Pure Brutality

[The Grand Nudger]

There it is again, neoliberal capitalist culture is bad, the king in the sky and/or our head has a less self centered plan.....ludicrous on it's face by it's own metrics. No kings plan by the metrics of that king, or whatever we think in our heads is personally best for us, is anything less or other than completely self centered as premised.

[Ahriman]

Improving what? Accepting things you shouldn't accept....? Is that what you mean?

Aristotle thought that there is a certain way people ought to live in order to flourish best. And he thought that this best way was knowable and demonstrable. The Christians adopted his system, though instead of simply being a practical path to flourishing they reframed it as God's will. But here "what God wants" is not some set of arbitrary commandments but simply what is best for ourselves. Dante makes it clear that if we choose to live badly, in a self-harming way, it's because we have made a mistake. We think we have chosen what is best for us, but we're just in error. You can call these bad choices sin or obsessions or fetishes or whatever word you want, but it amounts to the same thing. 

So in the bad old days when everybody was Christian, spiritual change was about re-aligning your mind to the will of God. Which is actually what's best for you anyway. Currently, post-Christianity, a spiritual change would be a similar kind of major reworking, but you wouldn't have to talk about what God wants. You can just say you have to live in the way that's really best for yourself, and discontinue the bad choices that you'd been trained in earlier. 

I think that traditionally spiritual change has tended to aim for less self-centeredness, and learning to value things of actual value, rather than what advertising tells us we should want. So, in terms of "accepting things," yes, it would mean that we would no longer accept the widespread values of Neoliberal capitalist culture. Whether we call this "doing what God would want" or "seeing what's really important," it amounts to the same changes, practically speaking.

I am not at all convinced that God has my best interests in mind. God has let me suffer as much as I have, for this long. Would he ever change his mind and allow me to not suffer? I'm not holding my breath.

[Belacqua]

I am not at all convinced that God has my best interests in mind. God has let me suffer as much as I have, for this long. Would he ever change his mind and allow me to not suffer? I'm not holding my breath.

I see no reason at all to believe in a God who divvies out suffering. If you were raised to believe in such a thing I think that's very unfortunate. It only makes bad situations worse.

I hope the damage can be undone, somehow.

[Thumpalumpacus]

I see no reason at all to believe in a God who divvies out suffering.

Given that suffering is divvied out so wildly, with some in the lap of luxury and others swatting flies off their starving faces, what sort of god might you see reason to believe in?

[Belacqua]

I see no reason at all to believe in a God who divvies out suffering.

Given that suffering is divvied out so wildly, with some in the lap of luxury and others swatting flies off their starving faces, what sort of god might you see reason to believe in?

There are strong arguments for mind as the ground of being. 

Modern versions of this are similar to the Vedic Brahman, the Neoplatonic One, or Aristotle's Prime Mover.

They're all difficult, so I don't know what's true.

[The Grand Nudger]

There are strong arguments for mind being the ground of the experience of being - but that's tautologically true, so ofc there would be. It behooves christian apologists to waffle around this one because they want the strength of that argument but cannot accept it's premise - as god..and not mind, is the ground of christian being.

[Leonardo17]

According to Aristotle, the soul is the form of the body.

That’s the allegory of the cave in Plato’s work. The issue of “Soul” is a deeper subject in spiritual teachings. There is no short answer to it. In fact, if you know what the Soul is, that makes you a spiritually enlightened person.

Grand Nudger:

There you go again.  Before the emergence and spread of political islam in the 6 or 7 hundreds ad the world was "a more peaceful place" too.  They're not doing islam wrong, you are - even if you're doing spirituality right, whatever you and deepak chopra think that is.  The thing that animates these movements...each and every one, explicitly, is the return to whatever passes for an islamic golden age in nutville.  Christianity is going through the same shit over here and has been over the same period.  Both groups are convinced that the trouble with people today ™ is their lack of true spirituality.  We are too materialistic today, and not open enough to a spiritual reality - unlike those people who lived in feudal systems or worse in the past - and that's chemical weapons grade irony, when you let it sink in.  People who uniformly believed that people were property (and often still do....) are supposed to be the exemplars of anti-materialist values in comparison.

Sure, though, islamic states are going through a period of regression at the moment, not because they've left their spiritual roots, but because there's a strong period of retrenchment going on rooted -in- those spiritual beliefs.

 

---

   I like the proof and observation based approach of atheism. I see it as something very positive when somebody says “Well, what’s the basis for that belief. Why would I want to believe in that?”. And inconvenient realities are accepted as better than wishful thinking or a mythology (any mythology) designed to make us happier by denying reality.
   Still: In true Islam there is this emphasis on truth. I’m not talking about today’s Gaza Strip Islam with women hanging around like a shadows of a drone or something like that floating just above them. People like me, who see value in less superficial approaches will see value in this “Truth” issue.
 
   Without going too much into details I’m going to add this: Masses in or era are still deeply stupid. And I’m not simply saying this for spiritual or religious people. If you identify with a political ideology, this is also true for that as well. People in our age are prone to making mistakes and defending irrational ideas. That’s simply the reality of our time. So when you are an atheist, you are a part of a group that promotes empirical realities. And that’s a very positive thing.
 
But Still: There are people like me who will go more solo. Not caring about the vast majority of the group they belong to, and (I believe) manage to get to some very self-nurturing and self-supporting perceptions and understandings. But this is an individual type of experience. So most of us will not climb on rooftops and start spreading “the good news” to get other people aboard:
 

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Sheldon:

So where are we on any objective evidence that a soul or anything spiritual exists, or are even possible?

- You would have to talk to the more dogmatic types of believers. They will see and create these proofs where there is none.

 

On an individual level, there is still a phenomenon called “spiritual growth”. In almost all genuine spiritual teachings, there is this path you have to walk as a personal transformative experience. That’s the thing that is “possible to observe” and therefore somehow empirical at least on some level.

 
And again: This is no easy task, for most people it means a gradual change that appears as a result of sustained effort stretched on years and decades.

Bellaqua:

Spirit is how we perceive the world, how we interpret it, and how we react to it. That's just what spirit is. 

Traditionally, people who think of themselves as spiritual are working toward a method of perceiving, interpreting, and reacting that goes against the material mainstream. Spirit, in this view, is not some differently ontological realm, but a condition of mind. 

This is not my own idea. It goes a long way back.

- That’s the psychological definition. Yet all of this ends when we leave this body. It’s all over. No more.

 
So when we talk about spirit we are talking about something beyond that. Which is the very object of all efforts toward spiritual growth. We would be meditating for hours or studying many different authors if we knew exactly what “Spirit” is.

Ahriman:



v

But they aren't, in fact they are even less aware of reality than most people, the spiritual people are completely living in some fantasy world in their head. I mean shit, we all have fantasies, but this is something else. Spiritual people completely reject the world as it actually is, and instead choose to believe they know a better way. They don't, but they all very much think they do. I had a therapist who was that kind of person, I trusted him for too long. I finally realized all he wanted was money, and stopped seeing him after that. I surmised that he was simply a money grubbing douche after thinking about how, after seeing him for many years, my mom was still the very same insufferable person she always was, so clearly therapy wasn't doing anything for her. But the therapist kept taking her money, and I'm sure he figured out at some point that therapy wasn't helping my mom, he just wanted her to keep coming back so he could make more money. I wanted to believe some people were better than that, but no. This dude clearly thought so highly of himself and was in fact just as much of an asshole as anyone else, if not worse. I have since refused to have any more therapy sessions with any therapist, I don't trust these people anymore. I shouldn't have trusted any of them to begin with. I am baffled at how literally ALL of the pertinent lessons a person learns in life are negative ones.

- I remember reading a book like this many years ago. The author was asking “Why are so many people seeking the truth in the East?” (Meaning the Hippies etc. visiting Katmandu, India etc.).
 
And you are right on this issue. This world is full of people selling some “convenient realities”.
 
And if you are talking about “Us”. We like to keep our two feet on the ground. Yet, we sort of like the explore what I would define as some “Possibilities”. But these are all “spiritual” possibilities. These are issues that are still very disconnected from the typical materialistic world view. But does this make all of us delusional? – I don’t think so.

Bellaqua:

d

I confess I remain very skeptical about all this stuff. The idea that AI has anything like the interior experience, which is a defining characteristic of being human, seems remote to me. 

No doubt it will be useful for all kinds of applications, but I don't see it as anything like a human soul. 

- Well your definition of “Soul” has already started being faked by AI. We even have graphic designer AI’s creating images that took a painter years to imagine in the past. Now the computer is generating several of them within minutes. I’m not talking about more mechanical duties like translation. AI’s are even generating music now. So so much for for the Kettle of odrerir (Kettle of Poetry norse Mythology)

That's true -- it's not just the American cowboy spirit. Putting the ego at the center, justifying that, and atomizing society because of it, happens everywhere to some degree. I mean, if it weren't so prevalent then the spirit-workers wouldn't have to work so hard against it. 

But I do think that our current liberal capitalist bourgeois values require an emphasis on the ego to continue functioning -- it's a vital feature, not a bug. 

Institutionalized religion, it seems to me, sometimes gains popularity in people's attempt to find an alternative to the money-only values that have soaked into the world so deeply. Unfortunately, as you say, the politicized versions of any religion tend to adopt the worst aspects of the political world rather than spreading the best aspects of the religious. It appears that soul-work must always be an individual struggle -- though of course choosing the right models makes all the difference.

Yes and our approach goes further than that. The main issue is this inner-transformation.

 
Many things are easier to say and more difficult to do. True spirituality (in my experience) will add to the potential of you / me doing some of these “positive” works on yourself and on society while helping you to tame and / or modify some more egocentric personality traits. And unlike psychotherapy, it’s free of charge. But still you need to invest in it. I had a trekking coach in college who said “This strip is free of charge but you will be paying with your bodies”, that’s also how real spirituality works. It’s the effort or that kind of investment in it that will usually come back to you as positive changes.

Grandnudger:

dx

The important thing to remember about spirit, is that the american one is bad, mkay.

- Diversity is probably one of the most positive aspects of creation

There it is again, neoliberal capitalist culture is bad, the king in the sky and/or our head has a less self centered plan.....ludicrous on it's face by it's own metrics. No kings plan by the metrics of that king, or whatever we think in our heads is personally best for us, is anything less or other than completely self centered as premised.

- In my view there are some paradigms that are good for some eras and less good for other eras. I still define myself as a capitalist. That is I believe in the power of the market to incite people to create good in a spirit of fair competition. But I also believe in a balance factor and I will want to point to the fact that 19th century capitalism is over (Since after the great economic crisis of 1929 and the Keynesian policies that followed under president Roosevelt). And I also believe in the value of Socialist approaches. That’s the big debate in France today. I kind of like the policies of the liberal French politician Emmanuel Macron. But I also feel compassionate for the common French people who are completely opposed to his liberal approaches that might impoverish them.

 
And that’s when spirituality kicks in. I now have the ability to be both capitalist and socialist at the same time

[The Grand Nudger]

Perhaps ai isn't faking anything Leo? You declined to speculate on which of a set of quotes was legit deepak and which were from the deepak generator.

Your idea of what a soul is boils down to fairy tales and bedtime stories. There's no point beating around that bush. If knowing what soul is defines a person as spiritual, there's a distinct possibility that would suggest that you and the rest of the new agers are as far from spiritual as could be possible. Not only do you not know what soul is, you reject what it is in favor of a range of wild eyed fantasies for any number of dubious reasons.

[Ahriman]

Spiritual growth don't mean a damn thing, leads nowhere. And on top of that, it costs money. So you're basically paying for nothing. You're paying for some douche to make you think you're on the right track, when nothing is actually happening. In fact, you might even be losing ground.

[The Grand Nudger]

I think we have a choice to make on this. We can either take the subject seriously, or not. So spiritual growth (and spirit) may indeed mean something, lead all sorts of places, and importantly.... be an actual thing that exists in reality......or, it's religious revisionism, the oddities of the self help book market, and ghost stories.... all the way down.