibility. Oh, it was very real at the time. But a bit of thought shows it wasn’t true.

I have looked into various religious belief systems and have found them useless for finding truth. Poetry is not the way to truth. Meaning, perhaps, but not truth.

If you think religion is merely an idea, then you are a lost soul, it means your soul is playing second fiddle to the ego self.

Ahem, thought is not reality, except as thought, religion deals with reality via the soul, not the brain.

There are definitely religious belief systems which are next to useless or worse, as there is some science which is not true, but as the saying goes, one doesn't throw the baby out with the bath water.

Have you ever tried Zen?

 

[Polymath257]

If you think religion is merely an idea, then you are a lost soul, it means your soul is playing second fiddle to the ego self.

Ahem, thought is not reality, except as thought, religion deals with reality via the soul, not the brain.

I know that is your belief. That is not mine. I don't believe in a (non-material) soul.

There are definitely religious belief systems which are next to useless or worse, as there is some science which is not true, but as the saying goes, one doesn't throw the baby out with the bath water.

Have you ever tried Zen?

Absolutely. Good for concentration.

Part of my point is that *no* experience is self-justifying. No matter how powerful the experience or how 'real' it seems, there is *always* the possibility of misinterpretation. And, with religious experiences, I think that is primarily what happens: people have these powerful internal experiences because their brains are in unusual sates and they interpret those experiences as being about a supernatural or a 'reality' beyond.

My belief is that is simply self-delusion.

 

[mikkel_the_dane]

By testing the ideas to see if they work in practice. By looking at the logic and seeing if it works.

Yes, I have. I also realized it was a brain state that was abnormal. It was an incredible experience, but I don’t believe it was more than a personal experience showing my own fallibility. Oh, it was very real at the time. But a bit of thought shows it wasn’t true.

I have looked into various religious belief systems and have found them useless for finding truth. Poetry is not the way to truth. Meaning, perhaps, but not truth.

You are aware that words like abnormal or meaningless have no physical properties. They are in your mind as how you make sense as a human. The same with truth.
Your problem and report me to yourself if you have to yourself, is that you believe that your cognition is not really in effect the same as in philosophy.
The problem is that you use a cognitive model like everybody else and your model is not special as not cognitive.
Neither am I special, but I know that.

 

[It Aint Necessarily So]

have you experienced the state of spiritual transcendence?

Of course. There are times when one feels a sense of connection to nature and life associated with a sense of awe and often gratitude as when gazing at the night sky and contemplating the dimensions and one's history and connection to those stars. Or when enjoying a beautiful sunset or a beautiful passage of music.

Incidentally, that's the first specific thing you've mentioned about whatever it is you are pursuing. At last, some common ground, something that I can relate to.

My problem is that I have asked a large number of RF posters (and another site before this one) the same questions I asked you. What are you pursuing and what are you receiving, and I can't think of a single example of any of them telling me anything that wasn't fluff - empty words, or what I called poetry.

Now you've mentioned I can understand. And if that's all that all of this is, why spend years in religious practice when that is available without it?

How would you know if you do not spend your life in religious practice?

Why would I do that to find out if there is something there when the people who do that can't say a word that makes it seem worthwhile?

I did have a decade in Christianity, wherein I also had spiritual experiences and which I attributed to the Holy Spirit. I later came to understand that I was experiencing euphoric states in church at the hand of a gifted and charismatic preacher identical to the states I experience today with rapturous music, for example, and which, as @Polymath257 said, I have come to understand is an endogenous mental state.

That experience in religion taught me that there was nothing substantive there.

You are an atheist, and thus you do not understand the reality represented by the religious concepts I use.

I think I do. I've asked you repeatedly to describe it. Unless you're holding something back, I think I understand that "reality" fairly well.

as the saying goes, one doesn't throw the baby out with the bath water.

I think I grabbed the baby from the bathwater and took it with me.

you should understand that the reason you don't understand is not because it seems like poetry, but rather you have no interest in practicing religion to find out if it is true

You're correct that I have no further interest in religion. I think I have enough personal experience and the testimony of others to know that whatever benefit I experienced there is available without spending time in meditation or whatever your practices are.

Look, if there's more to it than you and others have said, I ought to know that by now. I ought to have gotten a taste in my religious days. One of the people I've questioned ought to have been able to say something meaningful to me. Some of you ought to seem to have something I'm lacking and would like for myself.

My musical adventure was a spiritual experience. The first time I heard Blue Sky by the Allman Brothers, it was so beautiful that it took my breath away. I remember thinking that these people are singing with their hands, and it was like flying. I wondered if I could learn to do that.

Not long after, I got my first electric guitar, and even thought I couldn't play it, just making sound with it was also a high. I couldn't put it down. I practiced four hours every weekday evening and ten hours every weekend day. And that went on for years. Eventually, I became proficient, and eventually played in and then later formed bands. I taught my wife to play bass, and we performed for years in restaurants and coffee houses.

That has been a spiritual journey. One point I'm making is that there was immediate feedback that I was on to something meaningful to me unlike with religion and meditation. I had the euphoric experience in church, which kept me coming back, but as I explained, I later discovered that experiences like that were available to me without religion. They were available playing guitar, for example.

And that's the other point: Like I said, I grabbed the baby from the bathwater. I learned how to reproduce those spiritual experiences without religion once I understood that they had nothing to do with spirits.

I'll share some of that with you. Here's our version of Blue Sky (I did eventually learn to sing with my hands, and later, my vocal cords). This is Ricky on lead vocals and rhythm guitar, my wife on bass and backup vocals, me on lead guitar and backup vocals, and a digital drummer. Won't you take a trip with us and Mr. Bluebird down to Carolina to walk along the river?

 

[firedragon]

Care to give a reference? Where did you give this information?

No.

Cheers.