Spirituality, global hoax or personal truth?

[Blake]

Sir, you show your lack of knowledge about the bible. John wrote the book of revelation. He was the closet of the 12 to Jesus. The Apostle Paul wrote more then 10 of the books.

Anyway, it wasn't just random people.

Why are we still talking about religion?

I wasn't even thinking of the letters and the book of revelation etc. I was thinking of Mathew, Mark, Luke and John.

Anyway, go easy, I haven't opened a bible in 3 years, let alone learnt about who wrote it.

Blake

 

[Danoff]

I think it was 40 years but even if it was 70 years, if a life event such as the life, death, and resurrection of Christ happened to me personally, I would be able to account for the events accurately

40 years would have put the people old enough to remember the account in their graves back then.

I don't think most people lived past 40, let alone the nearly 60 years old they would have needed to be to have been old enough at the time.

 

[Duke]

I don't think most people lived past 40, let alone the nearly 60 years old they would have needed to be to have been old enough at the time.

Except for the ones who lived to be 900.

 

[Swift]

Any particular reason we're still talking doctrine?

 

[Duke]

Any particular reason we're still talking doctrine?

Because nearly all of the self-described 'spiritual' people in this thread identify themselves with one or the other particular doctrine or flavor of religion. That makes it hard not to. Also, without addressing organized religion, the conversation goes like this:

Judeo-Christian: "When we die, our eternal souls are judged, then rewarded or punished based on how we lived our Earthly lives."

Hindu/Buddhist: "You are partly correct, my friend; our eternal souls are judged, but they are sent back to Earth for another attempt at reaching enlightenment. Only if they do so are they allowed eternal bliss."

Atheist: "Bah. You're both wrong. How is your consciousness supposed to live when your brain dies? Some people..."

*all three wander away*

 

[Danoff]

Any particular reason we're still talking doctrine?

Because neither side is willing to not have the last word.

 

[Swift]

Duke, those are valid points. However, spirituality is a personal thing. It's a little bit different for everyone. It's good for everyone, but it's not the same for everyone. You and Danoff have decided that your spirituality is non existant. Where others of us have chosen to acknowledge that we do indeed have a spirit and it is this spirit(soul and spirit) that are the "real" us.

That's what I wanted to talk about. Where the real you comes from and/or goes to.

 

[Duke]

Well, the real me comes from the personality that develops as a combination of experience, sensory input, investigation, education, and internal analysis both of myself and all those external factors. It will keep developing for my entire life, and then it will disappear, except as an external factor affecting a few others' personalities.

 

[Pako]

Because neither side is willing to not have the last word.

No one needs the last word, although I bet you'd be surprised how old these people really lived, unless they were crucified, stoned to death or had their head served on a platter. In 95-96 AD, the apostle John writes Revelations. He was the last of the original 12 disciples of Christ to have died. Jesus was presumed to have been born around 4 AD. If John was even close to Jesus' age he would have been 80-90 years old when he passed away.

[edit]

Sorry Swift for talking about these events again. These events, however, are the foundation for my spirituality. They answer the questions I have and help me to continue to grow spiritually. Know when Christ was born or when the last disciple died doesn't really help, but it has helped me in researching and finding answers that I would have otherwise not questioned or never thought about. All these discussion has been really beneficial to myself and I thank this forum for being open enough to allow these discussions to continue.

[/edit]

 

[Swift]

Sorry Swift for talking about these events again. These events, however, are the foundation for my spirituality. They answer the questions I have and help me to continue to grow spiritually. Know when Christ was born or when the last disciple died doesn't really help, but it has helped me in researching and finding answers that I would have otherwise not questioned or never thought about. All these discussion has been really beneficial to myself and I thank this forum for being open enough to allow these discussions to continue.

[/edit]

I can certainly understand that. But of course, that leads to debates about Christ's ressurection and age and disciples and all that.

I simply find it astonishing that some people don't believe there is an intangible part to them. That really confusess me.

 

[Pako]

Swift,

What's confusing to you is that people have a different way (or have chosen to view a different way) of looking at things. There are people who believe with all their heart (or mind) that nothing exists beyond what we can see, touch, test or comprehend. Be it a right way or a wrong way of thinking, it is a different way of thinking even if you cannot comprehend it.

The same could be said for the way that you or I think in terms of spirituality. We have chosen to allow influences that we can't comprehend or control to enter into our lives. Although we can feel that spiritual closeness and love from God and can see his beauty in things around us, I still can't fathom or comprehend who/what He is in the sense that eternity, for example, is beyond my comprehension even though I can understand what eternity is.

I hope I haven't been too confusing. Sometimes when I try to explain things it ends up needing further explanation.

 

[Zardoz]

The words used to describe it say it all: "Faith", "belief", "intangible", "feeling", etc. They all pertain to what we non-believers consider to be concepts that stem strictly from the limitless imaginations of the human mind.

And there really is no limit to what we can dream up, is there? Just pay a visit to the main library of any major city, and wander through the Fiction sections. Everything there is a work of pure imagination.

Now consider this as you walk among those hundreds of thousands of works of fiction: The Christian Bible, which so many people are so convinced must be absolutely, literally true (primarily because they have been told over and over again that it is so, it would seem), is just one book among all those that you see.

For me, and many others, it is just one book among countless others, written so long ago by people whose perception of the world and the universe was barely more sophisticated than that of the Cro-Magnon people. I have never been able to convince myself that it is anything more than that, and never will.

 

[Blake]

I simply find it astonishing that some people don't believe there is an intangible part to them. That really confusess me.

And I find it astonishing that some people believe that they will live forever in some form or another.

Blake

 

[Swift]

And I find it astonishing that some people believe that they will live forever in some form or another.

Blake

Ok, do you know where you came from? Your parents, and where did you parents come from, their parents so on and so forth. Now, there had to be something to get that started because you didn't come from nothing. I'm not talking creation vs evolution. What I'm saying is that there was a time when you didn't exist, but you came from "somewhere" and when you die you will go "somewhere" That's what I'm saying.

 

[Blake]

Ok, do you know where you came from? Your parents, and where did you parents come from, their parents so on and so forth. Now, there had to be something to get that started because you didn't come from nothing. I'm not talking creation vs evolution. What I'm saying is that there was a time when you didn't exist, but you came from "somewhere" and when you die you will go "somewhere" That's what I'm saying.

I don't see how this has to do with anything, unless you're saying my 'spirit' had to come from somewhere.

But since my understanding of my 'spirit' is simply my consciousness, then my 'spirit' came from me, my expericences, my knowledge etc. When I die, I will have no spirit, it will not be there when my brain is not functioning.

And I didn't come from 'somewhere', nor did my parents, or their parents, we didn't just pop-up one day and suddenly exist, nor will we continue to exist after we die.

Blake

 

[Swift]

I don't see how this has to do with anything, unless you're saying my 'spirit' had to come from somewhere.

But since my understanding of my 'spirit' is simply my consciousness, then my 'spirit' came from me, my expericences, my knowledge etc. When I die, I will have no spirit, it will not be there when my brain is not functioning.

And I didn't come from 'somewhere', nor did my parents, or their parents, we didn't just pop-up one day and suddenly exist, nor will we continue to exist after we die.

Blake

Everything that we know of has a beginning(save God). Especially if you're going to live in a totally temporal world. So what was the beginning?

 

[tabs]

Ok, do you know where you came from? Your parents, and where did you parents come from, their parents so on and so forth. Now, there had to be something to get that started because you didn't come from nothing. I'm not talking creation vs evolution.

Yeah, you are.

What I'm saying is that there was a time when you didn't exist, but you came from "somewhere" and when you die you will go "somewhere" That's what I'm saying.

How do you know this?

 

[Swift]

How do you know this?

Because we are here. In whatever capacity. We are here. So, where did we come from. And from "we" I mean our conscienceness.

 

[Danoff]

Because we are here. In whatever capacity. We are here. So, where did we come from. And from "we" I mean our conscienceness.

Our conciousness comes from the food we eat, the water we drink, and the air we breathe. The energy that supplies our bodies (and fuels our minds) comes from our environment.

But I don't think you meant it that literally.

We came from our parents. My mom supplied an egg, which she was able to create because the food she ate gave her nourishment. My dad supplied a sperm in the same way. Before I was born my mother brought me to term by eating for me.

But I don't think you meant it that literally either.

The scientific evidence suggests that we "came" from other animals - evolved over long periods of time. This holds up with how similar we are in appearance and action to animals.

But you weren't talking about creation vs. evolution.

I can't give you the answer you want because the question assumes the presence of some kind of soul. If you don't assume the presence of a soul, I can tell you that I came from biological processes fueled by my environment which my species has evolved to take advantage of. If you're asking "where does our soul come from?" I can't help you - I don't think we have one.

 

[Blake]

Everything that we know of has a beginning(save God). Especially if you're going to live in a totally temporal world. So what was the beginning?

I began when I was born.

Because we are here. In whatever capacity. We are here. So, where did we come from. And from "we" I mean our conscienceness.

We have a brain, we have a brain with the capacity to think at a complex level. Why do we have this brain? Because we evolved and a big brain turned out to be a great survival trait.

You could ask where a dolphins consciousness came from, and you'd get the same answer.

But I'll ask you, where do you think our consciousness came from? And could you explain how?

Blake

 

[Pako]

What's different about humans from other life on the planet? We can think. We are not limited to programmed responses or limited to instinctual processes that are limited to other creatures on the planet. I know we're not talking about evolution here, but it can be argued that through higher thought processes with a more evolved brain that these "thoughts" are a bi-product to our evolutionary process. I have a hard time accepting this as every evolutionary change has been for a purpose of survival. We could survive just fine without this bi-product we know as our consciousness. What do our hopes, dreams, the things that define us as human have to do with survival. It makes more sense that my 'soul' was created for a purpose, and that purpose was so that I could experience love, joy, and all the good happiness stuff. It is my belief that I was created out of love, and based on that, I have a spiritual connection with my creator that I strive to maintain and mature.

 

[Blake]

Animals can experience pain and sorrow just as well as you and I, and I assume they can experience things such as joy. Have you ever seen an animal that has just had an animal that it interacted with alot die?

Blake

 

[smellysocks12]

Yeah, elephants have been witness to mourn the dead for a long period of time. Just because they can't tell you why they do so that still doesn't mean that they do this because of instinct. People act out of instinct just as much as animals. Men are following their dicks chasing women, walking around showing their muscles (if they have any) off parading around like a bunch of peacocks. As a matter of fact the only reason why human behaviour is less predictable and more complex is only because our brain capacity allows us to do so. You can't play Doom 3 on a 286.... but it functions the same way like a P4 3.2Ghz based PC. They are both computers, nothing more, nothing less. They aren't a gift from god or whatever because of their higher processing capacity. It's the same with people. We're still organisms, just like animals and amoebes.

 

[Pako]

Well which is it? Scientists used to think that humans were to the only ones to experience such things like emotion. When did that change? Bears appear to be having fun sliding down the snow. Elephants appear to be mourning their dead. These are all human traits that we try to apply to other creatures. That doesn't mean that these animals are actually experiencing these emotions, it only appears as though they are.

 

[Duke]

I have a hard time accepting this as every evolutionary change has been for a purpose of survival. We could survive just fine without this bi-product we know as our consciousness.

Evolutionary success goes not to the strongest or fastest, but to the most adaptable. We could survive just fine without higher thought processes, but we can dominate with them. So that's why evolution has still driven these apparently unnecessary traits.

What do our hopes, dreams, the things that define us as human have to do with survival.

Adaptability. That is everything.

It makes more sense that my 'soul' was created for a purpose, and that purpose was so that I could experience love, joy, and all the good happiness stuff.

It makes no sense to me at all that a 'soul' would be created by anything, to live in immortality beyond the confines of its physical life, yet be judged by its behaviour in what amounts to the first few seconds of that immortality.

I simply find it astonishing that some people don't believe there is an intangible part to them. That really confusess me.

I think there's an intangible part to me... I just have no reason to suspect, expect, hope, or wish that it will outlive my brain function.

 

[Duke]

Well which is it? Scientists used to think that humans were to the only ones to experience such things like emotion. When did that change? Bears appear to be having fun sliding down the snow. Elephants appear to be mourning their dead. These are all human traits that we try to apply to other creatures. That doesn't mean that these animals are actually experiencing these emotions, it only appears as though they are.

Scientists have never thought that animals don't experience emotion. At least not modern scientists. Anybody who's ever petted a cat knows that animals experience emotion.

 

[Pako]

Scientists have never thought that animals don't experience emotion. At least not modern scientists. Anybody who's ever petted a cat knows that animals experience emotion.

I'm glad to see that science finally agrees with what every pet owner has known. This emotion still has nothing to do with adapting or dominating an environment unless I'm missing something that you haven't pointed out yet. Why would I evolve to stand in awe at the surrounding mountains that are littered in NW Montana? It's not a fear, it's an appreciation. This doesn't help me dominate anything.

 

[Blake]

But maybe it does, what if a bunch of tribals stood infront of a mountain in awe and said 'we should move a camp here'. The adaptability of humans allows us to take this thing we stood in awe of and turn it into an industrial zone. =/

Or not. But maybe you understand some of my blabbering.

Blake

 

[Duke]

Emotions are a byproduct of intellect. They are not a survival/adaptation trait in themselves, though of course, feeling happy when you find things that are good for you and sad when you don't would seem to have its benefits, don't you agree?

Evolution does not ruthlessly remove everything that is not strictly required for survival. It does ruthlessly remove anything that interferes with survival on a big scale. Emotions have led to the death of many individuals, but the power of intellect in general is enough greater of an adaptive trait that it has allowed mankind to flourish despite the misues of emotion.

 

[Danoff]

The adaptability of humans allows us to take this thing we stood in awe of and turn it into an industrial zone. =/

That's domination.

I'm glad to see that science finally agrees with what every pet owner has known. This emotion still has nothing to do with adapting or dominating an environment unless I'm missing something that you haven't pointed out yet. Why would I evolve to stand in awe at the surrounding mountains that are littered in NW Montana? It's not a fear, it's an appreciation. This doesn't help me dominate anything.

You have a positive reaction to it because it's a good place to live. Just like people like living near the ocean - there's lots of wildlife and often freshwater near the ocean.

We're drawn toward water. Babbling brooks are beautiful, waterfalls are captivating, mountains (with all their ice and water running down them) are awe inspiring. Mountains also tend to have rain near them because they cause condensation in the air due to pressure differences as the air runs over them.

It's no coincidence that human have a positive reaction to water.

I don't like swimming all that much. I don't like the process - you get wet, you get cold - you get mostly naked in front of a bunch of strangers (and even though I'm a sight to behold and inspire awe myself, I still don't like that ). Anyway I don't like swimming. But every time I see a pool I want to be near it.

Now why on earth would I have some sort of natural impulse and fascination with a clean-looking pool of water?

Why is it that I'm inspired and captivated by images of a grove of trees with sunlight filtering through near a waterfall with a fresh pool of water, soft grass, and a wide variety of plants?