A Dire Metaphysical Warning to all Atheists!

Originally posted by NewAgeMan
reply to post by bogomil

 

Ok Spock, I'll try harder..

I can then offer you an armistice for the duration, where I will turn off my mangler, if you're serious.

reply to post by bogomil

I hate to think of what would happen if there is a God, and you got hold of him, and it's not God as the Absolute I'm worried about!

Originally posted by NewAgeMan
reply to post by bogomil

 

I hate to think of what would happen if there is a God, and you got hold of him, and it's not God as the Absolute I'm worried about!

If we're talking about the more mundane kind of 'gods' (type buddhistic), it would probably be good street-theater with a lot of thunder and lightening and me with an earthed tinfoil-hat, including one of these new-fangled 15-micro-second fuses.

But a lot of 'gods' really DO need to have their social skills rehabilitated, even if they hate to admit it.

PS I have asked TFSM to absolve you from any possible sins, you may have committed. He granted it, as he said, that anybody with a sense of humour is a friend of his.

Originally posted by bogomil


PS I have asked TFSM to absolve you from any possible sins, you may have committed. He granted it, as he said, that anybody with a sense of humour is a friend of his.

I prefer the god of composting.
I find he has a sense of humus.

Here is a fairly detailed NDE experience relayed by an ATS member which is stickied at the top of this forum

www.abovetopsecret.com...

This individual appears to be a very humble and kind hearted person, and is a person of faith, prior to their experience, and knowledge, you might say, afterwards.

What do you think - just a '___' hallucination, or an authentic experience of an afterlife reality? It's also interesting how these accounts differ depending on the belief orientation of each person.

Don't get me wrong, as there are also many of these accounts from prior atheists..

reply to post by NewAgeMan

So what we're looking at is a continual, evolving process of being and becoming, and since it's all one now and forever, sharing the same common source, there is no reason to think that death terminates our own evolving trajectory. Precisely what happens or what it looks like who can say, but to declare it as light's out eternal non existence, with certainty, based on a purely materialist interpretation of reality, is absurdly presumptuous if not arrogant.

If a cat eats a mouse, the life of the mouse continues in the cat. The one life has not ended but has continued. Is there some reason to think that the mouse has an individual immortal soul? If so, then life is not one.

I don't think that my own outlook is particularly purely materialistic but I do think that it is 'lights out' for the mouse. "absurdly presumptuous if not arrogant" is what I would consider a mouse explaining the personal immortal soul to a cat.

Originally posted by bogomil
reply to post by NewAgeMan

 

You wrote:

["Individual consciousness and primordial God-consciousness, absent ego or judgement, is the same consciousness, and the choosing self prior to judgement is ALSO a non-local phenomenon.."]

This is the part of your argument written with very small letters, and sneaked in amongst the rest as if it's axiomatic. I have already on a couple of occasions pointed this out, and I'm afraid that I will continue to do so until you address this tricky circle-argument directly.

That you on top use a really bad version of inductive reasoning doesn't make it more digestible.

What I have realised in this entire interaction with the OP is that (s)he is not attempting to even address, let alone convince any rational sceptic. The whole intended audience is non-rational believers who are to be impressed with the OP's "knowledge" and "rational argument". I had fallen in this trap once too often in the past, only to realise at the end that the "invitation to the rational sceptic" is meant only to increase the credibility of the "teacher" amongst his "students". By refusing to acknowledge that (s)he has been proven to be spewing BS, the "teacher" is supposed, by the "students" who are themselves both ignorant and incpabale of a rational discussion, have "won" the "debate" with a rational sceptic, increasing his/her credibility. "Humour" is a standard explanation when proven to be making a really stupid argument, that even the "students" can spot.

It is a sick attitude, but a standard MO among many "teachers" especially those without a significant number of "students".

Re: The humor of gnosis /,understanding, that I've been referring to although your meansprited replies Observer are a little hurtful, and not so helpful to the cause ie: it makes me sad to try to "prove" such a thing to you, where you sit. Turns my joy to sorrow, and the attempt to share in "koinonia", nothing but a tit for tat argument..



And then there's this

Originally posted by NewAgeMan

"Life is a Mighty Joke. He who knows this can hardly be understood by others. He who does not know it finds himself in a state of delusion. He may ponder over this problem day and night, but will find himself incapable of knowing it. Why? People take life seriously, and God lightly; whereas we must take God seriously, and take life lightly. Then, we know that we always were the same and will ever remain the same.......the Originator of this joke. This knowledge is not acheived by reasoning.
But it is the knowledge of experience."

~ Meher Baba

For knowing things, reason is NOT the be all and end all. You may be an Observer, but you have a blind spot, in a place of knowledge and understanding that you've simply never considered before, and all I'm trying to so here is ask you to give it consideration, and try it on, see if it goes anywhere, if there's anything to this supra-rational gnosis business, that's all. Sorry it doesn't meet your expectations, but how could it?

reply to post by NewAgeMan

Cry baby tactics? Yeah, that is very convincing

When you challenge rational sceptics to a discussion, it has to be conducted on rational grounds, not on whatever you can imagine.

You sound like an AI which has a huge collection of semantically meaningful sentences and paragraphs to search for your responses by picking words and phrases from what others post, with absolutely no idea of whether it even constitutes a meaningful response. However, the collection of your responses doesn't seem to include "Sorry, I was wrong!" or "Thank you for correcting me!"

AI is not fun to have a "discussion" with, not to mention an egostic AI that can't admit to being wrong.

reply to post by Observor


Sorry my responses to you have been with pauses. It's just that I agree with practically everything you say, and there's no need to affirm this. I believe there's a 'silent understanding' between us on many points here.

Originally posted by bogomil
reply to post by Observor

 

It's just that I agree with practically everything you say, and there's no need to affirm this. I believe there's a 'silent understanding' between us on many points here.

Of course and I completely understand that. There is not much point in responding to all points of agreement with an "I agree" even if the forum rules permitted it and as things stand, the forum doesn't encourage such responses either.

reply to post by NewAgeMan
Has evolution already been ruled out on this thread?

You quote this fellow Meher Baba as authority:

People take life seriously, and God lightly; whereas we must take God seriously, and take life lightly. Then, we know that we always were the same and will ever remain the same.......the Originator of this joke. This knowledge is not acheived by reasoning.
But it is the knowledge of experience."

I will quote back to you the words of a tree I once met as authority:

Growth and change are all I know,
I for one, would think it strange,
If you, yourself, couldn't grow and change.
. . .
I am older, you must remember.
Don't disregard the words of timber.

- - Speaking to the Wind, 1996

If the one existence we share is static, then that is a cruel joke indeed. But it isn't that way. It is dynamic growth and change (evolution).

In some particular moment that an individual experiences one, that is merely a moment which carries behind it all the growth and change which has come before. One may seem static at that instant, but that is only an instant. Life is not a still image, but rather an on-going play, with the script still to be finished.

reply to post by pthena

I absolutely agree, and no, evolution isn't being ruled out by any means. The premise of this argument being put forward is that once included, there is no possibility for escape, only transformation, and yet, with freedom, there is still choice in how we respond to the invitation to participate. If we lived forever in our present form, with accumulated bias and preconceptions about reality and existence, then that would surely qualify as a type of hell.

“Unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains alone; but if it dies, it bears much fruit.” – John 12:24

“The last enemy to be destroyed is death...Death is swallowed up in victory.” – 1 Corinthians 15:26, 54

reply to post by pthena

The human being is not a mouse, and death for the spiritually alive, is not a cat capable of swallowing us whole. At the apex, it's not "eat or be eaten", although there is spiritual food for our consumption and nourishment for those with discernment (eyes to see and ears to hear). But if we're completely blind with eyes tightly closed heading in to the jaws of death, I'm not sure how it's supposed to open them.. So it's now, in the eternally unfolding, and evolving, present moment, of being and becoming, when we ought to open our eyes and ears, to the domain of limitless possibility forever before us, wherein life meets life in eternity - and grow. We cannot assume that the material world of first impressioned subjective experience is all there is, or that the human being is just a "thing", it's just not congruent with the qualia of our own felt experience, which cannot be denied.

reply to post by NewAgeMan

I absolutely agree,

No. I don't think we do.

once included, there is no possibility for escape, only transformation, and yet, with freedom, there is still choice in how we respond to the invitation to participate.

We are all included, with or without our acceptance. We will not escape. The only choice we have is accepting or rejecting death. The possibility of rejection as a choice is delusion. You gave two verses, as supporting material, I suppose:

“Unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains alone; but if it dies, it bears much fruit.” – John 12:24

“The last enemy to be destroyed is death...Death is swallowed up in victory.” – 1 Corinthians 15:26, 54

The first is an acceptance of death as necessary for production of fruit(bearer of seed, vehicle of evolution). That seed will never be resurrected to live the life of a seed again. It has graciously passed its life on for the future benefit.

The second quote is firmly within the tradition of individual ego existence resurrection, within an apocalyptic framework. When the time is up (expected within the author's own generation, next 20 or 30 years), those deemed worthy will be clothed in immortality and then live forever. That's the definition of 'victory over death'.

I've read a little bit of New Age teaching. It is a post-Christian demythologized version of Christianity. In that, terms like 'sin', 'redemption', 'salvation' are stripped out, leaving the core promise: individual, personal, ego self continuation after death for 'the worthy'. As you put it, 'life after life', wherein the individual continues on as a self-recognizable self, in other words, ego, yet changed into glorious newness.

the domain of limitless possibility forever before us, wherein life meets life in eternity - and grow

So I remember some experiences from people who have gone before me. Those people are dead. The only continuation they have is the experience they passed on, which is of benefit to me. They are beyond being benefited by their own experience. I am the new man, they are the old. All I can do is add experience to the pot, and pass it on. I will not benefit once I've passed, some one else will. My personal self will be gone. That's evolution, and that's reincarnation. I am unique, and will never live again. Some one else, hopefully more advanced, will carry on, but that won't be me. That will be a new unique ego self.

Choice, choice. I choose to graciously be the seed.

reply to post by pthena


That's a very interesting perspective, thank you. I will spend some time with this. You are very wise.

I'm still convinced that there a part of us, when the ego is undone, who is resurrected, and that the work is to discover that self, but my intuition is telling me, that you are saying the same thing in your willingness to accept death as a neccessary part of life, willingly, and gtaciously, without any attachment to a separate self. This courage, to die gracefully, that the stuff of the resurrected life I think, right there..

"He who keeps his life will lose it, but he who willingly and graciously loses his life for the sake of truth and reality will keep it"... of course, anything approaching truth is ripe with paradox..

Anyway, thank you for your contribution to this thread, it's helpful.

There is truth in what you're saying, and I'm not unwilling to consider your perspective more deeply. The courage to live fully, be helpful, and then die with grace.. who could ask for, or has the right to demand anything more, and then if there is more, it would then come, not as an expectation, but as a pleasant surprise.

Let me see if I can come at this from a different direction

There are techniques which will (with some practice) appear to allow you to separate your ‘self’ from your body and so you can go exploring

I have done these things myself and yes there is some kind of effect, but the thing is it gets you no farther forward in working out what’s going on, if you’re honest you quickly realise that given the ‘states of consciousness’ you have to attain to get to these effects, then your brain (your subconscious) could be the thing that’s giving you these experiences – in the same way that when you dream you could be going somewhere else >or< your brain might (as part of its normal organic function) be generating the dream landscape

As someone who has (maybe) wondered around backstage of reality - about the only real thing I got from what I did was, learn from and enjoy this life as much as you can now, because you >might< be giving yourself a richly detailed and rewarding ‘after life’ but you will definitely be giving yourself a rich and rewarding current life

Worrying about what comes next gets you nothing and you might be missing the point of why you are here

reply to post by racasan
I did that back in 1973, where I did probably an astral body travel.
I was lying on my bunk in Alaska, thinking about my wife back in San Diego and the situation I had left her in.
Without any warning I was looking at myself lying there, then I was in the apartment talking with her but telepathically.
The significant thing is that she remembers it happening to her, where she was with another young woman who was her friend and who was staying with her at the time, standing in the living room, when the wall in front of her like turned into my face and, the same thing, where we were communicating telepathically.
Then her friend was looking at her, all surprised, and told her that she had just frozen for a minute, staring off into space.
ETA: but you are probably right because the result of this exchange was her telepathically telling me that she did not appreciate me being able to do that sort of thing.

reply to post by jmdewey60


A few years back I was in bed with my girlfriend – she is one of those people who talk in their sleep

Anyway I was reading and she had fallen asleep and after a while she started talking, just random words and soft muttering

Without moving I >thought< at her – can you hear me?
She – yes
Me – do you know how I’m talking to you?
She – yes (judging by her voice, an uncertain “yes”)
Me – can you say how I’m talking to you?
She – yes (but judging by her voice, it was as if I had asked a mildly objectionable question)

She then turned away from me as if I had disturbed her and was wanting to go back to what she was doing – which I let her do

As you can imagine I lay there thinking about this for a long time after

Side note: when I was thinking at her I might have been subconsciously sub-vocalising what I was thinking and she was hearing the micro movements of my vocal chords

But I have no mundane explanation for your experience – so I guess it just proves we live in a wonderful and complex universe

You know: the concept of 'god' does not bother me.

I prefer to live in this life and do my best. No metaphysical warning is going to change that.
I will try, always, to enrich existence, no matter what.

I'm not always successful, but I never use a book to justify my consumption.
My reward is now, not in the future.


"What Ifs" are entertaining, but I prefer the tangible. It hasn't failed me yet.