I need help concerning the word Agnostic

Dissident Heart

MA: While the question of God's existence probably does weigh pretty heavily on matters of the oppressed and miserable, I suspect that it weighs just as heavily on matters related the the affluent, happy and intellectually and morally curious as well.

Considering the amount of resources devoted to legal pharmaceuticals, alcohol, and other illegal substances, or legal substances taken illegally...the affluent are hardly a happy lot- they are an incredibly depressed crowd, with their own share of drunks and addicts seeking escape from an existence they can neither bear nor shrug off. The structures of injustice do not serve their best interests either, even if it does keep them stuffed and nested.

As for the intellectually and morally curious simply wanting to know about God for the sake of knowing, for the pleasure of learning and discovering new information about the ways the world wags, I wager there is a deeper motivation at work in their machinations of wonder.

There is a hunger for justice and will to joy that mobilizes the intellectual juices, and will not rest until it finds its goal...following Augustine's dictum "Our hearts are restless and will not rest until they rest in thee". And the 'thee' there is not an it, or a thing, but the God of love.

Then, the question becomes, "What is it I love when I say I love God?"

Asking the same of the morally and intellectually curious "What is it you love when you say you love knowledge, or truth, or wisdom?"

And, following this route of questioning, the issue of God is brought to what is most precious and valuable in your life...something you will not, cannot, simply examine objectively- as something separate, apart, in a test tube, or in neat order along ledgers of costs and revenues.

Interbane · Posted: Tue Nov 23, 2004 1:34 pm Post subject: Re: clarification

Eric:

1. 2 + 2 = 4.

There. One small instance of objective truth. If one's subjective view is different, I suspect they will not hold an accounting job for very long. I see that as an objective truth, though between us and that truth there is a curtain that allows for subjectivity. My mother grew up in Africa and was taught English in every aspect except for written numbers. Her whole life, she kept getting the numbers 2 and 3 mixed up. Yet even then would not the examination allow the trump of logic, which is subjective?

2. If you step out off of the sidewalk and in front of a fast-moving bus, you will be seriously hurt and most likely killed. Not if you're wearing furutistic armor, or a one in a billion scenario plays out to where you leave uninjured. That's a slightly weaker example.

3. God exists, loves you, and wants to reveal Himself to you inwardly through faith. Don't be absurd, even the notion that this is objective is ridiculous, even without the word love.

I'm not disagreeing that there are objective truths, just that many cases of 'claimed' objective truth are too quickly labeled. Yet our experiences I believe to be subjective... as our senses are distanced from reality.

Dissident: "Garble and nonsense, purely opinion means directing the question of God's existence towards issues that matter in a world ripe with inj

So aside from whether or not God exists, you must consider justice. Why? I'll refrain from calling your response nonsense, and I apologize for doing so earlier.

Dissident: "As I see it, discussions about the existence of God are garbled nonsense and irrelevant opinion when they are detatched from the actual living of real people in genuine distress and misery."

What is distress and misery? It is surely not being alleviated by the existance of God. Objective reality cares nothing for distress and misery, those are human faculties. Don't get me wrong, I'd pursue the erasure of distress and misery with on earth with all my heart if I could do more than cause myself distress and misery in the process. Yet basing a belief on the necessity for immersion into faculties so rampant with emotions makes that belief less certain - the belief is then more subjective, as emotions are very subjective.

MadArchitect: "If you posit that all human knowledge is ultimately subjective..."

I don't, yet the practice of all experience being subject to the spectrum before considering it a truth keeps me from believing in things due to emotional attachment. What is the distinction between an idea such as belief in God and 2+2=4? I understand it on a fundamental level, yet can't seem to find a middle ground of any clarity to categorize this thought.

MadArchitect: "A true/false scale is, at best, inaccurately named: what you're left with is really a scale of relative certainty, where certainty is related to intensity of belief."

Sure, with some things being certain enough that I will may anchor other faculties, thoughts, and knowledge to. Then is the base of my 'subjective pyramid' subject to subjectivity? Might be a subject for another thread.

Dissident: "Considering the amount of resources devoted to legal pharmaceuticals, alcohol, and other illegal substances, or legal substances taken illegally...the affluent are hardly a happy lot- they are an incredibly depressed crowd, with their own share of drunks and addicts seeking escape from an existence they can neither bear nor shrug off."

I personally did drugs because the feeling was euphoric. I'm neither depressed, nor on drugs any longer.

Dissident: "Asking the same of the morally and intellectually curious "What is it you love when you say you love knowledge, or truth, or wisdom?""

We're back to loving things that aren't human. Why is there any need to love these things? I value them greatly, but I do not love them. I also value my emotions, yet I do not love them. I think loving love would be acceptable, but isn't it just an echo of the original love?

Dissident Heart · Posted: Tue Nov 23, 2004 2:09 pm Post subject: Joy

Interbane: "So aside from whether or not God exists, you must consider justice. Why?"

This is key: Loving God is acting justly, or, seeking justice is serving God. Simply making the case for whether God exists or not has very little to do with loving or serving God.

And, as I see it, loving and serving God is not the same as simply entertaining a thought provoking or compelling argument regarding God's existence. When lovers of God seek justice, those who join in, share the burden and sacrifice, engage the risk and danger- then, they will have all the proof they need. They'll see it in their new lives, the lives they touch, and the change in the world where they employ their love.

The methodology is not sitting and pondering the logic of an argument, althought that is part of the process...the key is to give up the denial, stop minimizing the real threats, let go of my tiny ideal of happiness, and seek the joy I am meant to embody.

And, this Joy is not simply pleasure: it is loving that which most needs loving in life.

Interbane: "I also value my emotions, yet I do not love them."

How is it that you are not your emotions? This betrays a strange compartamentalism: over here are my thoughts- there, my emotions- there my feelings- there my attitudes- here, my agendas- there my allegiences; and here am I in the middle of it all, directing, dictating, and deciding what goes where and when.

I think this compartamentalism of your internal Psyche from your propertied Physique gets played out in your fervent efforts to keep Persons and Things completely separate.

In other words, your inability to see emotions as what you are, keeps you from relating to external objects as worthy of love?

Eric Hagelin · Posted: Tue Nov 23, 2004 2:14 pm Post subject: reply

MA types: "Even if we had seen the event ourselves, we could only call it an objective truth within the degree of certainty that we accord to the correspondence of our own senses to the actual state of reality."

And that would be pretty darned certain, wouldn't it?

MA types: "Point in fact, the only way you can do so is by an appeal to logic, which is a human faculty, and which we may only appreciate subjectively. Therefore, it is beyond our ability to prove the objectivity of any mathematical "truth"."

Nonsense. I have two apples and you have two apples. Add 'em together and there's four apples.

This is the rational, common-sense world were dealing with, here - not some boundary-less intellectual free-for-all where 2+2=3. Logic is indeed a human faculty, but its rules apply across the board to all humans, regardless of any human who tries to argue that it doesn't. To ask me to "verify 2+2=4 objectively" is nonsense. It is verified in and of itself. A=A; the fundamental premise of Ayn Rand's Objectivist philosophy, and one in which I think can be found much merit.

MA types: "This is a particularly weak example for the simply reason that there may easily have been people who have been hit by buses without serious injury. It's not common perhaps, but it may well happen."

It's not a weak example at all. I picked it, in fact, because of its potential for irregularity. Would any sane person care to test it out to see how weak it is? No way, Jose.

MA types: "On the other hand, other Christians put absolutely no effort into such matters, and never get any closer to the basis of the religion they've staked so much on."

True enough. Do you think they need to?

MA types: "Feelings are the least reliable indicator of objective reality available -- their very nature is, in fact, subjective, so you can hardly expect others to take them as proof of something that they themselves do not experience."

I've tried to respond to this starting from a number of different points, and can't quite decide what to do with it. Suffice it to say that I don't "expect" others to take them as "proof".

MA types: "Nevermind that the instances of purpose, joy, hope and help that you mention arise from a particular claim made about the nature of the universe."

I'm glad you pointed this out. I hope everybody reading this thread pays particular attention to your observation. You are absolutely right. "Making a claim" about the nature of the universe. Yes. I think it is crucial that we do so. To simply state "I don't have enough info to make a claim" is, in my opinion, a faint-hearted, lacklustre way to live.

I know that people can let their feelings and emotions get the better of them. But the coldly-intellectual can make the reciprocal mistake. There needs to be a healthy balance.

MA types: "The question we've raised is that of, how much does objective reality have to do with our perceptions, and the only logical answer is that we can't know, only assume."

MadArchitect, I would be interested in your critique/opinion of the following essay (it is in 3 parts) - if you are willing to take some time to read it:

freedom.orlingrabbe.com/l...anity1.htm
freedom.orlingrabbe.com/l...a nity2.htm
freedom.orlingrabbe.com/l...anity3.htm

Thank you.

MA types: "Plato's idea of the forms is a bit more complicated than that. The gist is that the form exists independently of the instance. Our souls, according to Plato's Socrates, ascend to the level of being where they may apprehend the forms, but only in the interval between death and birth. During the whole of our lives, we're left only knowing the instances, which are not, in the Platonic scheme, "truth", but rather instances roughly approximating truth."

Yes, good assessment. I did indeed oversimplify the notion. My only point was that the form didn't depend on the perception, but existed apart from it. You acknowledge this (if I am understanding you correctly), but then affirm that we can't know it to be true, only assume it to be true. Have I correctly understood you?

MA types: "I doubt you meant to do so, but you do realize that you just contrasted theoretical Christianity with "adult, rational" behavior?"

Good point. You're right, I didn't mean to do so, but it brings up a wholly different set of issues concerning the frame of mind we, as Christians, should have. Should it be one of worldly wisdom, or of child-like trust in God? And, as Christians, can we ever be free from worldly perspectives, ways of thinking, reliance on the physical and observable, etc.? The Bible claims that the wisdom of the world is foolishness to God; what does that mean in terms of our responses to God and to each other? But these questions are not relevant to the current discussion, and doubtless holds no interest to atheistic or agnostic freethinkers.

I personally think it is a polarized way to be. Heck, I don't think it, I know it. Because I live it. Reason vs. Faith... "reasonable" Faith... Reason combined with Faith... I think there will always be some irreconcilable areas.

I hope this was not too disjointed of a post. I haven't had my full quota of coffee this morning. I'm about to remedy that, though!

"...I beg of You to take away my freedom to displease You..."

~ St. Therese of Lisieux ~

Niall001 · Posted: Tue Nov 23, 2004 3:01 pm Post subject: Re: reply

Just as what I consider to be an interesting aside to this discussion, did you know that the Indian tribe known as the Hopi had a sophisticated language that did not differentiate between past, present and future. I don't know about you, but I can't really imagine what it would be like to think in terms like that.

Even concepts which seem timeless and universal have some sort of history.

Let us agree, there is no one single reality. Not upon this stage, not in this world, all is in the mind... imagination is the only truth. Because it cannot be contradicted except by other imaginations - Richard Matheson

There are no conclusive indications by which waking life can be distinguished from sleep - Rene Descartes

Mr. Pessimistic · Posted: Tue Nov 23, 2004 4:05 pm Post subject: Re: reply

Niall:

Do you have any refernce to this language? Any analysis?

Mr. P.

The one thing of which I am positive is that there is much of which to be negative - Mr. P.

I came to get down, I came to get down. So get out ya seat and jump around - House of Pain

HEY! Is that a ball in your court? - Mr. P

I came to kick ass and chew Bubble Gum...and I am all out of Bubble Gum - They Live, Roddy Piper

MadArchitect · Posted: Thu Nov 25, 2004 2:14 am Post subject: Re: Love

Just hitting Interbane's last question (still trying to get the hell out of Dodge), I'd say that 100% certainty on any issue is a mistake. It's hubris, since only the mind of God (in the omniscient Judeo-Christian-Muslim tradition) could know anything with absolute certainty.

Interbane · Posted: Fri Nov 26, 2004 12:05 pm Post subject: Re: Love

Thanks, it was closer to rhetoric than to actual pondering. You used the word hubris... I need to start another thread I believe. About the excessive pride of a person.

Dissident Heart · Posted: Sat Nov 27, 2004 2:47 pm Post subject: Re: Love

MA: Better to postpone love in order to talk about it, rather than to love wrongly and dangerously.

Still, there is something/someone you are protecting from this potential danger- out of a duty to love. You will postpone loving, out of a sense of love. There is a prior, basic, fundamental love that is saying, "We must postpone loving until we understand it correctly- because we do not want to harm the things we love." I think the question "Does God exist?" is much like chasing the root and source of this basic, fundamental love behind all loving.

MA: You deny, then, instances where justice might best be expressed and attained through the imposition of punishment?

The crucial component between Justice and Punishment is Mercy. The key impediment to Mercy is Ressentiment. Punishment arising from Ressentiment leads to Vengeance. Vengeance leads to Vengeance, leads to a perpetual cycle of destruction, making Peace impossible. Peace is the goal. Justice with Mercy leads to Peace. Justice as simply Punishment leads to War. If the Punishment is nothing more than Ressentiment seeking Vengeance, there can be no Justice. Love is a matter of healing the wounds of war, and reconciling the grievances of the ressentiful with the power of forgiveness.

The Ressentiful cannot forgive, deny the validity of mercy, seek only vengeance, and are left with punishment as their only tool for justice.

MA: Would you deny the possibility of love that is ultimately destructive, as in some forms of fetishism or obsession?

I would not define actions that lead to pitiful demoralization or increasing isolation or decreasing freedom as loving actions. Love is not ultimately destructive...actually, what love ultimately is, brings us back to the initial quest to find that love beneath, between, and behind all loving.

MA: my only wish is that everyone involved would choose to approach it (this board) in such a way as to encourage actual discussion and genuine intellectual inquiry. Personal comments are unlikely to do so.

So, genuine intellectual inquiry does not involve actual persons, or their quandries, weaknesses, character defects, spells of stupidity, ugliness, and occasional lapses of decency? Is the intellect necessarily so separate from the person, such that all the juicy stuff of messy emotional nonsense and passion has no part? What is the point of actual discussion that avoids actual persons?

MA: It's an observation based on a comment typed in a single post. To make it into a full-fledged observation about Interbane's character, you must extrapolate it and assume that it in some way describes who he is.

No, it's an observation finding its roots in multiple occasions across many threads on this board...a series of exchanges where the issue of "loving inanimate objects, elements of nature and animals in personal ways" has been a guiding theme. Thus, your valid concern over dangerous hasty diagnoses does not fit this set of circumstances. Although, it does say something about your own haste to diagnose yours truly.

MadArchitect · Posted: Sat Nov 27, 2004 3:43 pm Post subject: Re: Love

DH: The crucial component between Justice and Punishment is Mercy.

But here again, you haven't demonstrated whether or not punishment is an apt expression of justice. Rather, you've introduced an intervening term without establishing why it is in the best interests of justice to evade punishment.

The key impediment to Mercy is Ressentiment.

I would argue that there are other "impediments to mercy", such as law, social order, and in some cases, love.

Peace is the goal.

Peace is the goal of what? Not of justice, I would say, as the demands of justice sometimes require violence. Nor of love, since love has often led to violence as well.

If the Punishment is nothing more than Ressentiment seeking Vengeance, there can be no Justice.

This, I would predominantly agree with. But that "if" denotes the possibility of exception, ie. cases in which punishment does not arise from resentment (we can drop the French, I think, unless we're talking about a sense that isn't included in the English word) and would actually serve as a legitimate expression of justice.

I would not define actions that lead to pitiful demoralization or increasing isolation or decreasing freedom as loving actions.

Well, now we're back to the question, aren't we? So we can add this characterization to the (so far, rather short) list of descriptive terms that go into your understanding of love: non-destructive. Anecdotally, I don't always find that to be the case. I can think of instances where love has been the apparant motivation behind a great deal of destruction. For example, there are cases where a parent's love for their child has led that parent to kill another person, cases where a person has committed suicide in order to spare their loved ones certain measures of pain (the crucifixion of Christ serves as an analogue for both cases, I would say). Love of nationality has led to numerous wars, and love of money (that much deplored "root of all evil") has certainly destroyed its fair share of people, places and ideals. Some would even argue that the love of God has instigated some of the worst human atrocities known to man (thought I would argue that politics are more often at work than mere religious sentiment).

So, given all of those exceptions, it's left in your charge to either re-examine your own view of love (which I think unlikely), or to explain what other factor pre-empts love in cases where love apparantly does lead to destruction.

So, genuine intellectual inquiry does not involve actual persons, or their quandries, weaknesses, character defects, spells of stupidity, ugliness, and occasional lapses of decency?

My point is that, by taking the position of a person who presumes to be qualified to comment on another person's personal life, you assume a position of authority. In doing so, you negate the possibility of discussion on equal terms. And I've seen it happening on both sides of the fence in this discussion: the theists feel at liberty to explain why the agnostics are ultimately unhappy, and the agnostics feel inclined to explain why the theists are so eager to delude themselves. Very few seem particularly eager on every occasion to meet at some sort of respectful common ground in order to carry on a legitimate conversation capable of leading to actual re-evaluation.

Yes, obviously we're all real people on the opposite side of this computer screen, and we all have our own flaws, and those are specifically our problems. And it is neither the place nor, honestly, the capacity of anyone else on this board to sort those problems out for us. To even try demonstrates a certain level of vanity. (Oops, there I go being all hypocritical.)

No, it's an observation finding its roots in multiple occasions across many threads on this board...a series of exchanges where the issue of "loving inanimate objects, elements of nature and animals in personal ways" has been a guiding theme.

Well, if it adds any fuel to your fire, let me jump on the bandwagon by saying that I, presumably like Interbane, do not accord the same kind of love to inanimate objects that I do to living ones. Nor do I accord the same kind of love to other species of plant or animal that I accord to humans. And while I'm at it, I made the statement long ago, and still think it valid, that I love no idea so much as I love a person.

Given all of that, why don't we talk about the nature of love, rather than diagnose one another with some form of emotionally stunted growth, hmm? If I'm somehow frigid and stunted, I'll work that out on my own time, but my experience is that the sort of presumption that leads people to tell other people "what's wrong" with them is the sort of thing that kills message boards.

Although, it does say something about your own haste to diagnose yours truly.

Please, do tell. Sheesh.

Dissident Heart · Posted: Sat Nov 27, 2004 5:10 pm Post subject: Re: Love

MA: you haven't demonstrated whether or not punishment is an apt expression of justice. Rather, you've introduced an intervening term without establishing why it is in the best interests of justice to evade punishment.

I've described how Punishment devoid of Mercy impedes Justice. Punishment with Mercy is the act of stopping the offender from harming themselves or others. It is bringing superior force to cease the unloving action of another. IF Punishment is simply a way of inflicting Misery to "teach a lesson", then it has nothing to do with Justice, and everything to do with Vengeance...and it is a terribly poor teacher too! Punishment is only valid as a means to stop, impede, and derail unloving behavior. It is not valid as a means to teach or instruct or educate. Mercy is the element that stops Punishment from becoming simply a method of delivering Misery; and simply delivering Misery has nothing to do with Justice- and, is the opposite of Love.

MA: I would argue that there are other "impediments to mercy", such as law, social order, and in some cases, love.

I agree, until you include Love.

MA: Peace is the goal of what? Not of justice, I would say, as the demands of justice sometimes require violence. Nor of love, since love has often led to violence as well.

Peace is the goal of goals, the point to which all trajectories of Justice are heading- but only IF Mercy is protected and nurtured and given its necessary role. The violation of violence is an issue only if Mercy is denied, at which time Justice is neither directing, nor is Peace the goal.

It is not Love that leads to violence, but the ranking of some person/place/thing as more deserving of Love than some other person/place/thing.

In other words, as soon as we decide someone deserves more Love than someone else, we are prepared to commit Violence, and are willing to Violate the Peace of those less deserving.

As for Love leading to destruction, again, it depends upon the role of Mercy in the equation, as well as Ressentiment. The great and tragic mystery of Life is that it requires a great deal of Death. We kill to live all the time, and not only we, but everything that lives must kill to continue living. When this monstrosity is approached in Love, with Mercy to stabilize, Justice to guide, and Peace as the goal, then Forgiveness is possible, thus avoiding the terrible cycle of Vengeance that Violence promotes.

As I see it, Love is only pre-empted by Love. More precisely, a flawed and disabled attempt at Loving is pre-empted by a better equipped and more lucid Love.

Or, as Dar Williams put it, "What do you love more than love?"

Interbane · Posted: Sun Nov 28, 2004 5:00 pm Post subject: Re: Love

Dissident: "When this monstrosity is approached in Love, with Mercy to stabilize, Justice to guide, and Peace as the goal, then Forgiveness is possible..."

Pardon my interjection, is it God doing the forgiving?

I think that path is a balancing act beyond our abilities. Were we to have mercy, would unloving acts not still occur in humans who gain nothing from from mercy given to them? Then to decide when mercy will not stop an unloving act, thus requiring punishment, is also to play God in determining justice, which no man or men can do.

To make exceptions is to make mistakes, causing more pain and misery. To assume the values/definitions you've placed on these principles accurately reflect reality enough that you can approximate a course of action is not wise. Causality is never so simple.


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