• In total there are 4 users online :: 0 registered, 0 hidden and 4 guests (based on users active over the past 60 minutes)
    Most users ever online was 789 on Tue Mar 19, 2024 5:08 am

Chapter 17: The marriage of skepticism and wonder

#136: Feb. - Mar. 2015 (Non-Fiction)
User avatar
ant

1G - SILVER CONTRIBUTOR
BookTalk.org Hall of Fame
Posts: 5935
Joined: Thu Jun 02, 2011 12:04 pm
12
Has thanked: 1371 times
Been thanked: 969 times

Re: Chapter 17: The marriage of skepticism and wonder

Unread post

Polite condescension.

Gotta love it.
youkrst

1F - BRONZE CONTRIBUTOR
One with Books
Posts: 2752
Joined: Thu Dec 30, 2010 4:30 am
13
Has thanked: 2280 times
Been thanked: 727 times

Re: Chapter 17: The marriage of skepticism and wonder

Unread post

Polite condescension.

Gotta love it.
yeah, you are more the brash condescension type ant :-D
User avatar
Penelope

1G - SILVER CONTRIBUTOR
One more post ought to do it.
Posts: 3267
Joined: Tue Oct 02, 2007 11:49 am
16
Location: Cheshire, England
Has thanked: 323 times
Been thanked: 679 times
Gender:
Great Britain

Re: Chapter 17: The marriage of skepticism and wonder

Unread post

I find that people with no interest in spirituality tend to sneer at those of us who do contend with that dimension of ourselves. It is sneering contempt for what they label as unthinking or blind faith. Stupid and Childish is how I have been described....many times by people whom I feel are quite 'limited in their perceptions' as it were.

However, although I know I am not the greatest intellect, I also know that I'm not stupid either. My marriage and my friendships would have been much easier if I had been able to lay my spiritual pilgrimage aside and just live life on the surface......but I have not been able to do that, although I have tried more than once.

If I don't have a functioning spritual side to my nature, I feel as though I might as well just curl up and die.....And my marriage has survived and my true friends tolerate what they view as my 'nonesense'. I tolerate their tolerance!!!!
Only those become weary of angling who bring nothing to it but the idea of catching fish.

He was born with the gift of laughter and a sense that the world is mad....

Rafael Sabatini
youkrst

1F - BRONZE CONTRIBUTOR
One with Books
Posts: 2752
Joined: Thu Dec 30, 2010 4:30 am
13
Has thanked: 2280 times
Been thanked: 727 times

Re: Chapter 17: The marriage of skepticism and wonder

Unread post

Penelope wrote:If I don't have a functioning spiritual side to my nature, I feel as though I might as well just curl up and die.
What does "atman is Brahman" mean?

Let's break the phrase down into its two basic concepts.

First is "atman" - loosely translated, this means "soul" or "individual soul." Atman refers to the essence of each individual living thing - its soul or primary living energy. Each living thing - people, animals, plants - have an atman that forms each thing's eternal essence. The atman is not the body; the body is not eternal. The body houses the atman until the body dies. Atman is immortal and eternal.

Brahman is "world soul" or "cosmic soul." It is the eternal essence of the universe and the ultimate divine reality. It is the life source of all that has been, is and will be throughout the entire cosmos. It is not an individual being - it is more like the primal ground or reality of all being and existence.

So, the phrase "atman is Brahman" is saying, quite simply, that the individual soul is the world soul.

In other words, each individual soul - say, yours or mine - comes from and is made of the same reality as the world soul. There is no distinction between us, on the one hand, and the ultimate divine reality, on the other.

This is an amazing concept!

It basically means that in our deepest selves, we are divine. All living things are divine in their deepest selves. Now, that divine self may be hidden or covered over by hatred, envy, fear or other negative things. But, it is there nonetheless and it is our "true" and "eternal" selves.
To see a World in a Grain of Sand
And a Heaven in a Wild Flower,
Hold Infinity in the palm of your hand
And Eternity in an hour.

A Robin Redbreast in a Cage
Puts all Heaven in a Rage.

A dove house fill’d with doves and pigeons
Shudders Hell thro’ all its regions.
A Dog starv’d at his Master’s Gate
Predicts the ruin of the State.
A Horse misus’d upon the Road
Calls to Heaven for Human blood.
Each outcry of the hunted Hare
A fiber from the Brain does tear.

He who shall train the Horse to War
Shall never pass the Polar Bar.
The Beggar’s Dog and Widow’s Cat,
Feed them and thou wilt grow fat.
The Gnat that sings his Summer song
Poison gets from Slander’s tongue.
The poison of the Snake and Newt
Is the sweat of Envy’s Foot.

A truth that’s told with bad intent
Beats all the Lies you can invent.
It is right it should be so;
Man was made for Joy and Woe;
And when this we rightly know
Thro’ the World we safely go.
the eye of the storm

the centre of the clock face

the pupil of the eye

bon voyage
Penelope wrote:my true friends tolerate what they view as my 'nonesense'. I tolerate their tolerance!!!!
viva la tolerance :)
User avatar
Penelope

1G - SILVER CONTRIBUTOR
One more post ought to do it.
Posts: 3267
Joined: Tue Oct 02, 2007 11:49 am
16
Location: Cheshire, England
Has thanked: 323 times
Been thanked: 679 times
Gender:
Great Britain

Re: Chapter 17: The marriage of skepticism and wonder

Unread post

Thank you youkrst. That is a beautiful succinct summing-up of the Atman/Brahma and I needed to have it reinforced.

Fab Pomes too. xx
Only those become weary of angling who bring nothing to it but the idea of catching fish.

He was born with the gift of laughter and a sense that the world is mad....

Rafael Sabatini
youkrst

1F - BRONZE CONTRIBUTOR
One with Books
Posts: 2752
Joined: Thu Dec 30, 2010 4:30 am
13
Has thanked: 2280 times
Been thanked: 727 times

Re: Chapter 17: The marriage of skepticism and wonder

Unread post

ahhhh William Blake

what a dude! when i grow up i want to be William Blake :-D
In his Life of William Blake (1863) Alexander Gilchrist warned his readers that Blake "neither wrote nor drew for the many, hardly for work'y-day men at all, rather for children and angels; himself 'a divine child,' whose playthings were sun, moon, and stars, the heavens and the earth." Yet Blake himself believed that his writings were of national importance and that they could be understood by a majority of men. Far from being an isolated mystic, Blake lived and worked in the teeming metropolis of London at a time of great social and political change that profoundly influenced his writing. After the peace established in 1762, the British Empire seemed secure, but the storm wave begun with the American Revolution in 1775 and the French Revolution in 1789 changed forever the way men looked at their relationship to the state and to the established church. Poet, painter, and engraver, Blake worked to bring about a change both in the social order and in the minds of men.
User avatar
Penelope

1G - SILVER CONTRIBUTOR
One more post ought to do it.
Posts: 3267
Joined: Tue Oct 02, 2007 11:49 am
16
Location: Cheshire, England
Has thanked: 323 times
Been thanked: 679 times
Gender:
Great Britain

Re: Chapter 17: The marriage of skepticism and wonder

Unread post

Yes, William Blake was quite a guy. An Enigma with a capital E.

We went to see the exhibition of his work at The Tate Gallery in London some years ago. It was amazing to see his work benches and the way he earned his living as an artisan. But also his poetry - written in minute gothic script was something to see. His paintings were amazing, but the one that astounded me the most was his 'Ghost of a Flea' painting. It is so famous and has been used for posters, book covers, record sleeves and all, but it is about the size of a postcard. I had thought it would be enormous.

Marvellous stories about his life too. He once asked his wife if they could have an open marriage and have affairs with others. She said, 'No'. He seems to have acquiesced immediately, 'Oh, alright then'. :-D
Only those become weary of angling who bring nothing to it but the idea of catching fish.

He was born with the gift of laughter and a sense that the world is mad....

Rafael Sabatini
youkrst

1F - BRONZE CONTRIBUTOR
One with Books
Posts: 2752
Joined: Thu Dec 30, 2010 4:30 am
13
Has thanked: 2280 times
Been thanked: 727 times

Re: Chapter 17: The marriage of skepticism and wonder

Unread post

:lol:

Reminds me of Rumpole of the Bailey, she who must be obeyed.

I am constantly thankful that my better half knows just how to keep me in line and bat me down :-D
Post Reply

Return to “Demon-Haunted World: Science As a Candle in the Dark - by Carl Sagan with Ann Druyan”