Your position on naturalism

[Edwardo Piet]

You're the most sensible theist I've ever known. Apologies for blowing up on you earlier this month. It said more about my current state of mind than about you.

[emoji106]

I'm a very flexible person(ality).

Thank you for the kind words! Apology accepted, Alasdair. There are no hard feelings, I assure you!

Same here. An important aspect of my own personal and philosophical outlook regarding philosophies and personalities is that the way we analyze and personalize in a moment can greatly be in conflict with how we analyze and personalize in a lifetime.

Also both the short-term and long-term is less realistically relevant and therefore less vitally real than the medium-term which must exist by virtue of the other two terms being ends on a continuum.

[Kernel Sohcahtoa]

Ignorant, first off, I want to thank you for taking the time to give a very intelligent and well-thought out response to my questions. IMO, your conduct in this discussion is quite admirable.  With that said, If I've understood you correctly, then god cannot be anything concrete or finitely intelligible.  Is this correct?


 

If "a being" IS that act, I'm not sure the experience would be finitely intelligible like the rest of our experiences. The intelligible finitude of "things" (or "beings") is enough to know that it is not god.

Think of it this way: Imagine what it would be like to "discover" something as abstract as "being, itself". Imagine discovering "love, itself" or "truth, itself" or "beauty, itself" or "goodness, itself". Anything discovered as even remotely "concrete" is enough to tell you that it isn't god, or being, or love, or truth or beauty or goodness.

What happens when we do encounter something which does not seem concrete and appears to have no intelligible finitude?  Do we conclude that this is a deity? Is it possible that this thing can be understood, but we just lack the knowledge and development to understand it? Could the god of humanity's theists be a commonplace being to another sentient life-form much more advanced than us?  How would we know the difference?

[Edwardo Piet]

The basic problem I find with my own interpretation of Ignorant's position is that from my perspective it seems as though Ignorant is saying that God is noumenal and to know God himself is to know reality itself as opposed to knowing merely our own perceptions of it. And so Ignorant is saying That's Why God Is Important.

Unfortunately from my perspective it seems like the following question begging scenario:

How can God matter to us within the phenomenal realm?
Because God is reality itself, God is goodness itself. God is being itself. So God is the only thing that can matter to us.
But that's the noumenal realm and inaccessible by definition. So, again, my question is how can God matter to us within the phenomenal realm?
No, God exists in both realms and by definition God is the only thing that can matter to us.
But the phenomenal realm is all that matters to us because it's all that's accessible to us. So, again, how can God matter to us within the phenomenal realm?
Because God is reality itself, God is goodness itself. God is being itself. So God is the only thing that can matter to us.
But how?
Because God is the the only thing that can.
But how?

The problem is that to me it seems as though there's a relevant question being asked about epistemology: "How can we know God in a way that matters to us?" that is being answered with an irrelevant statement about ontology: "Because God is the only thing we can know that matters within our reality."

The question is "How?" but the answer is "What!"

I'm sure that you don't see it this way and probably feel I have strawmanned you, Ignorant. But remember this is just how I see the problem from my perspective. I hope that at least giving you the way I interpret the problem can be of some value or use to you.

[Silver]

So basically believers are seeking to know god rather than to better know themselves; when in all rationality they are merely substituting the basest, darkest parts of themselves for a belief in something that supports them in a world that otherwise rationally finds them to be just as evil as the being in which they believe; except, with the hold religion has on society, the behavior is seen as a means toward a beneficial end rather than the pure evil it is.

[robvalue]

In my opinion, God exists in the mind of each theist, and there's a different one for each theist. It's an idealised projection of the self.

For those of them that are "aware" of god's opinions on things, those opinions almost always happen to match up with the theist's. Yet the theists disagree with each other, often on some of the most fundamental points of reality and morality. Even people from the same religion.

That leads to several possibilities, none of which support a well-intentioned, powerful being that seeks to properly communicate with us, let alone a "God", whatever that is.

[bennyboy]

If God isn't a being, then who's Jesus?  Is Jesus "being, itself?"

=) YES! That is one of the basic Christian claims, anyway.

Hmmmm. . . to me, my mind is my being.  You are saying that my mind is Jesus?  Does this apply to everyone?  Is the mind of a child-molesting serial murderer Jesus?

This is a new claim for me-- I don't remember reading it in the Bible.  Is it a Catholic tenet?

[Ignorant]

=) YES! That is one of the basic Christian claims, anyway.

Hmmmm. . . to me, my mind is my being.  You are saying that my mind is Jesus? [1] Does this apply to everyone? [2] Is the mind of a child-molesting serial murderer Jesus? [3]

This is a new claim for me-- I don't remember reading it in the Bible.  Is it a Catholic tenet? [4]

Thanks for your questions.

1) No, I am not saying that your mind is Jesus. If your mind is your being and not "being, itself", then your mind is not Jesus, who IS "being, itself".

2) No. It seems like it would ONLY apply to Jesus. On your account, ONLY Jesus's mind is Jesus. If your mind is your being, then Jesus's mind is his being. If Jesus is "being, itself", then his mind is "being, itself".

3) Clearly not. See 1 and 2.

4) Catholicism does not teach that "your" mind is Jesus. Catholicism DOES hold that Jesus is god. If god is "being, itself", then Jesus is "being, itself".

[Ignorant]

Ignorant, first off, I want to thank you for taking the time to give a very intelligent and well-thought out response to my questions. IMO, your conduct in this discussion is quite admirable.  With that said, If I've understood you correctly, then god cannot be anything concrete or finitely intelligible.  Is this correct? [1]

What happens when we do encounter something which does not seem concrete and appears to have no intelligible finitude? Do we conclude that this is a deity? [2] Is it possible that this thing can be understood, but we just lack the knowledge and development to understand it? [3] Could the god of humanity's theists be a commonplace being to another sentient life-form much more advanced than us? [4] How would we know the difference? [5]

I appreciate your kind words and polite questions, Kernel. Thank you. Great name by the way.

1) Yes, god cannot be anything finitely intelligible. As for the word "concrete", I do not think it is the best word, but I can't think of a better one at the moment that similarly resembles finite intelligibility. I intended it as just such a synonym, but I certainly recognize its limitations and ambiguity. In short, finite intelligibility is a via negativa.

2) I personally can't even begin to imagine or propose what that sort of encounter would even be like. Even so, if we were to encounter something like this, I imagine we would be quite puzzled, and wonder if we've encountered anything at all. 

I don't think we could rationally conclude that it is "a deity" given the information so far (and perhaps, in principle, we never could).

3) Certainly. That is a possibility.

4) There are a few senses I could understand this question, so I am gonna choose to go with the sense that does not involve "revelation".

If the god of humanity's theists is understood to be "being, itself", then it cannot be "one being among many". Any "being", however advanced, is existentially related to "being, itself", even if that relationship is a "more advanced" one than the human relationship with "being, itself". It doesn't get more "commonplace" than that, i.e. "being, itself" is "common" to all places and all beings. They may be more aware of it. They may understand it more than we do. But they would still rely on it existentially in the same way we do. That is what "being, itself" means... it is common to all "beings".

5) Like I said, something about being human knows the difference between a "true thing" and "truth, itself". We don't tend to confuse an individual truth with the "truth, itself". That may mean that, even if we did "encounter" truth-itself, we would have no positive way of knowing what we've encountered as truth-itself.

May I ask a question? Suppose there is no positive way to determine that something we've encountered IS being-itself. Would that make my view of the world, as presented earlier, inconsistent/inadequate/etc.?

[bennyboy]

Hmmmm. . . to me, my mind is my being.  You are saying that my mind is Jesus? [1] Does this apply to everyone? [2] Is the mind of a child-molesting serial murderer Jesus? [3]

This is a new claim for me-- I don't remember reading it in the Bible.  Is it a Catholic tenet? [4]

Thanks for your questions.

1) No, I am not saying that your mind is Jesus. If your mind is your being and not "being, itself", then your mind is not Jesus, who IS "being, itself".

2) No. It seems like it would ONLY apply to Jesus. On your account, ONLY Jesus's mind is Jesus. If your mind is your being, then Jesus's mind is his being. If Jesus is "being, itself", then his mind is "being, itself".

3) Clearly not. See 1 and 2.

4) Catholicism does not teach that "your" mind is Jesus. Catholicism DOES hold that Jesus is god. If god is "being, itself", then Jesus is "being, itself".

Are you defining God, or saying one of His aspects or properties?  It would seem strange for "being, itself" to manifest as a burning bush, or to play party tricks with jugs of water.  It would make much more sense for "a" being to do so.

But "being" is a -ness that should be global-- any individual being, if it is separate, should not be "being, itself."  And since Jesus had place locality, and spoke as an individual entity rather than a global property, it would seem that Jesus must have been a man, somewhat like me, and cannot have been God in the sense that you are here defining it.

[Pat Mustard]

Well, it does succinctly point out the fact that you've not answered the original question. In fact, you'd answer no question with that answer.

Thank you for your observation.

You really don't like having your equivocations called out, do you?