2011 KW Religious Composition Poll

[ussusimiel]

Your description of the ecstatic experience is very close to what I'm thinking about.[Have you ever experienced this yourself? Psilocybin ('shrooms) has been the only way I've been able to do it, myself.]

Hints only (intimations might be a better word). My intuition is that the experience is so powerful that I fear it. It is ironic (maybe paradoxical ) that what may be the most fully human experience can also be perceived as terrifying!

u.

[Cambo]

Your description of the ecstatic experience is very close to what I'm thinking about.[Have you ever experienced this yourself? Psilocybin ('shrooms) has been the only way I've been able to do it, myself.]

Hints only (intimations might be a better word). My intuition is that the experience is so powerful that I fear it. It is ironic (maybe paradoxical ) that what may be the most fully human experience can also be perceived as terrifying!

u.

I've experienced it spontaneously, and with psychedelics (shrooms acid and mescaline). The only absolute faith I have is in the truth of these experiences. Just the experiences mind you, not in my interpretation of them.

Fascinating conversation, you guys!

[Zarathustra]

U, your description of the ecstatic experience is very accurate. You must have done your research if you haven't experienced it yourself. The part about not fearing death and feeling your fundamental unity with the world is spot on. It really is a bodily awakening that borders on spiritual. You become aware of yourself as a mortal, physical being to such an astounding degree of acceptance, that your physical being is revealed as the "magical" "miracle" that it truly is, which we so easily take for granted. Not a conceptual understanding, like a biologist or enthusiastic documentary narrator, but a lived-in awakening to the sheer reality of your being. At the same time, there is the consciousness "expansion" and ego-loss, so that the social roles and conceptual boundaries that separate us into distinct social selves breaks down to give one a sense of unity with everything and everyone.

Research is currently underway on using pysilocybin for cancer patients, and it has shown positive results in helping them to accept their imminent death. It relieves them of their anxiety and allows them to enjoy what little time they have left, to live in the moment and not worry about how their death will affect their family.

And I think this is an important distinction with most religions and religious experience for the very same reasons U pointed out here:

I used to do what religious people normally do (I was raised a Catholic) and focus on the primacy of the spirit over the body.

I think that focus on the primacy of the spirit over the body is a form of denial of the body due to inability to accept mortality. Though it's probably not fair to bring Rus up when he's not here to defend himself, I don't believe anyone else here expressed the religious aversion to death more explicitly than he did. He seemed to express the common notion I've encountered among many religious people that there is something wrong with this world because we die ... a view I believe is encapsulated in the Garden of Eden story, and the Fall of man. Primacy of the spirit is just another way to say "denial of body." It's my opinion that people who think this way believe they are reclaiming a higher spiritual existence, but I believe they are losing what truly makes us a walking miracle.

This is what I like so much about U's return to the body, reclaiming the body. And I believe it's what Nietzsche was talking about in my signature. Instead of "overcoming" the body, our spirituality needs to embrace it.

[ussusimiel]

Excellent posts, Z! And surprising for me because I always expect to get contradiction from the 'materialists' (although, I don't think I can count you among them anymore, by your own definition ).

I shouldn't really be surprised because anytime I read your quote from Nietzsche I sense something powerfully 'spiritual' in it. I think that you are right about our views approaching the same point from different directions.

u.

[Vraith]

Primacy of the spirit is just another way to say "denial of body." It's my opinion that people who think this way believe they are reclaiming a higher spiritual existence, but I believe they are losing what truly makes us a walking miracle.

This is what I like so much about U's return to the body, reclaiming the body.

I have had several such experiences, some drug-aided, but more important I think, especially on the above point, some not drug-aided. The strongest/most intense twice on long-distance swims, once long distance bike ride. And those weren't the "runner's high"/endorphin rush thing...though I think that may be a "first stage," or lower-level version. To me they felt like a simultaneous being in the moment/motion/body and beyond/engulfing that, being the sphere containing that center [and all the stuff "between"] of moment/motion/body.
Also twice very intensely in performance [in a musical, and in a band...the thing about those is that it wasn't just me in it]. It's pretty obvious the mechanisms cannot be exactly the same, but the holistic feel, though there were differences in particulars, occurred in the same "structure"/"space" on the same "ground," if that makes sense.
I don't think there can be a real "spirit" separate from a body and mind. Dualism is a red herring, and "the spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak" is both an inversion and mockery of what we are.
That doesn't mean spirituality isn't real and valuable and meaningful. Mostly I think it means exactly the opposite.
I don't think it matters/ruins/falsifies spirituality that a soul doesn't "exist" in a manifest/material sense any more than it ruins/falsifies mathematics that a true perfect circle can't be manifest/material in our physical world.
I think "oneness" with the universe is an absurdity in almost every sense...but the experience of that oneness real and priceless. If that makes sense.

[Hashi Lebwohl]

the common notion I've encountered among many religious people that there is something wrong with this world because we die ... a view I believe is encapsulated in the Garden of Eden story, and the Fall of man.

I wouldn't call death "wrong" or say that because there is something wrong with this world that death happens. Instead, it is simply a by-product of the physical world as it exists. Thermodynamics tells us that entropy always increases (in any system, dS > 0 where dS in the rate of entropy); in other words, everything seeks out the lowest energy state. Because of this, things break down and living beings die. The physical world is not meant to be immortal or eternal.

[Zarathustra]

Hashi, so you don't believe in a Fall? You don't believe in inherited sin? Without those concepts--without the idea that there is something "wrong" with man and/or the universe--there is no need for the concept of salvation. Jesus, repentance, Baptism, etc. would all be unnecessary if there wasn't something in need of "fixing."

For those who do take the Eden story seriously/literally, I've often wondered how they thought life would work out with immortal humans. They think God never originally intended for us to get into heaven?

[ussusimiel]

I always expect to get contradiction from the 'materialists'

I have had several such experiences, some drug-aided, but more important I think, especially on the above point, some not drug-aided. The strongest/most intense twice on long-distance swims, once long distance bike ride. And those weren't the "runner's high"/endorphin rush thing...though I think that may be a "first stage," or lower-level version. To me they felt like a simultaneous being in the moment/motion/body and beyond/engulfing that, being the sphere containing that center [and all the stuff "between"] of moment/motion/body.
Also twice very intensely in performance [in a musical, and in a band...the thing about those is that it wasn't just me in it]. It's pretty obvious the mechanisms cannot be exactly the same, but the holistic feel, though there were differences in particulars, occurred in the same "structure"/"space" on the same "ground," if that makes sense.
I don't think there can be a real "spirit" separate from a body and mind. Dualism is a red herring, and "the spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak" is both an inversion and mockery of what we are.
That doesn't mean spirituality isn't real and valuable and meaningful. Mostly I think it means exactly the opposite.
I don't think it matters/ruins/falsifies spirituality that a soul doesn't "exist" in a manifest/material sense any more than it ruins/falsifies mathematics that a true perfect circle can't be manifest/material in our physical world.
I think "oneness" with the universe is an absurdity in almost every sense...but the experience of that oneness real and priceless. If that makes sense.

That's what I'm talking about!

Vraith, you are a scare-quote-less materialist

u.

[EDIT: to remove a surplus 'I'. Is that ironic? ]

[Vraith]

That's what I I'm talking about!

Vraith, you are a scare-quote-less materialist

u.

You realize now you are going to break my heart if you ever say I'm not funny again, right?

[ussusimiel]

That's what I I'm talking about!

Vraith, you are a scare-quote-less materialist

u.

You realize now you are going to break my heart if you ever say I'm not funny again, right?

I suppose if a person only has one plane of existence I'd hate to deny them their sense of humour as well

u.

[Avatar]

I think "oneness" with the universe is an absurdity in almost every sense...but the experience of that oneness real and priceless. If that makes sense.

Yeah, I don't get that feeling. Never have. My experience is always individualistic. Separate. Apart. Observational. That sort of thing.

--A

[Hashi Lebwohl]

Hashi, so you don't believe in a Fall? You don't believe in inherited sin? Without those concepts--without the idea that there is something "wrong" with man and/or the universe--there is no need for the concept of salvation. Jesus, repentance, Baptism, etc. would all be unnecessary if there wasn't something in need of "fixing."

For those who do take the Eden story seriously/literally, I've often wondered how they thought life would work out with immortal humans. They think God never originally intended for us to get into heaven?

Yes, of course. The Fall was the choice to disobey God's direct command, thus breaking the fellowship we had; the result of this was the loss of our sanctified nature and thus we made ourselves susceptible to corruption, both mortal and spiritual. Even with this in mind, death isn't necessarily "wrong" but it is the logical consequence of a bad choice.

Note, though, that there isn't anything "wrong" with this world or universe--it is as it was made and it was made so that it would eventually break down. What is wrong is our broken relationship...but fortunately that can be fixed.

[Linna Heartbooger]

For those who do take the Eden story seriously/literally, I've often wondered how they thought life would work out with immortal humans. They think God never originally intended for us to get into heaven?

So, in this comment, are you treating 'heaven' as a thing that is 'purely spiritual,' i.e. not united with the physical world?

While even many churchgoers assume that model... it's got about as much agreement with the Christian sacred story as... say, license to do evil "because every sin will be forgiven" has in common with Christian ethics.

...I have some more things I'd like to say and ask about what you wrote. However, time to fix my lovelies some dinner instead...

Do I sense a concession to their physical needs?
Fixing a dinner for those nearest and dearest to you, those counting on you to show them love & nurture day in and day out...
...when, instead, you could be having a serious and intellectual discussion about spiritual matters?
I don't know about your priorities, Ananda...

which is to say... classy comment in context.
(I fear I actually made the reverse of that comment a year or so ago.)

[Zarathustra]

Hashi, so you don't believe in a Fall? You don't believe in inherited sin? Without those concepts--without the idea that there is something "wrong" with man and/or the universe--there is no need for the concept of salvation. Jesus, repentance, Baptism, etc. would all be unnecessary if there wasn't something in need of "fixing."

For those who do take the Eden story seriously/literally, I've often wondered how they thought life would work out with immortal humans. They think God never originally intended for us to get into heaven?

Yes, of course. The Fall was the choice to disobey God's direct command, thus breaking the fellowship we had; the result of this was the loss of our sanctified nature and thus we made ourselves susceptible to corruption, both mortal and spiritual. Even with this in mind, death isn't necessarily "wrong" but it is the logical consequence of a bad choice.

Note, though, that there isn't anything "wrong" with this world or universe--it is as it was made and it was made so that it would eventually break down. What is wrong is our broken relationship...but fortunately that can be fixed.

You're assuming Genesis is an actual history. I assume it's a story. From my perspective, it doesn't matter that you describe mortality as a logical consequence of a bad choice,* it's still just a religious way to account for something about this world that is "broken." Something went wrong in the Garden. We wouldn't have mortality if there had been no "bad choice" as you say. So instead of viewing our death as a natural process of every biological organism, you view it as a logical consequence of a punishing supernatural entity involved in a moral judgment of Mankind. That in itself--taking the Eden story literally--is a way to make death less than natural. It's a denial of death, by viewing in terms of "that which should not be." Sure, you think it "should be" because Adam and Eve sinned, so it "should be" because it's an apt punishment. But the assumed justice of this moral judgment is based on the idea that God has the right to judge us like this. It's a way to accept the judgment (otherwise, you wouldn't recognize the need for salvation). But this accepting judgment is what I'm talking about. It's like the Clave, viewing our existence as a kind of punishment, a judgment we receive merely because we happen to find ourselves alive. Damned-from-birth is life denying, world denying, and out of these denials arise a myth of redemption/salvation (being saved from that which is being denied: that our death is real, that it really is our end, and not some fantastical new beginning). The concepts of redemption and salvation are themselves a part of that denial ... the idea that we need to be saved in the first place.


*[Death for disobedience--from a loving god--doesn't seem all that logical to me ... I don't kill my children when they disobey me.]

So, in this comment, are you treating 'heaven' as a thing that is 'purely spiritual,' i.e. not united with the physical world?

While even many churchgoers assume that model... it's got about as much agreement with the Christian sacred story as... say, license to do evil "because every sin will be forgiven" has in common with Christian ethics.

I recognize that you might think this is an important distinction, but honestly, it's about as relevant to me as someone responding to a criticism of the implausibility of Greek mythology with a correction of the critic's knowledge of Greek mythology. No point of clarification on your part could ever convince me of the consistency or truth of your particular religion. A heaven that is connected to earth is so much more implausible and unprovable than the assumptions of my original question, that it only strengthens my point: this world, this existence, this body, can't be accepted as it is by those who share the view that something was "broken" by the actions of humans in Eden. For those people who view our existence as a state which necessitates salvation, they invent states of being (e.g. heaven) and parts of ourselves (e.g. spirits) which ostensibly transcend--i.e. escape, deny, subsume--this world and this body. Whether that is connected to this world or not, it still represents a kind of nihilistic judgment of our being as "that which it should not be." If reality needs this invisible layer of heaven + spirit + salvation in order to make peace with reality, then obviously one is not at peace with one's reality as it is.

My question was more an expression of my incredulity over the concept of death as some sort of rebirth or return to our ideal state (going to heaven, or the Rapture, or whatever). If salvation somehow negates or redeems Adam's original sin, why doesn't it also negate his punishment and return you back to the ideal "Adam-state?" Well, the answer is obvious to me: there never was an ideal "Adam-state" which was broken and corrupted by original sin. Your salvation myth is conveniently beyond the grave because there is there is absolutely no evidence for it, and beyond the grave is the one place where you can hide from that lack of evidence, and pretend it's all true. It's a way to face dying and not really think of it as the end. Like I said, a denial.

[Hashi Lebwohl]

You're assuming Genesis is an actual history.

erm...no, I don't. Some of the Bible is history, like the Chronicles or Kings, or Judges. Most of Genesis, like Revelation, is allegory--a story designed to teach a lesson.

Lucifer *chose* to disobey; his consequences are entirely of his own making. It can be argued that we, also, chose to "disobey" and become fully mortal, thus opening the door for death. This would be like having teenaged children whom you have told for years "drinking and driving is dangerous so don't do it" but they wind up doing it anyway, getting into a wreck, and dying. They chose to disobey your wise counsel and thus chose death.

the assumed justice of this moral judgment is based on the idea that God has the right to judge us like this

But He does have the right to judge us.

Life in this world isn't a punishment; it merely is what it is. Death was not originally part of the plan; God had to adjust the plan after the Fall.

After reading your reply to Linna, I think you misunderstand--no one, especially not me, would ever try and convince you that Christianity is either real or true. If you ask we will tell you what we believe; after that, you have to decide if you are going to accept it or reject it. No, I do not recognize any "burden of proof" requirement that anyone might make--I don't have to prove anything to anyone.

No rational person denies death. However, what is wrong with thinking that death doesn't necessarily have to be the end of existence? How does that harm anyone? Even if I am completely wrong and death is the end, how have I made myself any less of a person by thinking otherwise?

[Avatar]

I just worry that people might not do all they can to make this world better if they think it doesn't matter because what's really important is what happens after you die.

That said, plenty of religious people are dedicated to making this world a better place, so obviously there are different ways of seeing it. (Although, maybe they're trying so that their afterlife is better, but that's fine with me. )

--A

[Hashi Lebwohl]

Well, it is always possible to be overly zealous and care more about your afterlife than your real life, but people like that typically are a little off-balance already. All things in moderation.

[Avatar]

Yeah...the other thing is the "jam tomorrow" aspect of it. Doesn't matter if you're struggling now, it'll all be alright when you die...

(Of course, I also think it won't matter when you die, but for different reasons. )

But all that said, I'm also cognisant of the many good works that the religious do. There are positive aspects to it too.

--A

[Linna Heartbooger]

So, in this comment, are you treating 'heaven' as a thing that is 'purely spiritual,' i.e. not united with the physical world?

While even many churchgoers assume that model... it's got about as much agreement with the Christian sacred story as... say, license to do evil "because every sin will be forgiven" has in common with Christian ethics.

I recognize that you might think this is an important distinction, but honestly, it's about as relevant to me as someone responding to a criticism of the implausibility of Greek mythology with a correction of the critic's knowledge of Greek mythology. No point of clarification on your part could ever convince me of the consistency or truth of your particular religion.

It's impossible for me to convince you; gotcha...
I'm totally aware that you and I are each invested in our respective worldviews in a way that involves some serious "positive bias" - neither of us is exactly looking to be "disproven."

The thing is, sometimes I notice you accurately bringing up stuff that's in the Bible, and being (I think, reasonably) bothered by things that you're aware of, some of which I wish I could get more Christians to be (appropriately) bothered by.
Therefore, I get irritated when I see something that makes me go, "Given what he's said about other things, I think this guy should know better than that."

A heaven that is connected to earth is so much more implausible and unprovable than the assumptions of my original question that it only strengthens my point...

This is like "argument by declaration."
I'm not convinced you actually bothered to think about the implications of that possibility.
(maybe you did; but I can only see what you say, and you said nothing to indicate it.)
That said, you're not actually interested in this; you're not obliged to think about it in great detail.

...those who share the view that something was "broken" by the actions of humans in Eden. For those people who view our existence as a state which necessitates salvation, they invent states of being (e.g. heaven) and parts of ourselves (e.g. spirits) which ostensibly transcend--i.e. escape, deny, subsume--this world and this body...

So... I might be wrong here, Z, but... it sounds like you're really especially disgusted with religious people who subscribe to belief in the story of the Fall, far beyond many other beliefs and practices that you view as forms of denial.
Because it's one you're very familiar with?
Because it seems like the logic of it leads to mind control?
Because the intimations of guilt make you uncomfortable?
Because it's open to such horrific abuse if a religious authority figure attempts to presume to stand in the place of God?
Why?