"Why won't God heal amputees?"

[man]

understanding and reasoning happen on different
layers. the deeper you come up on the learning
curve the simpler reality appears, ending in a pure
tautology. on different layers before reaching this
you have different opinions about what is true and
what is wrong.
consider a game between two kids about a ball. you
as an adult you know that they would both feel better
if they stopped fighting and started playing. yet they
don't see it and remain quarreling. on your higher
level of understanding you "know" better but that
does not necessarily mean it translates "down" to
them. but they will grow in time and realize it them-
selves anyways.

to me a similar thing happens with all conceptual
thinking, including the concept of god, including
the question why "he won't heal amputees". on
the basic level of reality we are all ... "information",
"energy". there is not much solidity at the basic
level of the universe. but if this is so, why does
someone suffer from having lost a leg. and no
matter how hard he tries, why doesn't it come back?
the basic underlying question is: is it in principle
impossible that a matter arranges again like a
new leg?

is there evidence that spirit masters reality? even
when it comes to leg-growing?
to me it seems there is. those people who dealt
for the longest time with the relationship between
mind and matter seem to be located around the
indian subcontinent. there is very much information
about monks who seemed to have achieved
mastery over matter. much trustworthy information.

back to the initial "game". as long as the kids
do not understand that there is something that
unites their duality as being two kids wanting to
hold the "ball right now!" and lift their spirit to the
uniting concept of "playing together", they are lost.
no matter how hard they try, they will go back and
forth struggling and struggling. one will leave, take
the ball with him, the other ones father will come
and claim the ball. and they will continue with that
on and on.
now what is the relation to the lost leg? as long as
one sees oneself as a single entity suffering from
the lost leg, one has no chance of regaining it. does
that mean in principle it is impossible to regrow
a leg? i do not want to shoot over the top here by
throwing dust on amputees saying they are somehow
"unable" to do something, since i am not in that
situation. neither am i a wise man from india.
but i could use by own personal problems instead
of it and the principle remains the same. the thing
is that your situation happens to you since it gives
you the opportunity to end the duality, end the
quarrel about the ball, if you will. has there ever
been a being who would have been able to regrow
the leg? i would think so, but i would think as well
that he did not have interest to do so, neither his
own nor that of someone else. since it is a lesson
to learn, it is not wise to take it away and not learn
anything.

now, where does the god-concept come into all of
this? i would think that a real wise man does not
at all distinguish between concepts like "god",
"all pervading energy", "self" or even "love". the
real point is, this wise man would say, that whatever
name you give it, you are talking about the basic
"substance" of the universe. there is no more or
less of it at any place at any time. therefore there
is nothing more god or less god. therefore there is
not someone out there that can replace the missing
leg because he is as much the missing leg as he is
the one who is missing. or as much as the one the
prayer is directed to. i believe that in the very
moment when an individual fully grasps that,
"realises" that, not just talks about it (what i am
doing now), he is immediately able to "replace" the
leg, but he probably does not want to do so any
longer.
when i am playing with the other kid, i do not miss
the ball, or lose it, when i pass it over. i enjoy the
game as such.

the next thing is to realise that concepts, including
everything in this post, are just that ... concepts.
no matter how hard one concept tries to raise the
head above all other concepts, it still remains ...
a concept. and here is where talking ends and
experience has to take over. if you call it zen, yoga,
meditation, chris consciousness or bliss is merely a
question of taste.

humbly

 

[archimedes]

Quote from man:

i would think that a real wise man does not
at all distinguish between concepts like "god",
"all pervading energy", "self" or even "love".

Can we throw hot dogs in there too?

I always wanted to be one with everything.

 

[jefferis]

Quote from stu:

jefferis , I think it fair to say it is commonly understood these days to be simply wrong and reprehensible

So if you don't mind, don't tell me what I do and do not believe in. It is strange why you see ridicule being cast by a suggestion for the application of your own advice on comparable premises.


Then you are confirming in a round about way are you not, that you are at least possibly agnostic about God Allah and God Vishnu? By your own advice rather than believing there is no Allah or Vishnu, a more reasoned approach to be agnostic about them both, would be appropriate, would it not?.

My other question to you is, why would you separate Fairies or Thor by excluding them, contrary to your own advice? Exempting them for reasons of a fallacy looks like a cop out.

I've read some of your other posts, Stu and know BS when I see it. You seek to promote the fallacy of the irrelevant conclusion: instead of arguing the fact in dispute, the arguer seeks to gain his point by diverting attention to some extraneous fact. The fallacies are common in platform oratory, in which the speaker obscures the real issue by appealing to his audience on the grounds of popular sentiment, that since no one believes the Easter Bunny is real [except children], therefore God also must not be real, and therefore, belief in God is as ridiculous as belief in the Easter Bunny. Therefore any argument in favor of agnosticism regarding God must also result in agnosticism about the reality of the Easter Bunny.

The whole argument is specious.

The argument for faith as an avenue for accurate perception of the ultimate truths of the universe requires the concept of revelation. Revelation is outside the realm of empirical verification. The argument is tautological [a statement true by virtue of its logical form] and self-rerferential. It is logical, but cannot amount to a proof. Emmanuel Kant wrote of the unconditioned ground of being. The idea that something is infinite means by its very nature that you cannot subject it to the laws of cause and effect, because what is caused is finite, by definition, and not infinite. It is conditioned, or conditional: dependent upon something else for its existence.

In morality, he wrote that you cannot provide an ulterior motive to make someone value the good. It must be valued for its own sake. In other words, if you say, you should be good because you will get a reward: money, power, fame, eternal life, etc. then the reason the person does what is good is not because it is good in itself, but because of self interest. The selfish motivation taints the purity of the reason for the good. So, the idea of the good is axiomatic to morality, and a person ought to want to do the good because it is good in itself and for no other reason.

In the same way, the idea of God is axiomatic. What cause can cause the existence of God? If there is a cause, then by definition, God is not God, but would be created by some other agent. But God, by common definition, is uncreated and infinite. Since the empirical method can ONLY measure things by using the law of cause and effect [things that are created by causes], the very tools by which it attempts to measure, are incapable of measuring God and incapable of proving or disproving the truth of God's existence. They cannot measure the uncaused Cause of all things. The very means of empiricism would try to subject the infinite to the finite. It would be trying to prove an axiom, which by definition cannot be proved but must be accepted. If one accepts the axiom that God exists, then all else can follow. If one does not, then nothing one says, would prove the case, for the case relies upon the first premise: that God is the uncreated Creator of all things.

If you accept the idea of God as possible, then God, as the Creator, would have the power to make himself known to the people he created, IF he so wills or chooses to do so. He could also choose to make himself known to some and not to others, based upon his decision as regards to their moral character, inmost desires, or any other criterion he might choose. If he chose to reveal himself, his nature, and truths about himself, it could be direct and unmediated knowledge, or revelation using the nature of the material world, including the particularities of time, culture, language, geography, and circumstance. And he could reveal things that are necessary to morality, salvation, and himself.

However, once you enter into competing claims of revelation, whether that be Muslim, Hindu, Christian, or otherwise, you are no longer in the realm of empirical verification and you must evaluate the claims by other means.

 

[jefferis]

Quote from archimedes:


All creatures instinctively act in their own self-interest. All forms of life are essentially gene-propagating machines. This is why documented altruism exists in the animal kingdom, from insects on up. To the degree that altruistic behavior promotes kin selection, i.e. the survival of the gene pool as a whole, certain altruistic behaviors will be enhanced and reinforced via the unguided process of natural selection.

So does a human mother love her baby more than a chimpanzee mother loves hers? Sure--few would argue otherwise. But why is that true? Because the human mother has greater capacity for thought, and the intertwining of contemplation and emotion leads to a broader and deeper range of experience, overlaid with countless iterations of culture and tradition. The difference is one of degree, rather than kind.

Correlation implies causation is a logical fallacy by which two events that occur together are prematurely claimed to have a cause-and-effect relationship.
In this type of logical fallacy, one makes a premature conclusion about causality after observing only a correlation between two or more factors. Generally, if one factor (A) is observed to only be correlated with another factor (B), it is sometimes taken for granted that A is causing B. This is a logical fallacy because there are at least four other possibilities:
B may be the cause of A, or
some unknown third factor is actually the cause of the relationship between A and B, or
the "relationship" is so complex it can be labelled coincidental (i.e., two events occurring at the same time that have no simple relationship to each other besides the fact that they are occurring at the same time).
B may be the cause of A at the same time as A is the cause of B (contradicting that the only relationship between A and B is that A causes B). This describes a self-reinforcing system.
In other words, there can be no conclusion made regarding the existence or the direction of a cause and effect relationship only from the fact that A is correlated with B. Determining whether there is an actual cause and effect relationship requires further investigation, even when the relationship between A and B is statistically "strong".

 

[archimedes]

Quote from jefferis:

Correlation implies causation is a logical fallacy by which two events that occur together are prematurely claimed to have a cause-and-effect relationship.
In this type of logical fallacy, one makes a premature conclusion about causality after observing only a correlation between two or more factors. Generally, if one factor (A) is observed to only be correlated with another factor (B), it is sometimes taken for granted that A is causing B. This is a logical fallacy because there are at least four other possibilities:
B may be the cause of A, or
some unknown third factor is actually the cause of the relationship between A and B, or
the "relationship" is so complex it can be labelled coincidental (i.e., two events occurring at the same time that have no simple relationship to each other besides the fact that they are occurring at the same time).
B may be the cause of A at the same time as A is the cause of B (contradicting that the only relationship between A and B is that A causes B). This describes a self-reinforcing system.
In other words, there can be no conclusion made regarding the existence or the direction of a cause and effect relationship only from the fact that A is correlated with B. Determining whether there is an actual cause and effect relationship requires further investigation, even when the relationship between A and B is statistically "strong".

Yes. If I recall my college philosophy lectures correctly, David Hume illustrated this principle by pointing out that fire might not actually be hot. We can only assume that fire releases heat because of the tight correlation so far.

There is a technical theoretical possibility, however slight, that not all fire is hot -- because there is no way for us to sample all the fires that have ever burned.

Therefore, it might be suggested that fire does not actually produce heat -- Cthulhu does. The one-to-one correlation of fire to heat might merely be an elaborate test, to throw off those without sufficient faith in Cthulhu's heat-giving benevolence.

Hume also pointed out we cannot be certain the sun will rise tomorrow just because it rose yesterday, or otherwise cannot be certain it will rise in the same way. Which, again, is technically quite true. But he was making a philosophical point about the theoretical limits of knowledge, not trying to dismiss an overwhelming body of evidence or pull a fast one in debate.

At risk of trying to be punny, your intentional distortion of Hume suggests more heat than light here.

p.s. You are aware, by the way, that the same argument you just employed could be used to trash God's character? Even if the God of the bible exists today, what prevents him from turning into Cthulhu tomorrow? How does the Christian know that God's felt goodness and God's promises of moral rectitude and consistency are not spurious correlations? If you wish to make "correlation implies causation" into a broad-based logical fallacy, it becomes a logic gun you shoot yourself in the head with.

 

[man]

Quote from archimedes:

Can we throw hot dogs in there too?

in principle: yes. just don't tell anyone.

 

[archimedes]

Quote from jefferis:


If you accept the idea of God as possible, then God, as the Creator, would have the power to make himself known to the people he created, IF he so wills or chooses to do so. He could also choose to make himself known to some and not to others, based upon his decision as regards to their moral character, inmost desires, or any other criterion he might choose. If he chose to reveal himself, his nature, and truths about himself, it could be direct and unmediated knowledge, or revelation using the nature of the material world, including the particularities of time, culture, language, geography, and circumstance. And he could reveal things that are necessary to morality, salvation, and himself.

Remember that playground taunt, "my dad can beat up your dad?"

One can play the same game with revelation. "My revelation can beat up your revelation."

Religious folk like to pretend that General Revelation (i.e. the natural observable universe) and Special Revelation (holy books) are on the same ground -- mutually supportive of each other.

The reality is that general revelation -- what we can know of any potential creator via rational study of the logic and structure of the universe -- is wholly in conflict with special revelation, and in fact stomps special revelation into the ground.

If the universe is a supercomputer, say, then general revelation (i.e. science and logical observation) represents the direct study of the supercomputer itself... whereas special revelation is a Commodore 64 manual badly translated from Japanese into Urdu.

What we can know of a potential creator, if anything, is revealed through the philosophical and logical insight provided by general revelation -- the natural universe. A reasonable and rational assessment of this information forces one to conclude that, even if a higher intelligence built the supercomputer, the accompanying Commodore 64 manual--in all its varying versions--is a waste of paper.

 

[jefferis]

Quote from archimedes:


Hume also pointed out we cannot be certain the sun will rise tomorrow just because it rose yesterday. Which, again, is technically quite true. But he was making a philosophical point about the theoretical limits of knowledge, not trying to dismiss an overwhelming body of evidence or pull a fast one in debate.

Just pointing out that your argument also emanates from a faith based axiom: that there is no God, therefore all else potentially follows, since accident is the cause of all things, therefore everything follows not from directed causes but from material effects of atomic structures. All evidence martialed to support the argument of purely genetic motivations for love, etc, are all pre-conditioned on your axiomatic assumptions.

The problem of interpreting data according to prejudicial assumptions is not limited to a religious conviction, but also to the axioms of a faith in no purpose or creator. It may be logical, but it is still tautological.

 

[archimedes]

Quote from jefferis:

Just pointing out that your argument also emanates from a faith based axiom: that there is no God, therefore all else potentially follows, since accident is the cause of all things, therefore everything follows not from directed causes but from material effects of atomic structures. All evidence martialed to support the argument of purely genetic motivations for love, etc, are all pre-conditioned on your axiomatic assumptions.

The problem of interpreting data according to prejudicial assumptions is not limited to a religious conviction, but also to the axioms of a faith in no purpose or creator. It may be logical, but it is still tautological.

Wrong. I do not, and have not, denied the possibility that God--a higher intelligence--exists in some shape or form.

In fact I have gone out of my way to clarify the opposite. It is possible that a higher intelligence exists, and not logically possible to fully discount that proposition.

Based on the available evidence we have, however -- in the form of accessible information regarding the observable universe -- it is clear that special revelation is bunk.

That is not the same thing as saying god does not exist or cannot exist. One way that knowledge advances is by cutting off spurious pathways and reducing the number of alternatives. It is a step forward in this sense re declaring the popular metaphysical answers (i.e. popular religions) incorrect.

 

[archimedes]

Quote from jefferis:

All evidence martialed to support the argument of purely genetic motivations for love, etc, are all pre-conditioned on your axiomatic assumptions.

All logical declarations of fact or opinion in regards to the structure of reality are subject to this same observation. This is true whether God does or does not exist. Therefore, if you rely on this line of reasoning to discredit an opponent, you once again shoot yourself in the head. A reliance on logic and evidence is axiomatic if one wishes to make logical progress of any kind. Assertions that do not rely on logic and evidence are mystical, and not subject to rational discourse in the first place.

p.s. Gotta take a break here and get some work done. Might check back in later.