(February 24, 2012 at 12:12 am)Bgood Wrote: The more I read and hear Alan Watts speak the more I fall in love with the man. WATT a great intellect!
Here we may have to agree to agree. There are bits he has written that seemed overly pretentious and cheezily suggestive to me but one of my all time favorite books is one he wrote called "The Wisdom of Insecurity".
(February 24, 2012 at 12:12 am)Bgood Wrote: Human consciousness is a mysterious thing. Even if "god" exists or not, the human mind and body combination is a miracle I don't care what all the naysayers and cynical atheists say.
Damn I've got to agree once again. It truly is an amazing thing and so poorly understood by science at this time that philosophy actually has things of relevance to say about consciousness. By the time a thing becomes better understood it will have gravitated over to science completely.
I'm too not too keen about separating mind and consciousness from body however. Dualism is flawed. Outside of the movies no one has managed to separate a mind from a body without ending consciousness. We scarcely understand how consciousness emerges from the workings of a living brain so any speculation about an after life for disembodied consciousness seem ridiculous at best.
For me, atheism does not necessitate a stance of "nothing but .." toward any question. For my money, any understanding of human nature that can be reduced to rationalism is incomplete.
