The Great Beyond

[peter]

I think the anthropomorphisation (is there such a word - I'm sure you know what I mean) of God is one of the greatest barriers that many people have to breaking out of the shackles of the scientific mindset - the one that says that everything must be reducible to numbers and rational explanation. To be truly emancipated from the superstition of religious belief and dogma (this way of thinking would have it) one must be completely embedded in the factual, the empirical, the rational, with no room left over for the ineffable mystery of, well, anything, beyond the elucidating power of the enquiring methodology of science.

Simply the name 'God' immediately fixes the mind into the very place where it is going to exercise it's critical faculties - and that place is anthropomorphised to the point where in our enlightened age, the result for many is a foregone conclusion. I think it would be more helpful to drop any such names altogether, when considering what may or may not hold true beyond those places where the scientific method shines its light. Let's simply call it 'the Great Beyond', for example. I think this immediately opens up the mind to a multitude of possibilities - the stuff that may be the case in dimensions or universes, at distances, times and places that will forever be outside, be beyond the reach of our knowing. Forms of being beyond our conception, physical realities that defy the possible, emergent states of which we could never imagine in our wildest dreams. This is the Great Beyond - and I think it is much harder to deny by even the most hardened materialist, than our anthropomorphised God that so easily collapses under the scrutiny of the modern ways of thought. In the Great Beyond literally anything is possible.

[Skyweir]

Well that is definitely one semantic change that can perpetuate mystery and mystique.

“The great beyond” without any limitations of form, definition or appreciable parameters heartens back to ye olde times - when to insinuate appreciable parameters to the divine was a capitol sacrilege of the most dire.

Ahh the good old days of yore - when mystery and mystique held compelling sway over the hearts and minds of men (women and children).

That is irrefutably a rebuttal to science and scientific method.

And to be quite honest if ones heart and mind finds peace in semantic blinders fantasy offers and in the sublimely intent focus and pleasure of possibilities - more power to you.

Though I acknowledge the value of the visceral - an understanding of realities, the material, the immaterial, matter, anti-matter, appreciation of questions, exploration, understanding, problem solving and what forensic insights can offer those who seek to elevate understanding from superstition and magiks to substantive concepts.

[peter]

I have no problem with the search for knowledge - just the hubris that says man is the measure of all things. For me a life from which the ineffable, the mystery, the sheer joy of possibility is denied, is a lesser thing. A truncated version of what we are designed to be. The things we know today would have been the impossibilities, the magic, the mystery of yesteryear. No matter how large an area over which we cast the cold light of reason, the realm of the unknown outwith will render it a pinprick in the face of the immensity beyond where dreams may have free reign. Free of the anthropomorphism of our conventional thinking, denial of the ineffable becomes unsustainable.

[Skyweir]

I guess we must inform ourselves differently- I’ve read not one work of hubris from a scientific/forensic source that claims humankind is the measure of all things.

Not sure where you are getting a scientific dismissal of the universe, the evolution of the natural world and the complex and varied strata of all living systems.

Or one that places man as it’s focus ~ that sounds more like the domain of religion. Religions, superstition places humankind as the epicentre of all. After all man was made in “gods image” but “The Great Beyond” seems to seek both invincibility from critique and definition while perpetuating the divine importance of man.

Also scientific discovery thrives on possibility - to enable innovation such cannot be quashed or stifled. Imaginative creativity is the stuff of innovation and discovery.

Maybe you have your wires crossed lol

You are right the things we know today were not conceived in days gone by.

Free of the anthropomorphism of our conventional thinking, denial of the ineffable becomes unsustainable.

These are attributions to religion - giving gods human characteristics - and denial of the indescribable is nothing more than scientifically acknowledged folly.

There is much we mere humans do not comprehend - the nature & existence of gods is absolutely one of them.

Humans strive for supramortal meaning and relevance - I’d argue it is THAT which is unsustainable lol especially in the face of perpetual scientific discovery.

We now know and understand that there are no supra or supernatural entities floating about in the mesosphere - harp playing or otherwise.

But what we know and maybe continue to discover expands our understanding - it doesn’t stifle it or restrict it.

What poet or artist do you know who no longer create because our understanding of the world is more granular and rigorous?

We inhabit an amazing age - that celebrates discovery and exploration of new ways of thinking. Such adds enlightenment imo - and expands reason (imv reason is not cold but as alive and energetic as a wildfire) - not shrinks it.

We know the earth is not flat, we have not only reached for the stars but we are understanding our place with them.

We will continue learning and discovering and never stop. In a millenia when we have long gone - we will understand sooo much more.

That’s exciting to me.

[peter]

In truth I think we are just different Sky. You are more hard-headed, I'm more aesthetically minded (wrong word but it suffices). For each of us, being is going to be interpreted in the way that serves us best. For me, your way of seeing the world is parochial, narrow focused, while for you, mine is unrealistic and unsupported in the light of our current understanding. For me there will always be unicorns to be seen at 3am in the morning. I like it that way, but I concede it is a step too far for most people.

[Skyweir]

Our different persons should not impact what is factual or actual, no? Or whether or not your assertions above approach validity.

Discussions like these open minds, no? As we explore different ways of thinking we embrace critique, challenge and different perspectives to measure our understanding against.

Or we are merely engaging in an act of verbal declarations of “our will” in which different perspectives are summarily dismissed.

[peter]

Our different persons should not impact what is factual or actual, no? Or whether or not your assertions above approach validity.

Or indeed yours Sky.

My point in making the op was simply that the anthrpomorphic thinking in which so many discussions about philosophical materialism versus an acknowledgement of the ineffable/incomprehensible nature of being is shot-through, immediately skews the debate in a way that is detrimental to the cause of the latter. Couching such debates in terms of the 'Biblical God' versus science is to handicap the argument in favour of the scientific method/mindset to the point where adherents to the belief that there is, and will ever be, much more than we can know 'out there' - possibilities that will transcend our comprehensive abilities, now and forever, are stymied from the off; it is to cut the legs from under such arguments before they even start. Whether my belief or yours Sky, is one way or the other, it impinges not one iota on this point.

[Skyweir]

And you have furnished the thread with your ethereal thoughts regarding your assertion but have not yet established it as a fact .. it’s seems more a personal declaration of thought.

[peter]

At what point are speculations of the numinous sort anything other? But I contend my life is the richer for having a spiritual dimension than it would be if I shackled my thinking with the chains of brute fact. To each his own however.......

[Skyweir]

Ahh in this also we differ … I see fact / aka science as liberating and enlightening.

I see the mind shackled by religious dogma and superstition.

But that is as it is … where would we be if we all thought the same.

Though I see DIS-information and anti-fact movements as socially dangerous and harmful.

So many in the world today anchor themselves to conspiracy thought and movements - and in so doing limit their ability to see beyond such fantasies.

[peter]

By a world without altered states, expanded consciousness, extended frontiers. Nothing that can't be ripped apart in a test-tube. How drear.......

[Skyweir]

It’s only because you choose to view it that way

To see as the apostle Paul wrote “through a glass darkly” is to have an obscure or imperfect vision of reality - but - that time would remedy - is the worldview many preference in its choosing.

In time our understanding of the myriad mysteries of the earth and the universes upon universes will be expanded (by intellect) and we will no doubt look back in disbelief at what we once faithfully clung to.

Imagination is a key and critical component in scientific discovery and exploration.