Subject:
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Re: Is lgbt dead in the water? & Is religion dead in the water?
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Newsgroups:
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lugnet.off-topic.debate
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Date:
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Mon, 18 Oct 2004 05:49:47 GMT
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1577 times
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You know, for a time now I have wanted this whole thing to go away and stop
appearing on the main news page, for you see, I have a terrible weakness: a
great fascination in philosophy. So, this whole discussion was honey to me and I
was having a hard time refusing it. Well, we all know what happened now, don’t
we.
I must admit that I am very amused with all of this. First, that such a
discussion is found on a website for fans of little plastic toy bricks meant to
unlock the imagination. And second, that a discussion about a community
developed within the greater Lego Toy community for the purpose of giving
certain individuals a haven for their discussions, as they feel that the outside
macro-society persecusion has trickled into this micro-cosm society, has
developed into debates about metaphysics.
Did I say that right? Does it make sense? It’s kind of late and I need to stay
to my main thought... here goes.
There will always be religion. Religion has always throughout time served a real
and functional social purpose in all societies. In the absence of religion,
societies or individuals have developed some sort of alternative idea or belief
or distraction that fills the gap that religion served. And what is that service
rendered to societies by religions or cosmological ideas? Well there are
several. The first involves the best example for absolute, non-reltivistic,
occurences in our lives -- Death. Yep, it will happen no matter what you do.
And, as the vast majority of humanity and the knowledge puttering around inside
our amazing biochemical brains depends solely on data and reality acquired
through the course of this biochemical life, then death is the ultimate end of
our existence. It is the end of every laugh, love, kiss, cry, pain, fear, hurt,
taste of food, smile, sunshine on our faces, ten mile jog, whatever, that we
have experienced.
A lot of people find this very depressing when they stop to think about it.
So, the reassuring thought that death is not the end is a nice thought. But how
would that work? Well, a transformation into a non dying state of being would be
in order. Okay, but then what? Well, everything we know to be real, i.e.
corporeal, had to have come from somewhere -- that will be where we return.
Well, this goes on for a while, but eventually you get an idea for a religion
that has an everlasting afterlife and even explains where it all began. Next
stop is of course the clock maker, that being who/what made it all and set it
into being.
There are of course other social functions and social unity that
religions/profane ideas provide for what we humans crave. Example, we crave to
think that we are masters of our seemingly chaotic surroundings in a seemingly
chaotic universe and that we are so much more than smart monkeys. Also, we love
the fantastic and crave meaning. This is of course starts to run into the whole
secular/profane debate, but we psychological like to feel that everything makes
sense and is according to a sort of design or order. Science, after all, seeks
to know, seeks to make sense of what we don’t know. If science replaces
religion, then it is providing that which religion once did. But, that takes the
fantastical out of it so unless science starts providing the extraordinary (the
spice of life), then we humans will find ways to fill that gap.
By the way, all of my ideas here are greatly boiled down for space
consideration. Little elaboration allowed.
But, there is the whole thing that our thoughts, our beauty, goes so far beyond
simple biochemical reactions. If we only had biochemical reactions, then why are
we not like the animals and other life forms around us? Sure, we are heavily
influenced by biochemical chemistry -- sex appeal/drive, instinct, illness, etc.
But, we have the power to overcome it with our minds. We have the ability to
exceed the sum of our parts. How is that scientifically possible? (Rhetorical
question) We can so easily deny ourselves but eventually after all that doubting
away we find that there is still something there doing the doubting. There is
still something there, a mostly untapped potential, that can give us the
extraordinary that we so often crave.
So, where does that come from? How can we rise to be more than a sum of our
parts? Is not 2 + 2 = 4? Maybe there are some fascinating biochemical reactions
that we have not studied yet?
If we deny the human ability to overcome the mundane physical, then we deny all
of our great accomplishments. Such as, music, art, the atom bomb (that was a
woozy), civilization, doughnuts, language, laughter, and the list goes on.
There is nothing in nature that points to the rise of this specialness. If using
tools or burying the dead or caring for our young provided the answer, then we
would not be alone in terms of sentient species on this planet. Yet, we humans,
whatever shape, size, color, skeleton, etc. that we come in, are alone. And that
too is a depressing thought that religions answer.
So, there are some pretty good reasons why religion in some form or another will
always be around. But, what is this whole idea of a deity? What is this whole
idea of the supernatural? Religions and cosmological ideas don’t have to involve
anything outside of the extraordinary found here on Earth such as a pretty
sunset or music or art that provides powerful emotions, yet they often do. We
just can’t seem to get away from those ideas.
I once read a story. There was a circle who lived in the second dimension. He
lived a happy life with all of the other simple two dimensional shapes on their
two dimensional plane of existence. Then, one day he was abducted by beings from
the third dimension. They gave him the form of a third dimensional being and he
was able to look down upon all of his friends and their two dimensional
existence. He was transfigured into a sphere. He of course went through total
mind shock at the thought of this new dimension. It was so totally beyond
anything that he could have imagined! Parallel lines that are not straight but
never intersect. Multi-faceted beings. Movement in whole new directions, you
know, all that 3-D stuff. It was glorious as his mind began to comprehend the
existence and the possibilities of this new dimension. Then, he thought how
great it would be to go back and tell all of his friends about it. So he asked
to go back, and the 3-D’s took him back. But not a single 2-D person believed
him as it was so strange, so far beyond their reality and their existence. They
thought him mad for the gibberish he spoke about this 3-D that they had never,
and probably would never, experience. Then, circle called to be taken back to
3-D, and he was. And, in a great thought, he asked the 3-D beings, what
dimension was beyond the 3rd dimension. They looked at him quizically and said,
there is nothing beyond this dimension, it is absurd to think so, and they went
on with their happy everyday 3-D lives.
I like to think that the supernatural is a lot like this. We are the 2-D beings
in our happy, tangible, five senses, data in - data out world. And then, some of
us get a brief glimpse of something even greater that is beyond our 2-D
perception. And then we argue about this 3-D reality in our poor, limited 2-D
vocabulary and our poor 2-D minds/knowledge. Maybe our ability to overcome the
sum of our parts comes from the fact that there is a little bit inherent in us
that is outside of this, like some subconcious dream voice quietly letting us
know that we are something more, because we come from something more.
Maybe not. But, as sure as we try to answer the question of death, so too are we
always struggling with the question of life. And, the question of who/what we
are. Sometimes, we just can’t answer these questions with what we have available
to us and we have to look at it from a different perspective altogether. And,
sometimes we are happier with a much simpler idea.
My own beliefs... well, I belong to no church or organized man made religion,
yet I am a stout Christian. I am not a cult of one, nor do I find definition or
justification in others. I do find love and service in others, as I try to give
to others. I would not be labeled by modern political correct terms as tolerant
or moral relativist. I do put forth that we all have the mind capacity to think
whatever we want to think, either to our betterment or ruin (think atom bomb).
Which is why I do not see God as being a construct or our social/personal
desires or needs. God is real. Take that for whatever you want, but He makes
himself real to those who search Him out. Making automatons does not engender
Love. Having others that are almost like Him come unto Him through all that
there is shows a strong tried and true Love.
Well, I will quit there since my main thought was on the social function of
religions. I don’t want to get into a theological debate as I find it inane, and
I have no wish to join them -- the churches that is. I just thought I would
throw in my own as that seems to let others know where the author is coming from
so they can deny these thoughts as they wish.
P.S. I know using God in this debate is to some people like using the same word
in the definition of itself, but I like to look at it like this. Each and every
person’s reality, and what they make and understand of it, derives out of their
experiences. For some, those experiences are of the tangible, mundane and easily
repeatable. In fact, we all have those experiences. Even then, some of us have
stuck a fork in a power socket, and others have not. But, there are some of us
who have gone beyond the ordinary and, for whatever reason, have broadened their
experience. They have included senses and data that requires either great feats,
or great inspiration to accomplish. They have used that little bit of something
extra in us all to learn of something greater. And, it too is the same. When we
try to use the ordinary to figure it out, then we come out with different
results according to each person’s different ordinary experiences (example,
different notions of God and truth and morals). But when we put aside our
limited 2-D selves and open ourselves to the 3-D, then we come to know something
far greater than that which we can touch in this time and space.
Time so stop, Avery Christy
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Message has 1 Reply:
Message is in Reply To:
 | | Re: Is lgbt dead in the water?
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| (...) I did not rip you. I cautioned you against the use of a Straw Man falacy in misapplying the definition of tolerance, but that's a discussion of rhetoric. If you perceived my addressing of your rhetorical shortcomings as a "rip" on you (...) (20 years ago, 15-Oct-04, to lugnet.off-topic.debate, FTX)
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