(July 10, 2017 at 3:36 pm)JackRussell Wrote:I completely agree that there is no more reason to accept one supernatural concept over another, even if no deities are on offer. The supernatural is not a coherent concept, much less a supportable one. "Wonder and the numinous" can indeed be experienced without resorting to the supernatural or subscribing to "spirit permeating the world around you".(July 10, 2017 at 3:31 pm)Khemikal Wrote: Generally speaking, people who do not follow a religious tradition and may not even believe in gods as entities - but do feel or believe in some sort of inneffable, commonly supernatural, "x" or spirit permeating the world around them. Any animist, most neopagans, assorted shamans and fortune tellers and ritualists fit this descriptor. All deists fit. Some theists - but it's a stretch on that count.
Ok, fine, but why should any rational person accept this too. Wonder and the numinous as experiential can be understood perfectly naturally as well.
On the other hand, I wonder if it's necessarily bad to "fool yourself" provided you understand that's what you're doing. I for example have great fondness for coffee but for various reasons it's bad for me physically. On my daily walk, I frequently promise myself that I'll stop at the local Dunkin Donuts for a latte when I get to that point on my walk -- and then I break that promise to myself when I get there, telling myself that I'm almost home anyway and I'm kind of hot and would just rather have a glass of ice water. I just tell myself different things and my dimbulb subconscious believes it, even if I know I'm lying. This is a well known fact, that your subconscious is terribly gullible and responds to commands -- even commands of your own conscious self -- quite well. You only have to be willing to personify it a little and talk to it as if it's a separate being.
It is not my style to get through my life existentially in that way, but I can see how it could work. Jedi mind tricks seem like cheating, but in my old age I just don't give a fig anymore ... whatever works. If I needed to kid myself about gods or afterlives, I suppose I could. I wonder if many people don't do that anyway, even if they won't admit to it. I know so many people who hold their faith so loosely that it seems totally ad-hoc and utterly self-contradictory. If you gently press them, they'll admit it -- yet, they persist in it. Why? I can only presume that it works for them. [shrug]
