A Funny Thing ...

[Urthman]

I have always been into science and logic, but my path, of late, has taken a rather strange twist.

Recently, a friend of mine asked me if I believed in God. I replied that I could not possibly answer that question in a manner he could understand. He pressed me - "Well, try me" he said ...

"Okay!" I said "No, but I know where it is and I know how it creates reality."

I explained further that the "how" is not method but cause - and that I hesitate to go any further because it requires that I say things that won't make immediate sense - that conjur up notions of magical thinking, schizophrenia and temporal lobe epilepsy, but not because of anything I might actually say - but the words and phrases that I must use -even appropriately- that have been dragged through the mud.

Paradigm - there's a magic word - your paradigm is your perception of reality and truth - quite appart from mine - and even covers the language that you use to explain how you see it all. To quote R. D. Laing: "what is evident to you is not evident to me" (and vice-versa)

So -- the words that I must use to explain my epiphany will trip all of the triggers in your paradigm - so that you will not be able to hear a word that I say amidst the cacophonous echoes from within your own paradigm - not mine.

The funny thing - as here I sit trapped with [what I perceive to be] such an important message and the system is, apparently, pre-wired to spurn it.

So - I don't believe in God but I know where it is -- how does that work?

Well, the "one true God" is real but being "everywhere" is not entirely accurate. The immediate problem is that the word itself conjures up ideas of a magical being - even amongst [us] atheists - and that is so far from accurate it isn't funny.

But - here's the thing: with what we know about matter and energy - the probability that some combination of materials under certain serviceable conditions would produce life is impossible. But here we are. Life is impossible but unmistakably real. Conscious minds are impossible but unmistakably real. And I might even suggest that evolution is just as impossible and just as unmistakably real.

Conversely - the rotting of fruit, that water flows down hill, that systems wind down into disorder - there is the highest probability and extremely logical behavior that we can measure and understand. Science can explain entrope but can only describe and catalog its opposite.

So - welcome to the fourth dimension - your inner eye naturally looks "down" - entropically - and watches life, evolution and mind run off in the opposite direction - we debate and dismiss these things in different ways, but if you want to see God and how it creates reality - you really need to turn your inner eye in the opposite direction.

Chances are - as is the nature of the system - you have already spurned the construct despite half-seeing it.

Edited October 16, 2007 by Urthman

[Fawzo]

I have always been into science and logic, but my path, of late, has taken a rather strange twist.

Recently, a friend of mine asked me if I believed in God. I replied that I could not possibly answer that question in a manner he could understand. He pressed me - "Well, try me" he said ...

"Okay!" I said "No, but I know where it is and I know how it creates reality."

I explained further that the "how" is not method but cause - and that I hesitate to go any further because it requires that I say things that won't make immediate sense - that conjur up notions of magical thinking, schizophrenia and temporal lobe epilepsy, but not because of anything I might actually say - but the words and phrases that I must use -even appropriately- that have been dragged through the mud.

Paradigm - there's a magic word - your paradigm is your perception of reality and truth - quite appart from mine - and even covers the language that you use to explain how you see it all. To quote R. D. Laing: "what is evident to you is not evident to me" (and vice-versa)

So -- the words that I must use to explain my epiphany will trip all of the triggers in your paradigm - so that you will not be able to hear a word that I say amidst the cacophonous echoes from within your own paradigm - not mine.

The funny thing - as here I sit trapped with [what I perceive to be] such an important message and the system is, apparently, pre-wired to spurn it.

So - I don't believe in God but I know where it is -- how does that work?

Well, the "one true God" is real but being "everywhere" is not entirely accurate. The immediate problem is that the word itself conjures up ideas of a magical being - even amongst [us] atheists - and that is so far from accurate it isn't funny.

But - here's the thing: with what we know about matter and energy - the probability that some combination of materials under certain serviceable conditions would produce life is impossible. But here we are. Life is impossible but unmistakably real. Conscious minds are impossible but unmistakably real. And I might even suggest that evolution is just as impossible and just as unmistakably real.

Conversely - the rotting of fruit, that water flows down hill, that systems wind down into disorder - there is the highest probability and extremely logical behavior that we can measure and understand. Science can explain entrope but can only describe and catalog its opposite.

So - welcome to the fourth dimension - your inner eye naturally looks "down" - entropically - and watches life, evolution and mind run off in the opposite direction - we debate and dismiss these things in different ways, but if you want to see God and how it creates reality - you really need to turn your inner eye in the opposite direction.

Chances are - as is the nature of the system - you have already spurned the construct despite half-seeing it.

Nice post!

Is the inner eye obscured on purpose or was it accidental , shall we say the original fall from grace. Is anything accidental for that matter?

[Wizard Adam]

That is so true!

I am into Quantum Mechanics and Physics rather deep, so what you just said makes perfectly clear sense too me, however my wife and my son would be completely lost saying things like "huh, I don't get it." To which I usually say "I know".

There aren't a lot of Quantum physicist who are atheistic becaue physics is all wrong and we know that now, we know sub-atomic particles literally appear and disappear. The answer is why? And where the hell do they go when they aren't here? Quantum Physics have given science a level of spirituality that is far more mature than most ancient religions.

One thing you said is you "know" where God is. You didn't say believe or think, which are negative references to authority! However with the wrong inflection knowing just comes off as arrogant.

When I read and study Quantum Physics it feels too me like it starts up in maturity where Gnosticism left off before they were slaughtered by the Holy Roman Catholic Church.

I am sure you are into Quantums as well, since you are into science, but incase you aren't I thought I would bring it up as something for your mind to nibble on in your off time.

Perception rocks, especially for those who meditate on it and think about it often. It truly is the fountain of youth, so to speak.

Edited October 16, 2007 by Wizard Adam

[Urthman]

The inner eye is turned downward because there is no need to look the other way. It certainly doesn't serve survival. Even attempting to understand the mechanics of reality -science- there is still no reason to look the other way. All of our mechanical devices have a cost in heat and erosion - inefficiency - entrope - but the key to understanding the construct is to examine "the other way"

Entrope is causality in a one to many relationship - one cause to many effects - it is, essentially, falling down.

Behavior (a term I use solely due to the absence of a more appropriate one) is causality in a many to one relationship.

Examples:

1. The Moire' pattern (or interference pattern) - two overlapping window screens where you can see the one through the other. Hold them op to the light and you can see a third pattern - the interference pattern - there it is! The many to one causality producing a third entity without cost.

2. The television picture - millions of red green and blue dots produce a distinct image - each dot has its cost in energy (is entropic) but the resulting image is right there - and without cost.

3. Materialism - in the materialist philosophy, only material exists (particles and energy) - can we argue that BOTH the atoms exist AND the molecules exist? No, we discuss the entities independently referring to the other implicitly depending on the contextual nature of our discussion.

But - if we were atoms - could we even prove the existence of molecules? -- I would argue 'no'.

4. The mind - the brain consists of many millions of patterns of behavior both chemical and electrical and these patterns resemble algorithms - repetitive processes that persist in the same activity over and over again. None of these little algorithms possess any of the properties of the behaviors we would call 'thought' or 'emotion' - we cannot track down a single idea within them - but the collective process -'mind'- is like the television picture - a grand alignment of seemingly insignificant dots that manifest 'me'.

A many to one relationship running in the opposite direction from entrope.

The fourth dimension.

But - to 'know' where the one true God is ... good point - seemiingly arrogant as my initial statement was seemingly irrational (contradicting).

Proposition: Man is not at the top of the food chain.

Just as the many dots produce a picture and the many cellular processes produce mind, many people produce another effect - 'Gods'. These aren't "the one true God" to which I eluded from the beginning, but the "other Gods thou shalt not hold before me". The commandment doesn't say that there aren't any - it says to put them aside.

What are they? What do you think were they talking about?

Anthropologists have argued that notions of God were invented as token placeholder ideas to explain natural phenomenon. I don't buy into that at all - it requires an original thought - a significant intellectual leap. No one ever needs an explanation of anything they grew up with - it's generally taken for granted. Atheists argue that ideas of God were invented by scoundrels to subjugate the stupid. I don't buy into that at all. I tend to argue that the ancients were as intelligent as you or I.

But -- reflect back on your high school days - there were ther Jocks, the Heads, the Geeks and School Band - each caste having its own cultural idiosyncracies and territories - members were possessed of the group to which they belonged - and each group saw the other (in varying degrees) as an adversary or opponent.

The jocks would have a laugh at the geeks expense in the gym - and the geeks would have a laugh at the jocks expense in science class.

There they are - the "other Gods" - and the ancient Hebrew word for adversary or opponent? Anyone?

So - these lesser Gods: from a many to one relationship of cause and effect = culture.

Another lesser God: can anyone provide any empirical evidence that the Internal Revenue Service actually exists?

Edited October 16, 2007 by Urthman

[Fawzo]

4. The mind - the brain consists of many millions of patterns of behavior both chemical and electrical and these patterns resemble algorithms

You're not equating the mind and the brain as the same thing in this statement are you?

The rest I will ponder tomorrow at work.

[Urthman]

You're not equating the mind and the brain as the same thing in this statement are you?

The rest I will ponder tomorrow at work.

I already answered that in the sentences that followed

None of these little algorithms possess any of the properties of the behaviors we would call 'thought' or 'emotion' - we cannot track down a single idea within them - but the collective process -'mind'- is like the television picture - a grand alignment of seemingly insignificant dots that manifest 'me'.

That was the 'paradigm' you tripped on and missed the rest of it - no biggie - I do it all the time.

'Mind' is certainly not an object or 'thing'

Edited October 17, 2007 by Urthman