"Hard-Wired" for God: Take 2
by JoyVery interesting theologian Mahanoy has posted a very excellent blog post over at one of my haunts - Street Prophets - taking a different tack on the NYT article "Darwin's God" that Mike discusses in his blog post.
Mahanoy asks, Are Humans "Hard-Wired" for God? Herein is my response to that question, mixing a little science with a little sociopolitical reality, put into the blender with some icy chunks of perceptive experience. A mid-afternoon smoothie, and an opportunity to take a look at different implications from whether people can actually commit their lives to a formalized misconception (which they do all the time).
I heartily recommend reading the Street Prophets post by Mahanoy for theological context, (or his cross-post to the DKos Main Page where this post appears as comment along with a host of others), and invite you to follow me below the fold for my own thoughts on the matter…
I don't think we're hardwired to believe in any particular god concept, as religion is a sociopolitical institution established for specific (or, at one time specific) functions in society. Governance, education, socialization. As these functions have been steadily transferred to more inclusive secular institutions, religions end up mostly with tradition - maintenance of the social mythology, cohesion for sub-groups, and 'works' in the world.
But we are in fact neurologically hardwired for whole classes of experience underpinning and long associated with religions. These are subjective qualia, some of which can even be stimulated artificially by probing particular areas of the brain. One notable quale is the experience of separation of consciousness [a.k.a. Out-Of-Body or OOB], found to be associated to neurons at the very top of our brains that coincide strikingly with most religions' head fetishes (anointing with oil, covering the top/crown of the head, etc.). The Hindu mystics designate this as the Sahasrara, or "crown chakra."
Another quale is the experience of direct insight into the minds of others [a.k.a. ESP, etc.], found to be activated upon stimulation of the frontal lobes precisely where Eastern mystics have placed the "Third Eye." Hindu mystics call this the Ajna, or "brow chakra."
So yes, we are hardwired for spiritual experience. And this experience tends to translate through our cognition into the apprehension that there's more going on in the totality of reality than just that which our sensory circuits are able to provide as subject-object interaction (perception of the material world outside ourselves).
Personally, I am of the not-writ-in-stone opinion that as the products of evolution that seems firmly tied to practical abilities, we have to develop 'extra' abilities step by step on the substrate of all that came before. All that has come before is limited to 3 spatial dimensions and 1 direction of time. Like the rather spectacular development of trichromatic vision (seeing red) in higher mammals, a new dimension of perception has been added to our toolkit and we learned how to use it very well to our survival advantage.
But our lives are short, and we don't get evolutionary developments inside of it. The toolkit we're born with must serve us all our lives, and it often takes that long just to figure out how best to use it. I view the innate hardwiring for spiritual experience as the necessary precondition for development of means to directly perceive one or more real extra dimensions of spacetime that are all around us all the time right now (but we can't see it).
Or, as the generations go forward in time, more and more babies will be born who actually do perceive more than 3+1 dimensions, just as they once were increasingly born able to see the world in trichrome distinctions. Whether or not the consciousness that 'normally' inhabits those dimensions actually qualify as gods/God is still an open question. But it's not unreasonable to presume the pre-perception of them via this brain hardwiring might lead to that cognitive conclusion.
Of course, I'm a born synesthete who has always received more information from my perceptual equipment than others - so you can pay me no mind. §;o)
March 5th, 2007 at 3:17 pm
Thank you Joy,
I am not sure I can understand all that you are saying, but my sense of it and my belief is that we have this natural spiritual sense which does contact or contemplate realities which are beyond us or deeper that us. Communicating this is difficult. The religions of history put some specific content onto this sense and thru them allow us to experience those deeper dimensions. The actual nature of these depths is unknown to us. But, the reality of these dimensions is a part of most persons experience. This understanding fits my "position" as a telic agnostic. Something is there. It's deep and beyond-even mysterious.
In this manner, one can respect all the religious and spiritual philosophies that abound. One thing I like about this understanding is it eliminates the exclusivity and inexorable pride that develops in fundamentalisms. It encourages respect and tolerance. And surely, as time goes by a common understanding of the practical every day best and highest ethic for living arises.
Comment by bj — March 5, 2007 @ 3:17 pm
March 5th, 2007 at 3:49 pm
bj:
You're onto something, I think! This is why I spend some of my time looking into the several mystical traditions that form the basis of Huxley's "Perennial Philosophy" [Huston Smith has a fine overview of this in his book Beyond the Postmodern Mind]. There is something very real - on the 'given' qualia end - going on here. What does it tell us about what's real?
If you ever get the opportunity - and mine came at a teeny tiny used book store sidewalk sale in Little Switzerland off the Blue Ridge Parkway one day years ago) to get hold of the 2-volume set of The Nature and Destiny of Man by theologian Reinhold Niebuhr, go for it big time. In volume I [Human Nature] he does some really deep delving into the ultimate sin of pride, and how it so stubbornly attaches itself to religions and religious leaders. Our own human manifestation of the "Tragic Contradiction" that so well illustrates the dichotomous mission and sacrifice of Christ.
The reality of our hard-wiring for spiritual experience is that the 'New Atheist' God-haters can't ever win. If their goal was to get to the core of humanity's diverse religious traditions, they might have a prayer of causing a sociopolitical "evolutionary leap" that would well serve the modern world. But their abject denial that there's anything in existence that they can't poke, prod, measure or put under a microscope puts them into a gilt cage of their own design that they'll never escape from.
And despite all my disagreements with Sam Harris' views on many things, this is one of the areas in which I find myself in basic agreement with him. There's something going on, and the examination of universal human mysticism is a good place to begin.
Comment by Joy — March 5, 2007 @ 3:49 pm
March 5th, 2007 at 4:08 pm
(Christian) theologically speaking, I would argue that we are hardwired against God"”i.e., original sin. No one seeks God (Rom. 3:11). Of course, that doesn't rule out that fallen man has a genetic predisposition to seek a false god or a false religion or spirituality.
Comment by David Heddle — March 5, 2007 @ 4:08 pm
March 5th, 2007 at 4:14 pm
Joy,
At your suggestion, I did buy and am wading through Huxley. I will get the Niebuhr volumes you suggest. In the recent past, after years of doubt, I have rejected the literal approach to the world's sacred scriptures, in my case Christianity, as a reliable avenue to truth. Some in this position, take to criticism and hostility against religion. Not me. For I can't escape what seems to be an innate wondering and reaching into something beyond. It won't go away.
Beyond that, is the magnificent application of Christian teachings in the lives of so many around me. The simple goodness and humility that I find in these lives. It, too, calls deeper. This religion, as I believe others do, reaching into the depths and producing levels of moral character that are compelling. I am willing, of course, to admit the evils of religion. But, it's the examples of compelling goodness in the lives of the common man and woman that strike me. So, I have to believe we are onto something.
If we are correct, then you are right. The atheist cause is hopeless. Going against the very nature of life itself. Yet, the dangers of prideful religion need their counter, and perhaps this is a useful role in the scheme of things for the philosophy to occupy. I see the same traits in the fundamentalist practitioniers of both religion and atheism. Checkmate??
Comment by bj — March 5, 2007 @ 4:14 pm
March 5th, 2007 at 4:38 pm
Hi, David. While "original sin" is used by Christian theologians to explain our existence in a decidedly imperfect world, it honestly doesn't do much speaking of worth to me. I didn't commit that sin, the archetypes supposedly did - and I get punished for it. How just is that?
So while the concept does serve a trivial purpose of explaining conditional circumstances which are so very much at odds with the omni-whatever of the God who supposedly set the archetypes up for such a monumental fall, I've got plenty of sins of my own to live with and/or feel personally responsible for. That's enough to keep me plenty busy shedding tears and trying to atone.
The "false gods" are just our inability to conceptualize in semantic terms something that we can actually experience. All mystics claim that describing the ineffable is impossible, and they represent every human language ever spoken or written. This reminds me a lot of Plato's cave-shadows. We can only construct for ourselves a grand puppet stage, and it's always less than perfect, practically and conceptually. Yet we do it anyway, I suspect because we do innately know the ineffable is out there (or maybe in here)…
See how hard that is to describe? From there, per our sociopolitical formalizations and institutionalizations, people with will-to-power are drawn to that which offers them power. And the corruption proceeds.
Rust never sleeps, you know.
Comment by Joy — March 5, 2007 @ 4:38 pm
March 5th, 2007 at 4:52 pm
Joy,
That is (in my opinion) a common misunderstanding of original sin–that is certainly not how Augustine formulated it. It is not: we are charged with Adam's sin as if we committed it. That would indeed be unjust. It is actually much worse: Adam's sin has left the human race so corrupted that in our natural state we are in total rebellion against God and cannot choose not to sin. (No one seeks God"¦) So our condition is a result of Adam's sin, but the sins with which we are held accountable are all our own.
Comment by David Heddle — March 5, 2007 @ 4:52 pm
March 5th, 2007 at 5:10 pm
David,
That sounds very Calvinistic. I believe the human state is very similar, potentially (depending on the individual) to what Paul described was his condition, which was that he desired to do good, but his body of flesh (his sinful nature, the inherited corruption and corrupting influence) caused him to fail, to sin. (See Romans 7:15-25.) Man can "will to do good" - it is just not in his power to do that which is good, as the sin "that dwells in" him or her "wars against" his mind (again, depending on the individual), bringing him or her "into captivity to the law of sin". Jesus called Nathaniel "an Israelite indeed, in whom is no deceit" - and this was before Nathaniel had believed on Jesus or received the Holy Spirit. Man has the freedom to choose right or wrong, to sin or not to sin - else, God's judgment for their evil choices would not hold, as their choices would not really have been choices.
I agree.
Comment by Douglas — March 5, 2007 @ 5:10 pm
March 5th, 2007 at 5:19 pm
David:
And being a result of the archetype's mistake, we all have to live and die with it despite the atonement of Christ. Hence: Tragic Contradiction. He didn't get out of here alive either (had to die first, in a particularly ugly way). No Christian who ever lived and believed with all his/her heart that s/he would be among the few who will never die ever got out of here alive. We dig their bones up all the time and graveyards all over the world are filled to the brim with them.
I have sought God all the days of my life that I can recall, and I am the same "me" - with oddly the very same ways of thought and wonder - in my twilight as I was when I was a child.
To me, it seems a lot more rational to just go ahead and accept reality, because my death is going to find me one of these days just as sure as I'm born. If I'm wrong about that I'll be pleasantly surprised, but I can't live my life as though I don't have to die. I've seen way too much of it, among the most innocent of human beings.
My mortality is actually my friend - it informs me that my time is limited, and that I must always try to make the best of it. In service to a future that I will never see or know. This veil of tears is a journey - an adventure. All adventures include tragedy, or the treasure sought and quested for has no ultimate value.
Doesn't mean I don't believe consciousness survives in some form or other (or no real form). Just means my material nature has to stay behind. I don't mind, and I don't need Adam's pity for his wife's mistake to justify it for me. That's all.
Comment by Joy — March 5, 2007 @ 5:19 pm
March 5th, 2007 at 5:46 pm
Whether it's a matter of neurological 'hard-wiring' or sociological 'soft-wiring', I believe religion is as natural to human beings as friendship or family.
Possibly my single favorite passage of the bible is Acts 17:16-31, in which Paul preaches to the philosophers at Athens:
God appointed the places and times for all nations of men, such that we might reach out and find him; though he is not far from us, because it is in him that we live, and move, and have our being.
Comment by BenK — March 5, 2007 @ 5:46 pm
March 5th, 2007 at 6:00 pm
Hi, Dave
That doesn't mean that we don't have a built-in spiritual sense, though, and an awareness of the transcendent. Quite the contrary, it is premised on the idea that we do - You can't rebel against something that you have no connection to.
It also doesn't mean that sinful man doesn't have a longing to be right with God, in some sense. Most everybody wants to have a good relationship with their wife, or their family members, or whomever, broadly speaking. Most everybody wants to be a "good person" too, broadly speaking. However, we also want to do stuff that keeps us from achieving these desires. Our unwillingness to set aside our personal pride, and to submit our immediate desires, prevents us from reaching these goals.
Comment by Deuce — March 5, 2007 @ 6:00 pm
March 5th, 2007 at 6:38 pm
Well there is some debate on that I topic. I personally believe that be born-again is to recieve a new nature, i.e. a new spirit.
Comment by Jehu — March 5, 2007 @ 6:38 pm
March 5th, 2007 at 6:41 pm
David:
Foolishly (and I am a professional fool…) thinking scientifically about spiritual things, what if there was a broader reason for that awful set-up in the Garden?
For a moment, imagine that there are more than 3+1 dimensions in the totality of reality, and that consciousness - in some form or no discernable form - exists in all of them. Then imagine that a being existing in all dimensions at once decides to create something amazing… form in which consciousness can manifest for experiential (and educational) purposes. Sort of like a grand experiment by the Ultimate Scientist.
Imagine that this being has previously created lesser, not-quite chained in form beings, for his/her/its/their purposes but lacking the 'extra' quality breathed into the new creation - freedom of will. Then he/she/it/them 'tests' the new creation by giving it a specific choice to make. One which he/she/it/they bets itself they WILL make (given the new degree of freedom). Despite fair warning to the subjects that the choice has serious consequences that cannot be undone. Then he puts a snake into the Garden, to conduct the test.
Think about WHY Adam would doom himself (since we are told the choice that really counted was his, not Eve's) and his progeny forever. He understood the boundary he should never cross. He knew the creator would execute the consequences, according to his promise/warning. He is thus a responsible agent of the choice.
Then ask yourself how Love entered into physical manifestation. Do non-responsible agents (the created beings who have no freedom of will) know love? Are they really capable of manifesting such a quality? Then consider that Adam's choice (not Eve's, as she was set up from the git-go by design) was to live - and die - with his love. Share her fate, because he loved her, and love makes people do things they shouldn't do.
Voila! The new creation "falls" into physical manifestation (pre-created, and evolutionarily fit to host). Puts itself into lesser dimensions and explores the limits as well as the hopeful horizons of life in 3+1. Love and hatred and jealousy and fear and the always-doomed struggle to survive.
Also for Adam and his wife the Lord God made tunics of skin, and clothed them.
Just an exercise in metaphor, since metaphor is used to explain our "fallen" (into physical nature, where all life struggles and dies) condition. It also could explain our indirect perception that there's MORE than the strict limitations of our physical condition.
Would such an experiment please an omni-powerful consciousness representing the Ultimate Scientist? Would such an all-present (in all existing dimensions) being leave room for his new creation's ascension toward him/her/its/them self "the hard way?" As something more valuable to him/her/it/them than mere choice-less robots?
I of course don't know the relative truth or value of such speculations, and don't claim to know. It's just something that occurred to me once upon a miracle that had no explanation at all. And it pleased ME, for whatever that's worth… §;o)
Comment by Joy — March 5, 2007 @ 6:41 pm
March 5th, 2007 at 7:50 pm
Someone could always claim that the apparently designed appearance of, say, the Empire State building, is an illusion, and that in fact its construction happened entirely through the interaction of various natural material organisms (human brains, hands, etc), acting solely in accordance with the laws of physics. Indeed, a thoroughgoing materialism is committed to such a reductionist account. For hard-core materialists, mind is just a particular configuration of matter, and the 'intelligent design' of, say, the Empire State building is nothing more than an aggregation of purely natural motions of matter-energy. Ditto the emergence of species, the building of the pyramids, manned spaceflights, etc.
Adducing all the evidence for evolution is like examining an architect's brain and noting that all of its physical properties and operations can all be explained without reference to an invisible designing mind. But no one really denies the claim that the Empire State Building was designed by minds. So it seems that some material processes license inferences to the existence and agency of minds.
Why do some material processes license the claim that 'minds designed the Empire State building' while (allegedly) no material processes license the claim that at least one mind designed my cat?
It seems that the naturalist holds some principle such that no designing minds are to be postulated unless we can associate a spatially locatable material mind-producing organ with each putative mind.
But how can science justify this principle? It seems to be saying that no matter what we might find anywhere in the universe, nothing will count as licensing inference to minds unless it is part of a causal chain to material organs. Thus, if every day starting in 2010, verses from the Bible appeared in the sky all over the world, no inference to a mind would be licensed because of these verses in the sky unless they could be shown to be causally linked to a material organ somewhere in the universe.
Thus, God could do nothing visible in the universe that would license a human inference to the reality of God's mind, because God has no material organ associated with his mind.
This seems odd. The opponents of ID demand that ID conform to scientific rigor. But there seems to be an a priori principle held by these opponents that nothing counts as a mind at work unless it is associated with a mind-causing material thing somewhere in the universe.
Comment by stunney — March 5, 2007 @ 7:50 pm
March 5th, 2007 at 8:07 pm
David, Joy, et. al.
(Not surprisingly) I have my own take on Original Sin and the Fall.
Which is, that the fall and the notion of original sin represents the birth of self-conscious individuality.
At a certain point in human evolution, there arose the idea of "me" and a self, separate from the universe. With that idea comes duality, the possibility of good and evil, which is why the fruit is from the tree of the knowlege of good and evil. That ultimately erroneous idea of and belief in separation is the original sin, which casts us out of our true wholeness and creates a feeling of fear, danger, desire and suffering.
This same arising of the self and the sense of separation can be seen in each (apparent) person as he or she develops. It occurs somewhere around age two, and the birth of this sense of individuality, personal will, and a sense of separation is aptly known as the "terrible twos".
The good news is that there is a salvation from this incomplete, flawed, imperfect sense of self. Because, in fact, that self is not real, it is only a story, and this can be seen when the self is looked for directly. In reality, there is only God / Consciousness, reflecting through apparent individuality and apparent separation. And this can be seen, although not by any person (because the idea of our actual identity being a separate person is itself the prison).
Comment by MatthewCromer — March 5, 2007 @ 8:07 pm
March 5th, 2007 at 8:25 pm
stunney:
Yeah but… that's only because they've reduced themselves into nothingness. How in the world can we expect any big-t or little-t 'truths' from mindless zombies? §;o)
Comment by Joy — March 5, 2007 @ 8:25 pm
March 5th, 2007 at 8:42 pm
Excellent point. There is a hard-core materialist assumption behind that whole position, and behind all the "who designed the designer" nonsense.
Comment by MatthewCromer — March 5, 2007 @ 8:42 pm
March 5th, 2007 at 10:02 pm
Yes, they demand evidence for the reality of a universe-transcending mind, and then they rule out in advance anything counting as such evidence.
But if science in principle is aimed at knowledge of the whole of reality, and if any universe-transcending non-material mind is real, then the a priori ruling out of anything counting as evidence for non-material mind(s) being real is at odds with science.
Alternatively, science is not in fact aimed at knowledge in principle of the whole of reality.
The question to be asked of the scientific atheist is, 'Which is it to be?'
Comment by stunney — March 5, 2007 @ 10:02 pm
March 5th, 2007 at 11:14 pm
Joy asks:
Joy,
I've already explained to you that materialists do not believe we are "mindless zombies".
Comment by keiths — March 5, 2007 @ 11:14 pm
March 6th, 2007 at 4:46 am
joy,
Enoch. Elijah.
Comment by Douglas — March 6, 2007 @ 4:46 am
March 6th, 2007 at 8:46 am
Enoch and Elijah were Christians? §;o)
Comment by Joy — March 6, 2007 @ 8:46 am
March 6th, 2007 at 8:58 am
Joy, I don't think you want to take that tack. If the nonmaterial world can be detected by the material brain, through physical characteristics acquired via evolution, then the "spiritual" world is part of the material world, subject to all kinds of hypotheses, testing and so forth. As no such evidence has been found, one might think that you'd be better off keeping your explanation for an unseen world strictly on an unseen level, rather than tying it to something falsifiable.
(And really–"extra dimensions of spacetime" Are not space and time the bedrock of the material universe?)
Comment by grendelkhan — March 6, 2007 @ 8:58 am
March 6th, 2007 at 9:26 am
This doesn't follow. It begs the question on several different levels and also assumes that we have clear criteria for what constitutes "material"
Comment by bipod — March 6, 2007 @ 9:26 am
March 6th, 2007 at 9:55 am
grandelkhan:
And…
Hmmm… which is it? What's a "bedrock" of a universe - is it something made of matter or energy? Has it been established that a "mind" is matter and/or energy, or was that just the brain it manifests through?
While I admit my speculations are both silly (didn't I tell you I'm a fool?) and imprecise, my terms were chosen on purpose.
Imagine… that's a nifty word. It speaks directly to mind, and is a fully creative, volitional and immaterial act. Imagine there's a totality of reality that includes more than our 3+1 dimensions, and that there is consciousness that exists in all of them at once. For my purpose:
"¢ Mind = Consciousness (or, perhaps just its higher creative attributes)
"¢ Dimension = parameter of manifestation
Was there RED before life developed the physical sensors to detect its presence? Have you ever read Flatland (A romance of many dimensions)?
I admit that it's probably impossible for any human to precisely describe the totality of reality (if it indeed includes More than we are equipped to perceive directly). The attempt can be fairly approximate, metaphorically or allegorically speaking.
Here in 3+1, matter and energy do their complex dance. We do not know if matter and energy dancing in 3+1 is the entirety of everything 'real', or is a shadow, a projection, or a reflection of an "uber-dance" being choreographed from St. Elsewhere (whatever that might be). The possibility is as ancient as human perception of a 'spirit world' and the illusionary Maya of experience, and was philosophically formalized in Western terms at least 1500 years ago.
So I haven't exactly invented these speculations of whole cloth. I borrowed too. It's just an exercise in creative thought, a pondering of facts and inferences to see if they may point to something More. In such an exercise it's a mistake to confuse the finger pointing to the moon with the moon it's pointing to.
Comment by Joy — March 6, 2007 @ 9:55 am
March 6th, 2007 at 10:10 am
grandelkhan:
And…
Hmmm… which is it? What's a "bedrock" of a universe - is it something made of matter or energy? Has it been established that a "mind" is matter and/or energy, or was that just the brain it manifests through?
While I admit my speculations are both silly (didn't I tell you I'm a fool?) and imprecise, my terms were chosen on purpose.
Imagine… that's a nifty word. It speaks directly to mind, and is a fully creative, volitional and immaterial act. Imagine there's a totality of reality that includes more than our 3+1 dimensions, and that there is consciousness that exists in all of them at once. For my purpose:
"¢ Mind = Consciousness (or, perhaps just its higher creative attributes)
"¢ Dimension = parameter of manifestation
"¢ Totality of reality - all that exists, seen or unseen, on any level of description
Was there RED before life developed the physical sensors to detect its presence? Have you ever read Flatland (A romance of many dimensions)?
I admit that it's probably impossible for any human to precisely describe the totality of reality (if it indeed includes More than we are equipped to perceive directly). The attempt can be fairly approximate, metaphorically or allegorically speaking.
Here in 3+1, matter and energy do their complex dance. We do not know if matter and energy dancing in 3+1 is the entirety of everything 'real', or is a shadow, a projection, or a reflection of an "uber-dance" being choreographed from St. Elsewhere (whatever that might be). The possibility is as ancient as human perception of a 'spirit world' and the illusionary Maya of experience, and was philosophically formalized in Western terms at least 1500 years ago.
So I haven't exactly invented these speculations of whole cloth. I borrowed too. It's just an exercise in creative thought, a pondering of facts and inferences to see if they may point to something More. In such an exercise it's a mistake to confuse the finger pointing to the moon with the moon it's pointing to.
Comment by Joy — March 6, 2007 @ 10:10 am
March 6th, 2007 at 10:12 am
Actually, a great deal of such evidence has been found, both anecdotal (including a myriad of unimpeachable accounts), and scientific.
Here's an example of a well-designed study showing strong evidence for the survival of consciousness (or alternatively psi abilities).
Comment by MatthewCromer — March 6, 2007 @ 10:12 am
March 6th, 2007 at 10:21 am
Matthew - when my post disappeared I went looking to see if it got waylayed to moderation for some unexplainable reason. Nope. I found it (twice!) in the spam filter file. Also found your post above, so sent 'em both on through. Don't know what the issue is, so this is a test…
Comment by Joy — March 6, 2007 @ 10:21 am
March 6th, 2007 at 10:41 am
stunney says:
This is true. And completely absurd.
We only know of the brain and any other external material object through the senses. Senses are translations. This means that the external world we know is a simulation. The brain is not responsible for the simulation because it is a part of it. It is phoenomena, not nomena. So there is no such thing as a mind-producing organ any more than there is a language-producing word.
Oh, and one more thing. Even dissregarding everything I stated above, how does one spatially locate an object that 'produces' the frame of reference in which it's location is defined?
Comment by Mertens — March 6, 2007 @ 10:41 am
March 6th, 2007 at 10:59 am
While I do agree that it is unfair to a certain extent, I think of the original sin as an extension of the concept of inheritance. Is it fair that some babies are born into rich families and others into poor families? How fair is that? I never worked for any of the things my parents gave to me after I was born, but I still get it anyway. So why should this concept only be reserved for the inheritance of good things?
I think due to the original sin we inherited God's condemnation - that we should all die, physically, at least. I don't think it applies to the spiritual judgement.
I know the original sin sounds unfair, but I think it makes alot of sense when I think of it this way.
Comment by WinglesS — March 6, 2007 @ 10:59 am
March 6th, 2007 at 11:27 am
I think the original sin concept was a best guess of one ancient culture, and probably not just one. Maybe we should consult Joseph Campbell on this. We all find ourselves beset with urges and drives which can lead us into destructive paths and outcomes. I think of it as a result of our evolutionary-developed nature. We are animals subject to animal drives. Underlying our consciousness is our animal nature. Our genetic system is quite a mixed bag. In some ways we are mysteries even to ourselves. The ancients experienced this reality and generated their own understanding expressed through stories and myths. We do otherwise with our present understanding of life's development. Our spiritual capacities allow us to channel these drives into more productive avenues. Yet, that channeling is imperfect-call it sin if you like. The better we get at it, the more pleasant and productive are our lives and our contribution to society.
Comment by bj — March 6, 2007 @ 11:27 am
March 6th, 2007 at 11:35 am
Wow. You've solved the mind-body problem!
Or perhaps not. Someone (Bishop Berkeley, for instance) might rephrase what you've said: "If the material world can be detected by your mind, through consciousness awareness and rational understanding of its mathematically ordered design, then the material world is part of the mental world that includes such conscious mental activities as forming hypotheses, testing and so forth."
In 1999, the Los Angeles Times ran a series of articles on the latest developments in physics. One piece was entitled something like, 'Space, Time Obsolete in New View of the Universe'.
It was a very interesting piece, and similar in content to part of what I'd read in Brian Greene's excellent intro to string physics for the lay reader, The Elegant Universe.
Comment by stunney — March 6, 2007 @ 11:35 am
March 6th, 2007 at 11:51 am
WinglesS:
How does this translate to the admonition that the children are not to be punished for the sins of the man (or woman)? If even us terminally 'condemned' and sin-prone humans can manage to enshrine this principle in our decidedly imperfect systems of justice, does it make us better and more moral/ethical than god/God?
Makes more sense to me as an experiment in free will and the infusion of love in the world. Humans were supposedly created 'a little lower' than the angels, but with more value to the creator. Of course, what human (besides Enoch and Elijah, h/t Douglas) is so 'good' as human that s/he is a pleasing companion to god/God?
Looks like kindergarten to me, these material 3+1 chains. Certain things to learn (or feel, or do) before we're qualified for first grade. I've never seen a literalist able to adequately address the obvious set-up in the Garden. What the heck was a snake doing right there under the forbidden trees? Why was its hissed temptation aimed at the tree of knowledge and not the tree of life? And why then was Eve's sin not the one to condemn us to matter, but Adam's? Because his choice was between Eve and God? Because he loved Eve more than he loved his 'unique' (but obviously inferior and dumb) status with God?
And how the heck did this strange interpretation get assigned to material life's Prime Directive (reproduce - sex) as 'original sin', by an orthodoxy that used it to justify their own misogynous tendencies to demonize women in general, when Eve was apparently not responsible (the snake was - as agent of the scam)? Only to then turn into centuries' worth of mass genocides against gnostics whose interpretation to the ultimately evil status of matter itself obviously followed quite naturally from the dogmatic premise?
The Fall purports to explain why we're living and dying in material chains in a reality where we can never succeed in the Prime Directive's first commandment: Survive. The reason supposedly has everything to do with our knowledge - or desire to know - good and evil. It seems to me that in this allegory God is far more "guilty" than any of the actors in the play he scripted on purpose. Which looks, if indeed there was reason for a 'special creation' of free beings (in his image), like a desirable (to him) consequence of that gift.
A grand experiment, that must please the operative scientist even though he is said to have very nearly scrapped the whole thing early on because freedom turned all-but universally to evil.
But of course I could be totally wrong.
Comment by Joy — March 6, 2007 @ 11:51 am
March 6th, 2007 at 11:58 am
If evolutionary biology is to explain morality, it must show the link between morality and adaptive behavior. The trouble with this is that a very large range of human behavior is agreed to be immoral, while evolution has to hold that nearly all behavior derives from the adaptive features of our genetic makeup. From this it would follow that much, perhaps even all, immoral behavior is adaptive. But then adaptiveness cannot be that in terms of which moral (as against immoral) behavior is defined, or that from which specifically moral (as against immoral) behavior springs.
Some naturalists are prepared to bite the bullet about this. That is, they are ready to say that there is no such thing as morality in any robust sense. There are just human wants and human inclinations to talk a certain way about them. Morality, if the term is to be retained at all, simply refers to whatever happens to be the majority of, or most commonly possessed, sets of dispositions and ways of speaking with regard to inter-human conduct.
The problem with this view is that it falls foul of naturalism's most basic starting point—human experience. Naturalism privileges science as a form of knowledge because it relies on the most immediate data yielded by our consciousness of the world. Among these data are most certainly the deliverances of our sensory and perceptual abilities. We experience a patch of green and call it grass. We hear a sound and interpret it as indicating a wave is moving at a certain speed through a large body of air molecules. We look at a dial and determine by its measurement the mass of a subatomic particle. Etc.
But these are not the only kind of data of consciousness. There is also the utter conviction that shooting defenceless innocent children as they attempt to escape the Beslan massacre is something we are morally bound to condemn—that it is objectively prohibited to act thus, whether anyone (the killers, for example) subjectively wants to or not. There is the absolute certainty we find our conscious mind giving us that leaving a man to die of thirst in the desert while driving off in a full water-tanker is an abhorrent act of callousness that violates an ineluctable moral obligation (unless one is racing to save the lives of others who would die if you stopped to help—in that case one's obligation is different–saving the others–but it's still an obligation).
In other words, naturalism rests its case on the sheer force and given-ness of sensory experience. But that force and given-ness is at least, if not more, present in the case of people's consciousness with respect to major moral duties and moral values. One is more ready to attribute an experience of green to optical illusion or bodily malfunction (such as color-blindness) than to give up as 'illusory' the idea that one must not kill kids or leave dying men in the desert. One is more ready, in a laboratory, to attribute the position of the dial to a random electrical disturbance, than one is to attribute the notion that we should not rape our grandmothers to an adaptive illusion, or a merely contingent lack of desire to do so.
Naturalism, in order to dismiss morality as a projection or illusion with no real objective claim upon us, ends up having to deny the validity of the only thing that would even render itself (naturalism) plausible in the first place—the ineluctable deliverances and character of the subjective conscious experiences of human beings.
Comment by stunney — March 6, 2007 @ 11:58 am
March 6th, 2007 at 12:37 pm
Thanks Joy.
It seems that my recent comments are all being delayed, perhaps you've found the reason why. . .
Comment by MatthewCromer — March 6, 2007 @ 12:37 pm
March 6th, 2007 at 12:47 pm
Joy:
Simply put, you can't pass on what you don't have. Just because you are innocent does not mean you won't suffer due to other people's actions. The punishment you are refering to is eternal destruction which Christ's sacrifice makes possible to avoid. Because of that provision that principle of justice holds true.
Comment by Mertens — March 6, 2007 @ 12:47 pm
March 6th, 2007 at 1:32 pm
grendelkhan:
There's something more about this I should clarify. First, our consciousness uses our physical brains to formulate understandings of ourselves and our world, based on what our brains are physically capable of processing and formulating. The recently identified experiential wiring for the brow and crown chakras indicates that there is something to be experienced, but does NOT tell us the 'true' nature of what is experienced.
The hard-wiring has already been subjected to testing and confirmation, hypotheses have already been offered. Hard-wiring consists of neurons and dendrites and synapses forming specific parts of our brains, which we rely upon to process all of our thoughts and imaginings and reckonings and experiences and incoming sensory data.
For all practical purposes, I would presume that the hard-wired experiential perception that consciousness is separable from matter indicates that consciousness is separable from matter, at least in a projective sense (stimulation of these neurons allows projection). I would also presume that the hard-wired ability to link with an exterior consciousness not my own indicates that consciousness is intrinsically 'link-able' through stimulation of these neurons for that ability.
Metaphysical materialists are in a bind here. In order to claim that consciousness projection and linking are obviously NOT 'real' because we are hardwired for projection and linking, they would have to also claim that all other faculties of experiential consciousness and perception are not 'real' either because we are hardwired for experience and perception.
At which point we can dispense with any notion of reliability in either our sensory or our processing abilities, as we cannot reach any conceivable 'true' conclusions about the ourselves or our world derived from those. Making their pronouncements on the matter totally dismissible.
Which means - to paraphrase Nitshze - Science Is Dead. I don't think you want to go with that tack.
Comment by Joy — March 6, 2007 @ 1:32 pm
March 6th, 2007 at 1:42 pm
Matthew, I found another and released it. Apparently today was the day the filter got automatically 'cleaned' of its hundreds of drug and erectile dysfunction treatment announcements and I missed it the first time. Should be fine now that I've informed the filter that neither you nor I suffer from erectile dysfunction… §;o)
Comment by Joy — March 6, 2007 @ 1:42 pm
March 6th, 2007 at 2:02 pm
Well we don't judge a child for the sins of his parents. However, by jailing or executing his parents, we do indirectly punish the child. That is how I see it. God does not judge us spiritually for the sins of Adam. However he did punish Adam and we inherited this punishment indirectly. Well, I could be wrong, but it's the way I see things currently.
We can't get more ethical than God this way, unless you mean that a child's parents should not be punished, which imo is injustice.
Comment by WinglesS — March 6, 2007 @ 2:02 pm
March 6th, 2007 at 2:08 pm
Oh, Joy. Nietzsche! I know it's German, but that's no excuse.
Comment by thechristiancynic — March 6, 2007 @ 2:08 pm
March 6th, 2007 at 2:11 pm
LOL!!! Why don't we do to these guys what we did to Native Americans with unpronouncable names when they signed up in the army - assign 'em a 'Smith' or a 'Jones'!
Comment by Joy — March 6, 2007 @ 2:11 pm
March 6th, 2007 at 4:02 pm
Joy:
Aren't neurons, dendrites and synapses the end result of sensory translation? How can they be relied on to process sensory data when they are the result of such a process?
Comment by Mertens — March 6, 2007 @ 4:02 pm
March 6th, 2007 at 6:05 pm
Mertens:
??? Huh. I was always under the impression that they're the processing machinery. That which processes the sensory data (coming in from remote sensors - eyes, ears, nose, skin, tongue), analyzes and cross-references the data with stored material in the data banks, and turns the report in to consciousness. Which experiences the whole event, and sometimes acts volitionally on it.
Comment by Joy — March 6, 2007 @ 6:05 pm
March 6th, 2007 at 7:09 pm
i`ll try to clarify what i mean tomorrow.
Comment by Mertens — March 6, 2007 @ 7:09 pm
March 7th, 2007 at 4:48 am
(From Wikipedia…)
Nitshze: Nitshze. Singly-named, not-quite-famous disciple of Confuse-us. First to declare "Science is Dead!", right before accidentally detonating too much Chinese gun-powder during an experiment.
Comment by Douglas — March 7, 2007 @ 4:48 am
March 7th, 2007 at 6:50 am
That sounds very Pelagian.
Vivid
Comment by Vividbleau — March 7, 2007 @ 6:50 am
March 7th, 2007 at 9:20 am
Douglas,
When Paul wrote about himself, he was writing about a regenerated man. Such a person does indeed have the ability to choose either to sin or not to sin. It is unregenerate man who cannot choose not to sin. Regeneration and belief do not have to happen at the same time, and in general they will not. We have no idea if Nathanael had been given a heart of flesh prior to meeting Jesus. Furthermore, I'd venture to say that Jesus was speaking in broad terms of Nathanael's character"”saying that here is an honest man"”which of course applies to many unregenerate people as well. (Nethanael, more than the others, voiced doubts about Jesus: "Can anything good come from Nazareth?""”and Christ commends him for his inquisitive mind and lack of guile"”another sign that scientific investigation is good!) What the classic view of original sin would argue is that even honesty among the unregenerate is sinful, for it is not with the intent of glorifying God.
Comment by David Heddle — March 7, 2007 @ 9:20 am
March 7th, 2007 at 9:38 am
Joy:
My take is slightly diffrent. I'm under the impression that the physical world we observe is a mental construction based on read functions (the remote sensors you speak of). We don't actually see the translation devices as they really are, only their representations after the translation has taken place. Whereas you say that we rely on various organelles of the brain to processes our experiences, imaginings and so forth, I say that these organelles are the end result of such a process as they are only known through the picture presented to us. Of course, to effect the organalles is to effect our experience but only because of what they represent.
Comment by Mertens — March 7, 2007 @ 9:38 am
March 7th, 2007 at 10:53 am
Mertens:
Well, there are some out-there physical extrapolations that postulate such things as manifestation in 3-space being a pure function of time, as 'instantons' measure time as movement in 3-space on the Planck level. IOW, all of creation is "recreated" instant to instant when it jumps from one coordinate location in 3-space to the next (the units are small, so a lot of it's merely matter's habit to be in this moment what it was the moment before).
This would have physical reality as a construct of the personal or impersonal 'observer' necessary to collapse wavefunctions by measurement (the coordinates in 3-space having moved, and that movement measured by the system).
So your impression has some theoretical validity if you want to go all the way down to point-space (nondimensional). This isn't really something we can empirically establish, however. So FAPP [For All Practical Purposes], I tend to be a realist. We, along with all other life forms along the scale of relative consciousness, do have material bodies gifted to us by nature and evolution. I've had children - their bodies were grown of material substance for nine months, meaning I had to supply the necessary ingredients via my intake of food (or the process taking nutrients from my physical body). Matter and energy doing a matter/energy dance in 3+1. Real, if anything is real.
Now, our understanding of the physical world is indeed a construct fed to consciousness as the end result of processing of sensory data and cross-references to memory, stored data and sometimes colored with added dollops of emotion. We (our 'higher', analytical and volitional consciousness) experience consciousness as a steady stream of 'moments' that are actually much, much longer - one to another - than instantons represent.
It takes our processors awhile to forward-feed the product to consciousness. IOW, there's a real-time delay, and I attribute this to the processing functions. They're really fast, but not instantaneous (beyond global entanglement of the processors themselves). Cross-connections and analysis using biochemical triggers proceeds in nanoseconds, but that includes further subprocessing).
It is true that all we know of the world is what we perceive of the world. That may not be an entirely accurate representation (it's just data), but it 'works' pretty well toward our physical survival in the physical world. And since our sensory equipment and processors are generally alike, we can agree about the definitions of what we can each perceive. We agree upon colors, and divvy them across the spectrum of light frequency. We agree upon shapes, textures, tastes, etc. too, but mostly because we learn to label the distinctions conventionally after we are born.
IOW, nobody has any real idea if what we call "red" is really the same color for you as for me, we've just agreed that 'this' color (point to it, give the kid a crayon) is "red," and all things that color are "red." We could as easily have called it "booga" and we'd all agree it's "booga." Then our quale of experience would be "booga-ness."
Bottom line - our sensors are designed to sample data from the world and input it to our processors, which process them and 'tell' us what is out there. I think you are confusing what is presented to consciousness after processing of the data - our representation (thus our understanding) of the world with the world itself. A finger-moon issue, IMO.
Comment by Joy — March 7, 2007 @ 10:53 am
March 7th, 2007 at 12:30 pm
There has been a lot of talk on this thread about original sin. However, I think that it would be more fruitful to talk about God' original intent and man's original state. According to the biblical account man was created as morally innocent yet granted the freedom to make signifigantly free moral choices. I think this is something that critics of the "free wiil defense" fail to take into account (of course they reject even an allegorical interpretation of Genesis). Of course the world today is different as the result as man's moral falleness but that is not the way that God originally created him, indeed the Biblical account says that man was placed in an idyllic environment. So what do we fault God for? Creating man in the first place? Giving him freedom and opportunity to seek and find interesting adventures? To begin to explore and learn about God's creation? Are those cruel and evil things? I don't think so. God's intention was good. The state into which he placed man was good. But, he also granted man free moral choice. It was man who made the choice which was not good. Of course the history of man since then has been primarily a history of poor moral choices. God has allowed that but also offers forgiveness. Is that something bad?
Comment by JOHN_A_DESIGNER — March 7, 2007 @ 12:30 pm
March 7th, 2007 at 2:54 pm
John, I agree it was man who made the 'bad' moral choice (as judged). Which means it wasn't woman God was overly concerned about (just a rib, we can make more…). Obviously a set-up, and I do think that needs to be considered per what the allegory of these archetypes is trying to tell us.
If the Garden was so 'ideal', what the heck was a trash-talking snake doing in the midst of it?
Did the snake have super god-fooling powers to sneak in under the fence? Did God create evil in the snake (thus placing evil in the Garden)? Did the snake have free will, and if not, how is he capable of evil? Was he there at the behest of the creator? Was he co-equal to the creator, so put himself under the tree when God wasn't looking (so much for omniscience)? This snake character needs some careful examination, I think.
So… because the 'lesser' creation Eve was set up to be tempted by a very shady character with no 'good' intentions, the man is literally forced into an entirely different KIND of choice. His choice was between walking around in the evenings with God and naming things, or sharing Eve's inevitable fate of fall into matter (complete with mortality, suffering, etc.).
IOW, Adam's choice apparently meant more (to God) than Eve's did. Which is fair if you examine the context, since an omniscient deity would have known the snake was there and what would happen.
I'm guessing here that Eve was a lot more of an attraction to Adam than a talking snake would'a been, which is why she had to take the first bite. So the temptation (or pity, or desire to share Eve's fate because he loved her) would work on Adam.
Then God curses humanity in a monumental fit of rage, complete with flaming-sword cherubim enforcers. And Eden (somewhere near future Babylon) vanishes into the mists of history just like Avalon, never to be seen or heard from again.
If we can't reasonably explain the presence of a talking snake with a serious anti-god attitude and amazing powers of persuasion in what was advertised as a perfect paradise, then blaming either Adam or Eve is not something I think warrants imposing forever-suffering on the whole of humanity. Which, also according to that book, were wiped all the way down to 7 individuals and some critter pairs early on because God couldn't stand 'em living (and dying) outside the Garden either. Still had a big mad on.
Sure, 'good' and 'evil' are forever at war here in this non-idyllic world, and death always wins in the end. But the allegory looks to me like it was Love that got us here (Adam's love for Eve, not God's love for either of them), and most humans still think love is a good enough reason to stay for awhile. And it doesn't look to me like God ever figured out what real love is, or he'd have known he couldn't just demand it by edict and threats. Fear, awe, terror… these come easy. Love is something else.
The books say he incarnated a couple of millennia ago to check it out for himself (and simplify things down to bedrock), but that just got him killed, after suffering a little of what humans have been suffering at the hands of their evil kin ever since that day in the Garden. Have things changed yet?
I realize the allegory is very ancient. Thus it's formalized in a certain way with respect to cosmology of its origin. It was God's experiment. He/she/it/they (the plural is used in the plotting stage, so that's why the snake is so suspicious) supposedly conducted it on purpose. A tale…
For insight, see Job.
Comment by Joy — March 7, 2007 @ 2:54 pm
March 7th, 2007 at 3:17 pm
Joy,
Nice post. It's nice of you to try and actually put some meaning into the Genesis myth. So much of the discussion becomes a war about it's historicity and thus the reliability of the literal meanings of the Hebrew writings. If you treat it as you would one of the fables of olden time and search for it's lessons, you have a man giving up everything and then suffering everything for the one he loves. The God of the myth then acts, typically, in the extravagance of a jilted suitor.
If you poll most of us, and ask us just what is the most compelling experience of this life, all the wise will say "love". The pursuit of love which seeks the best interest of the beloved is really the ballgame. Some spend a lifetime running away from that truth. Others learn along the way and prosper as their days grow shorter. We may not know much, but we do know this. For all the rest we have Mastercard.
Comment by bj — March 7, 2007 @ 3:17 pm
March 7th, 2007 at 3:58 pm
Joy, Thanks for the long thought provoking response. Let me briefly respond to a couple of things you wrote about. (Tonights bowling night so I don't have the time to respond as I would like… Gota go bowling with my buddies!) You said:
Was that snake just a myth? Is Satan just a myth? Is Evil just a myth?
If there is anything that I have learned from my study of history is that there is a very real, very cruel, unnatural evil running amok in our world. Think of the last 100 yrs think of Hitler, think of the Nazis, thinkd of the concentration camps. Evil is very real. We make a mistake when we think of "the Fall" happening way back then. Every time man succumbs to evil he commits the same mistake that occurred at the so called Fall. The Fall Keeps happening over and over again. That's what we need to understand. We especially need to understand why good men often fail to do anything to resist Evil till it's often too late. What's lost in the mists of history is, well, lost.
Second,you said:
But, what about the story of the good samaritan? What is that about? And who was it that tryed to teach us that lesson? The world does need love, but it is more than love of a man for a woman.
Comment by JOHN_A_DESIGNER — March 7, 2007 @ 3:58 pm
March 7th, 2007 at 4:04 pm
Joy:
A very good question. It's interesting that you brought up the book of Job. If you consider the 1st chapter and cross reference it with the Eden account in Genesis as well as John 8:44 the snake's identity becomes much clearer. Of course this is coming from a historical perspective instead of the allegorical one you take.
As for the other topic:
To the contrary, I wholehartedly agree that our representation is not the same as the world as it is, if you can even call it that. It's just that everything physical including the brain is part of the representation.
BTW I have no doubt you know alot more about counciousness models than me. I've read some by Stuart Hammerhoff, Jack Sarfatti and others (still a bit over my head). What do you think of these and is there anything you can recommend to me?
Comment by Mertens — March 7, 2007 @ 4:04 pm
March 7th, 2007 at 4:21 pm
Joy:
To the contrary, I wholehartedly agree that our representation of the world is not the same as the world itself, if you can even call it that. It's just that the physical world including our bodies (and the brain) is part of the representation.
BTW, I seems that you are in the know about current theories of mind. I've read a couple like Penrose and Hamerhof's Orch-Or reduction or Jack Sarfatti's Post-quantum back action (Just trying to understand concepts, my math ends with integral calculus with imaginary numbers). What do you think about these and could you recommend anything you find interesting?
Comment by Mertens — March 7, 2007 @ 4:21 pm
March 7th, 2007 at 5:12 pm
Sorry about the double post. Didn't know if the first one went through due to the delay.
Comment by Mertens — March 7, 2007 @ 5:12 pm
March 7th, 2007 at 5:27 pm
bj:
LOL!!! Well, some do.
John:
Yes, there is evil in human beings, who can imagine the worst of horrors and then make them real - even enjoy it. Who denies it?
I've mostly challenged the literalists with these observations and questions, because they don't really seem to have thought out their stance clearly. Besides, I got my questions and interpretations from Jews, whose origin cosmology Genesis *is*. Who don't tend to take it literally. They do continually try to fathom what it means.
Literalists don't need meaning - they read it flat, and don't seem to notice the tragic contradictions in the story, which present themselves over and over and over again in all the so-carefully preserved all-too-human stories that follow, in all the books. Repeated themes in Holy Writ usually mean they're concepts that need particular attention. The God of the Garden does not appear to be omniscient. The God in the Cain-Abel story showed a definite fondness for bloody death, before humans had ever committed murder or even tasted meat. The God of the Flood is way, way overboard vindictive. And the God of Job is just plain evil.
Per the beginnings and struggles of Genesis (including a very strange tale of finally granting an elderly couple the child they yearned so long for, then ordering Abraham to slit his throat), one might suspect it's an entirely different god from the one Jesus called His [loving] Father. Maybe there's more than one god. Or maybe the one god finally grew up. I don't claim to know, I just see the issues and can grok why so many in the modern world aren't impressed.
Comment by Joy — March 7, 2007 @ 5:27 pm
March 7th, 2007 at 5:51 pm
Mertens:
Are you saying that the 'personification' of evil predates humans? That human evil is not human, but the work of a demigod? Who was God's best friend, if Job is to be taken as literally as Genesis. I know, I know. You'll tell me about Satan's great fall too. Was that before or after human evil? Or *is it* human evil?
And just an aside, Adam never met the snake.
I like the Penrose-Hameroff model pretty well, even though it's a bit weak on the actin-connection as well as the fact that I'm not all that fond of quantum gravity. Of course, if I were to mention massless extremals with hedgehog vectors collapsing through an 8-dimensional spacetime (so alignment comes in stages, as it must), somebody out there would scream "Monopoles!" and suspect that I think it's all magnetic or something… §;o)
J.J. McFadden has a fairly interesting field theory of consciousness, but it's got a few problems too. They all do. Limitations are mostly to physical correlates, operational mechanics, lack of definition for the property[ies] at issue, and of course, the embedded presence of professional nay-sayers (metaphysical materialists guarding the turf) who insist there's no such thing. Penrose's series on the human mind is good, and not too difficult to fathom.
We're obviously having some issues with the spam filter. It grabbed me yesterday and today. Should be rectified soon (I hope!).
Comment by Joy — March 7, 2007 @ 5:51 pm
March 7th, 2007 at 6:12 pm
John:
Until the appearance and mission of Christ, where was love ever displayed by God to man? Oh, we hear it a lot "God loved [whoever]", but mostly to describe someone exceptionally handsome, or wealthy, or lucky, or successful in battle, etc. Your basic "favored by the gods" that's been around forever. And a lot of the notable OT moral failings of God could be the same sort of attributions - assigning to God what were in fact just really nasty political wars and amazing natural disasters.
Maybe creation was an act of love, but Genesis doesn't describe it so. Everything thereafter - before Christ and after Christ (and in His name) has been pretty ugly.
Human love comes in a number of forms. From the exclusivity of man-woman (after polygamy became unpopular) to the multiplications of parent-child, sibling-sibling, the rest of family ties, friends, communities, nations, humankind in general… humans don't seem to have trouble expressing love, any more than they have trouble expressing evil. Seems as if we 'know' them both. So, apparently, does God (if we go ahead and credit Christ with a monumental display of love that God hasn't shown before or since to the whole world).
Just ruminations. Y'all can pay me no mind, as I make no claims to knowledge or truth.
Comment by Joy — March 7, 2007 @ 6:12 pm
March 7th, 2007 at 6:16 pm
Joy,
Amen. I have marveled and respected how some have gone to this OT book and found solace given the actions of the deity toward this good man. If you can, more power to you. I shuddered when reading it, even while healthy, hoping I never had to come back to it during sickness.
Well, so much for the charge that all IDists are Christian fundamentalists.
Comment by bj — March 7, 2007 @ 6:16 pm
March 7th, 2007 at 6:54 pm
Job didn't think so.:wink:
Comment by chunkdz — March 7, 2007 @ 6:54 pm
March 7th, 2007 at 7:10 pm
Joy channels Richard Dawkins:
I just thought it was worth commenting that Joy agrees wholeheartedly with Richard Dawkins on this one.
Just to add a few points, the OT God is also forgetful, can be negotiated with, and makes mistakes that he regrets later.
Not much like the God that modern Christians worship, yet most of them insist they are one and the same. Why is that?
Comment by keiths — March 7, 2007 @ 7:10 pm
March 7th, 2007 at 7:13 pm
Joy wrote:
chunkdz replied:
Chunk,
If God had just finished doing to you what He did to Job, wouldn't you say what you thought He wanted to hear? Anything to avoid setting Him off again.
Comment by keiths — March 7, 2007 @ 7:13 pm
March 7th, 2007 at 7:21 pm
bj:
Strangely enough, Job is one of my favorite books of the Bible. I've always been rather drawn to it, maybe just because every time I read it, I learn something new that seems 'important'. Holy Writ is of course that way through and through, and the Biblical authors were exceptionally clever (as well as inspired). Sometimes Job seems almost a comedy of errors, but you'd have to appreciate really biting satire.
My Dad was horrified to find me reading Job in the days after my son died. Tried hard to convince me to go to the Gospel of John (quite beautiful, that) instead. John's for when I'm feeling mystical, which I certainly wasn't feeling at that time. It always seemed to me that in the last discourse, when God is boasting so petulantly of all his great and terrible powers, that he sounds like a child there, too. Job is nobody, and knows it. This super-being has targeted him just to win a bet with Satan, and then has to stomp his feet and pound his chest for Job's insignificant attention - while NOT answering any of Job's pointed questions?
To which Job says yep, you're even badder than I thought! Let me just cover myself in ashes here…
Job won the debate hands down. And never does this 'Almighty' God seem to understand that obedience, terror and overwhelming awe are not love. Maybe he had to be human first. Do a little atoning both ways.
Comment by Joy — March 7, 2007 @ 7:21 pm
March 7th, 2007 at 7:39 pm
keiths:
Well, the tragic contradiction(s) are not that difficult to see, are they? Notice, however, that I have said all this without calling anyone a moron, idiot, child abuser, or any other of the colorful epithets Dawkins and his hate-consumed 'friends' like to throw at other people, as if they were all wannabe OT godlings.
I think it doesn't hurt to question. Perhaps it's because - as noted in the OP - we really are hard-wired for God. If we don't question (seek) and reason (use our minds), how will we ever learn anything? [Yes, I know you believe that religious people are not allowed to question or reason, but that's not a general truth, is a bigoted misconception].
Because that's what Jesus told us. §;o)
Comment by Joy — March 7, 2007 @ 7:39 pm
March 7th, 2007 at 8:02 pm
Joy, your first paragraph would have been more convincing if you'd refrained from the strawman argument in the second. I've never seen Keith argue that religious people are barred from rationality, however vehemently he argues against specific religious beliefs.
Comment by Mesk — March 7, 2007 @ 8:02 pm
March 7th, 2007 at 8:15 pm
Joy,
Thanks for the take on Job
My background in scripture is literalistic until I just couldn't do it anymore. I am aware of other ways of finding meaning therein, but I am just not practiced in such.
Comment by bj — March 7, 2007 @ 8:15 pm
March 7th, 2007 at 9:04 pm
Mesk:
By golly, you're probably right. I too tend to assign certain well-publicized and oft-repeated prejudices of the EA crowd across the board.
keiths - If indeed you do believe that religious people are allowed to question and reason about their interpretations, I apologize for an assumption I should not have made.
Comment by Joy — March 7, 2007 @ 9:04 pm
March 7th, 2007 at 10:32 pm
keiths wrote
Is that what you've gleaned from reading Job? I must say you make exegesis look easy. It's almost as if you didn't even have to read the book to make a judgement about it.
But since you've asked - if God brought me through a trial like that, then blessed me with twice what I had before, and I lived to be 140, and all my friends and neighbors came and gave me lots of gold and stuff, and I had oodles of children and grandchildren… well let's just say I'd consider myself a blessed man, and perhaps a better man for having gone through a trial of that magnitude.
How about you?
Comment by chunkdz — March 7, 2007 @ 10:32 pm
March 7th, 2007 at 11:37 pm
Mesk wrote:
Mesk,
Thanks for pointing that out to Joy.
Joy wrote:
Indeed I do, although the degree to which they are allowed to reason and question obviously varies with the group to which they belong. As far as I can tell, almost anything goes, belief-wise, in a Unitarian/Universalist congregation, including atheism. Other groups are less lenient (just ask Spinoza or Bruno).
Anyway, I appreciate and accept the apology.
Comment by keiths — March 7, 2007 @ 11:37 pm
March 8th, 2007 at 12:14 am
chunkdz asks:
Actually, I read Job two or three times as a Christian and probably five or six times after leaving the faith. It makes a lot more sense to me now that I view it like any other piece of ancient literature.
If my ten children had been killed because of what amounted to a bar bet between God and Satan, then no, I wouldn't feel particularly blessed, even if God gave me ten more kids and a bunch of gold. You can't replace a dead child.
And knowing that God could experience another mood swing at any time and take it all away again is not really conducive to a serene life.
Comment by keiths — March 8, 2007 @ 12:14 am
March 8th, 2007 at 12:21 am
If you read opening chapters of the book, it is quite clear who did these horrible things to Job.
Comment by inunison — March 8, 2007 @ 12:21 am
March 8th, 2007 at 12:23 am
sorry opening chapters should read opening verses
Comment by inunison — March 8, 2007 @ 12:23 am
March 8th, 2007 at 12:46 am
Why would you need to replace a dead child?
Comment by stunney — March 8, 2007 @ 12:46 am
March 8th, 2007 at 1:04 am
For those given to moral criticism aimed at Job's God, a question:
Where do y