(May 1, 2014 at 8:48 am)Kitanetos Wrote: From someone who was pagan, the deity most often associated with the earth as a living entity is Gaea/Gaia.
This is a page from Goddess Gift Net. At the bottom it says -
Quote:Venus of Willendorf: Neolithic. Great-breasted Nurturer. Willendorf Goddess represents Gaia, Mother Earth, and Mothering in all her raw and fertile splendor.
This is a modern belief, of course, because nobody knows what the figurine represented to the person who made it. It's likely that people in the Upper Paleolithic period had developed a concept of an Earth goddess but we have no idea what they would have called her because they didn't leave any written records.
There is no mystery as to why my unconscious mind chose this symbol. I already knew that some modern pagans think that the Venus of Willendorf is Gaia.
(May 1, 2014 at 8:48 am)Kitanetos Wrote: I believe when someone states that a divine, godly presence is felt, it is simply that individual's mind misinterpreting the way that the body is responding to stimuli created by what it experiences. For instance, sometimes listening to music or a speech to which one is particularly atuned can create a profound well of emotion in an individual, and that is why theists listening to the music/speech claim to feel god when they are actually substituting a natural bodily experience for the divine.
Neuroscience is showing that there's more to it than that. The transcript of God On The Brain is a good introduction to this line of research.
Where are the snake and mushroom smilies?