On Wed, Jan 14, 2015 at 1:30 AM, meekerdb <[email protected]> wrote:
> On 1/13/2015 11:08 PM, Jason Resch wrote: > > > > On Mon, Jan 12, 2015 at 3:39 PM, meekerdb <[email protected]> wrote: > >> On 1/12/2015 8:32 AM, Bruno Marchal wrote: >> >> Atheism is a variant of christiniaty, because for non atheist non >> christian, "God", like any term in a theory, is defined by axioms or >> semi-axioms indeed. >> >> >> I suppose by "semi-axioms" you mean definitions by description, like >> "ground of all being" or "creator of the universe" or "that of which we >> cannot speak" - which are used to define "God" by Christian theologians >> too. But I'll bet you $100 that if we pick a person at random who is >> neither a Christian nor an atheist and ask him if "God" refers to a >> superpowerful, immortal person who judges human behavior he'll say "Yes". >> > > That stars weren't holes in the celestial sphere didn't mean stars > didn't exist, it meant we had to update our conception of what stars are. > > That Earth wasn't flat didn't lead to people denying the existence of > Earth or throwing out the word altogether, it meant we had to update our > conception of the Earth to something more like a ball. > > Two people might both say they believe in Quantum Mechanics, but yet > they might have very different ideas about what that means. Person A might > mean they believe in the Everettian view, while Person B might believe in > the Copenhagen view. > > Such it is with the concept of God. > > > No it's not. As Bruno says "God" is defined by description. Stars are > defined ostensively. > You may start with a description, but your theories can lead to a refinement of that description and discoveries of properties you did not have at the start, even if it cannot be viewed ostensively, our theories have led us to discover properties of the insides of stars, black holes, quarks, and parallel universes. I don't see why the same can't be done for possible explanations of the source of reality. Perhaps in your mindyou think nothing objectively exists beyond the physical universes, so that there are no objective properties of any thing beyond this universe to discover. > > That some, or even most people's conception is faulty is not > justification to throw out the term. It means only that there is room for > progress to better approximate reality with our conception. Furthermore, > the possibility for the same word to mean different things to different > people make a word useless. As we see with the various interpretations of > QM, there is common-root meaning, and minimum set of ideas commonly held > ideas, even if they aren't exactly the same. > > You may find some particular tribe's conception of God to be ridiculous > and unworthy of acceptance, but to reject the notion of God altogether on > this account alone would be like rejecting the ground you walk on because > flat-Earthers are mistaken about that ground's geometry. > > > I only reject the concept of God that I understand to be designated by the > word "God", and I've specifically explained that I understand the term to > refer to a supernatural, powerful person who created the world and judges > human behavior. > Why cling to a description that you know to be in error rather than refine it to something more correct? Do you know that for many religions, that word is used with a very different meaning? To resuscitate an old post I made in 2011, here are some alternative definitions, used by hundreds of millions (if not billions) of people on Earth: The supreme God in Hinduism is Brahman which is defined as: "the eternal, unchanging, infinite, immanent, and transcendent reality which is the Divine Ground of all matter, energy, time, space, being, and everything beyond in this Universe." "Among Hindu sects, Advaita Vedanta espouses monism. The closest interpretation of the term can be found in the Taittiriya Upanishad (II.1) where Brahman is described as satyam jnanam anantam brahman ("Brahman is of the nature of truth, knowledge and infinity"). Thus, Brahman is the origin and end of all things, material or otherwise. Brahman is the root source and Divine Ground of everything that exists, and is the only thing that exists according to Shankara. It is defined as unknowable and Satchitananda ("Truth-Consciousness-Bliss"). Since it is eternal and infinite, it comprises the only truth. The goal of Vedanta is to realize that the soul (Atman) is actually nothing but Brahman. The Hindu pantheon of gods is said, in the Vedas and Upanishads, to be only higher manifestations of Brahman. For this reason, "ekam sat" ("Truth is one"), and all is Brahman. " What do the Hindus say is the source of Brahman? From the Brahma Samhita: "I worship Govinda, the primeval Lord, whose effulgence is the source of the nondifferentiated Brahman mentioned in the Upanishads, being differentiated from the infinity of glories of the mundane universe appears as the indivisible, infinite, limitless, truth." Hindus also cast doubt on matter, calling the illusion "Maya", regarding Maya: "In most of Hinduism and Transcendentalism, all matter is believed to be an illusion called Maya, blinding us from knowing the truth. Maya is the limited, purely physical and mental reality in which our everyday consciousness has become entangled. Maya gets destroyed for a person when they perceive Brahman with transcendental knowledge." "The concept of Brahman as the single formless transcendent 'being of absolute existence' that is the origin and support of the phenomenal universe, is nearly identical to that of YHWH, the concept of 'God' in Judaism. The term YHWH comes from the Semitic root הוה 'howa', to exist, and is connected with something that is self-sustaining or self-existent, is the cause of all existence, and the totality of the phenomenal universe that brings everything into being." Among the 99 names of God in Islam: Al-Wāsi' The Vast, The All-Embracing, The Omnipresent, The Boundless Al-Ḥaqq The Truth, The Real Al-Wāḥid The One, The Unique Al-'Aḥad The Unity, The Indivisible Aṣ-Ṣamad The Eternal, The Absolute, The Self-Sufficient Al-Bāqīy The Immutable, The Infinite, The Everlasting Some of the names of Krishna: Achala - Still Lord Parabrahmana - The Supreme Absolute Truth Sanatana - The Eternal Lord Sarvajana - Omniscient Lord In Sikhism, the most important Mantra is known as the "The root Mantra", It begins: "there is one creator, whose name is truth..." In Buddhism: Samantabhadra Buddha declares of itself: "I am the core of all that exists. I am the seed of all that exists. I am the cause of all that exists. I am the trunk of all that exists. I am the foundation of all that exists. I am the root of existence. I am "the core" because I contain all phenomena. I am "the seed" because I give birth to everything. I am "the cause" because all comes from me. I am "the trunk" because the ramifications of every event sprout from me. I am "the foundation" because all abides in me. I am called "the root" because I am everything." Various thinkers over time have, apparently through reason, come to a similar conclusion: "Geometry existed before the creation, it is co-eternal with the mind of God, Geometry provided god with a model for creation, Geometry is God himself." -- Kepler "To all of us who hold the Christian belief that God is truth, anything that is true is a fact about God, and mathematics is a branch of theology." -- Hilda Phoebe Hudson "I would say with those who say ‘God is Love’, God is Love. But deep down in me I used to say that though God may be Love, God is Truth above all. If it is possible for the human tongue to give the fullest description of God, I have come to the conclusion that God is Truth. Two years ago I went a step further and said that Truth is God. You will see the fine distinction between the two statements, ‘God is Truth’ and ‘Truth is God’. I came to that conclusion after a continuous and relentless search after truth which began fifty years ago." -- Gandhi > Some people say "God is love", Bruno says "God is unprovable truths.", > Paul Tillich said "God is whatever you value most." But just because > somebody says "Unicorns are rhinocereses" doesn't mean I have to start > believing unicorns exist, or that that when I say unicorns don't exist I'm > denying the existence of rhinocereses. > Do you believe in a source of reality beyond the apparent physical reality we find ourselves in now? Jason > > Brent > > > Jason > -- > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups > "Everything List" group. > To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an > email to [email protected]. > To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. > Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list. > For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout. > > > -- > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups > "Everything List" group. > To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an > email to [email protected]. > To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. > Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list. > For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout. > -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. 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