Hi Og
I'm not sure I understand or buy your proof. I'm sceptical...for which I do not apologize, I'm also not well (not at all) read on this aspect of "religion", for which I apologize .... "arguing" with you in a state of ignorance.
The nature of the universe is that there are no ultimate boundaries or individual entities. What is the case with the universe is that it is one gigantic process where all things that you might call an individual are, in fact, expressions of everything else.
OK I can buy this ..after all we are stardust and some butterfly in Sumatra can be blamed for hurricane Katrina. There is an interconnectedness (Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency)?
The ego disconnects us from this reality. It gives us the false impression that we are separate from everything around us. We then walk around with the impression that we have things like free will. In fact, the reality is that we are complex machines that adapt to environmental stimuli in a complex fashion.
I'm not sure I understand this? OK on a day to day basis I don't worry too much about my actions.... much in the same the Sumatran butterfly did not...is this what you mean by disconnected from reality? Or do you mean the 'power of now' kind of reality?
I can buy we are extremely complex machines. Certain aspects of me have no control, without argument. But I'm having a problem letting go of the concept that I have no free will. I can understand that I loose my free will after my fourth beer and have the fifth regardless of the consequences, but I can stop at two! OK, so I don't apparently have a genetic predisposition. I have been very angry with my son, he was about to get a smack from me but I realized I did not have to be angry and the situation turned around immediately. During that moment of realization it felt like a deeply 'now' moment. It certainly felt like I had free will, it certainly was buried while I was in an emotional state. The philosophers and neuroscientists seem split on the free will aspect.
..... Just as the impulse to flex your arm muscle travels down a neuron and stimulates the muscle cells to contract, my text is hitting your eyes and entering your brain right now. It's causing cascades of neurons in your brain that interact with other neural networks that have been laid down over time due to other external stimuli and your genetic makeup. Based on the content of this message and the historical makeup of your brain, you will respond in a certain way to this text.
OK this describes the machine like aspect of our lives. Your argument asserts (I think) that the programming of our "apparent free will" started from before conception (actually from the moment time began). But do we have free will?
All that being said, the Judeo/Christian/Muslim God... The god of the west... Is defined as an individual entity that we are necessarily separate from. Furthermore, this entity inserts us into the world, and then takes us out and judges us based on our behavior during our lives.
I think many theists might argue this interpretation. Thinking back to my early indoctrination.... God is in us all type arguments.
Given my above commentary, this God notion is clearly a product of the ego which is an illusion. If there is an ultimate God entity, then it must be identical with us and the whole universe and us identical with it. Boundaries are just how our control systems (brain) relate to the world to create our behavior. They do not have some sort of cosmic meaning where an ultimate creator of all the universe is concerned.
I still think many theists would argue this point
.... get the feeling for the math used to describe the universe. You'll see arbitrary reference points and imaginary boundaries used as intermediates to understand elements of the cosmos. Engineers make a profession out of defining boundaries and manipulating the contents of the boundary to respond in a fixed and known way to information crossing that boundary (I/O systems engineering).
I'm a chemist by training who walks in the footsteps of chemical engineers. Chem engineers use boundary conditions to help simplify a model, because the contents of the model are often complex and adding the complexity of the universe would get them (and me) to the sixth beer. Different types of engineers may use boundaries in other senses?
The judeo/christian god is a product of our ignorance.
I agree with the sentiment though I would say "faulty logic" rather than "ignorance" for we and they are capable of both. I agree with much and don't understand much too, but for me it does not constitute a proof.
A picture I use is that the various religions, theistic and deistic, and atheism are just models to explain the meaning of life universe and everything. Wise people have noted all models are wrong, just that some are useful.
I also apologize for being a fan of Douglas Adams.
All the best |