Are believers less intelligent than Atheists? Discuss

Discussion in 'Religion Archives' started by universaldistress, Sep 9, 2012.

  1. Quantum Quack Life's a tease... Valued Senior Member

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    totally agree..... [delusions cost regardless of their color]
    however the other edge to the double sided sword has for exmple Genetically modified crops and animals coming into the scheme of things with a very short sighted attitude to corporate profits. Where the God Mammon is dominating and only for the short term.
    So what happens in 100 years when the Genetically modified crops and animals destroy or seriously impinge upon any naturally evolved DNA? [eh? who cares...100 years from now the comporation would have been taken over or liquidated by then. [And the natural evolution by "hard knocks" method is totally corrupted]
    The point being that the ability to have vision for the future beyond the grave is greatly diminished due to the inability to see value beyond the grave. [ materialism ] Therefore the quality of affection a parent may have towards then selves, their own children, or elderly and society in general, for example, suffers accordingly...[sociopathic materialism]
    The only judge being available is themselves...which naturally means that if they are materially inclined then the only judge is their bank balance. [ and a cold and dark bed to sleep in ]

    I have a friend who is currently living in a cotttage that is over 1040 years old. It only had to be built once and was probably really cheap even then [ stone cottage in Great Britain ]
    How many houses are built today and expected/anticipated to be rebuilt or replaced at least a few times in a generation? What is the cost associated? A hell of a lot more than that simple stone cottage that has lasted 1040 years of providing accommodation.
    1040 years = cost $x Great Britain stone cottage
    1040years = cost $x *20 common approx. 50 year* planned life expectancy of a house today. [*ha if only]
    the cost of materialism [consumerism] can be staggering when you think on it...

    any ways just waffling...sorry..
     
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  3. cole grey Hi Valued Senior Member

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    Well I never think it will be easy to travel roads like this. Perhaps this could be elaborated into a zen christian koan, if my interpretation is not sufficient. I think a child can be in awe and have intimate love at the same time. A young boy could see his intimately loved father as the all-powerful being who can make the spinach go away (referring to a podcast by ken wilbur "turning spinach into candy" http://feeds.feedburner.com/INpodcast , which is accessible on itunes, or maybe it is in here too - http://rationalspirituality.com/articles/NatureOfNature.htm)
    Are we more than children to a God? I don't think so. The issue with our relationship to God is how to progress from beings that can only experience God in this pre-rational way, to beings who can experience God in a rational way. This is our spiritual evolutionary path, one of the external stimuli requiring evolution (the lack of habitat or whatever), being this issue of perception.

    I agree that the standard ideas of the wrathful God, from whom we must be saved, are not useful for creating anything but fear, or maybe "respect" or "awe", but never love.

    In this osho video he describes our seeming need to be taught love while hate is totally natural. Although this could be denied as our "natural" state, it is undeniable that the world we live in is deeply flawed, and the responsible party (if we are to maintain any human value at all, we must also maintain responsibility), at this technologically developed stage of our existence at least, is humanity. (Just to avoid anyone misinterpreting me as an Oshoist or whatever that would be called, i disagree with much of his "answers" but deeply appreciate his train of thought in providing questions). http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p0H5JnNXpTM&feature=relmfu

    So we clearly need to be saved from ourselves, or our listening to the devil, or however anyone wants to frame it. I personally am going with needing an external metaphysical intervention due to my current "understanding" of our existence as somehow relating to something outside of our current material box, but i have no problem with the idea of saving ourselves if that intervention is not going to be effective.
    i personally think discussions on important subjects are valuable as long as they can be real discussions and not proselytizing or evangelizing. I am not judging in any way, however, those people who feel the need to stand on the street corner or run around trying to convert others, as long as they are preaching something logically consistent and valuable to humanity, which, admittedly, most are not.
    Here you point out one thing we need to be saved from - maya. the fact that people in the east are saved by teachers, gurus, or themselves , doesn't preclude the fact that they must be saved. Unless, of course, hanging out in this disinformation is perfectly wonderful, in which case, why bother with any striving of any kind?
    (Amitabha buddha and "pure land" buddhism, also seems to allow for an external savior, and i am less informed on that subject than i should or intend to be.)
    what his private thoughts were we probably do not know, but i agree that most people are not going to be comfortable, initially, with "maybe logic", and require solid ground to stand on, right or wrong.
    trusting oneself is necessary unless you wish to trust no one, or some one else, so i see it as less tricky than the other options.
    I still insist that happiness is only part of what it means to be human, and until we go beyond our current state, it is futile to try to maintain a state of constant happiness, possibly even psychologically unhealthy. It is certainly cruel to taunt the world of humanity with the idea that they SHOULD be happy all the time, in this life, at least as i see it, as we exist currently. To be free from UNNECESSARY sorrow may be a good goal. To be free from the suffering CAUSED by inaccurate thinking, or other evils, yes. Not pure happiness as described by many people.
     
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  5. wynn ˙ Valued Senior Member

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    Sure, we can be considered as "God's children." However, we do start off with our human notions of what it means to be a child. And when an adult tries to be a child, that is usually just childish.

    There is in religions sometimes the instruction that we should be "like a child" - trusting and having faith. But when adult people with adult responsibilities do that, it tends to go awfully wrong.
    When children are taught religious ideas from an early age on, that is one thing.
    But to expect, demand, that adults undergo the same process, the same way, that is something quite different, and is what cultism and serious mental and life problems in general are about for people who as adults try to take the route of being child-like.


    Flawed - in what sense, in relation to what purpose?

    To say that this world is flawed is to say that God's creation is flawed - and this is defamation of God's character.


    Osho = a big garage full of fancy cars.

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    You need to be saved from yourself, from listening to the devil?
    Why do you need this salvation?


    I am not sure we need to be saved from maya.

    A need only exists in relation to a purpose. Ie. "For there to be X, there needs to be Y."

    To what end do we need to be saved from maya?


    It may not be wonderful, but it's not that bad either. You love to learn, to think and all that, don't you? It gives you a sense of self-efficacy, and you like that, do you not?
    Not to mention that there are many beings who simply love samsara.


    Or one can conceive of the options differently altogether. Instead of contrasting "trusting oneself," "trusting no one," and "trusting others", one can depersonalize the whole thing, and instead of thinking about it as a matter of pledging allegiance to a person (either oneself, others, or nobody), one can conceive of it as a matter of pledging allegiance to a principle.
    Allegiance to a principle is more sturdy than allegiance to a person, even if allegiance to a person usually feels more real and more substantial. Relationships with people change, people change, sometimes for the worse, or die, or break up with one, so trusting oneself or others is subject to that change and decay as well. Trusting principles doesn't suffer from these problems.


    It seems you are talking about cheerfulness. Which I don't mean when I say "happiness."
     
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  7. kx000 Valued Senior Member

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    Don't generalize, gentlemen.
     
  8. cole grey Hi Valued Senior Member

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    well, we have to think about what parts of childhood we might emulate or experience again. Clearly throwing tantrums, or forgetting how to use the toilet, is not included in the instruction "be like a child".
    This is the guru follower's state though, the guru takes on the responsibility for the person and the person gets to regress to a positive "single-mindedness". I personally wouldn't give up my freedom and responsibility that way, but i understand what a clean and simple (and yes cultish) step this is to take, if you are willing to trust someone that much. I couldn't.
    well, the world is an amazing learning tool, and when i connect with that idea viscerally, i feel grateful and happy.
    That is not clear - the creation could have been allowed to make choices which led to a state where shortcomings of human behavior are not addressed but allowed to usurp even natural functions (acid rain, frankenfoods, etc). Now of course we could regress further and further back until we reach adam and eve, and then back again to the creation idea and say "god is at fault for creating flawed people", but that is not a REQUIRED logical idea, although it is certainly as valid as the negation, and i personally tend to swing towards this placement of "ultimate responsibility". I guess to me it is clear that there are problems, God seems to let them exist, BUT that doesn't mean i have to start calling the problems pleasures. War may be a necessary evil, but it is never simply a good thing. I am not willing to assume God is just a cosmic surgeon and all the bad things are really good things, until the point when that is shown. I am willing to say things were necessary, and perhaps meaningful or important can be a better end than happiness or goodness. BUT, if i walk around thinking up is down and black is white, how will i do any thinking at all? I would rather think clearly floating on a sea of uncertainty than sit on an island made of nonsense.

    to be clear i mention the devil as one of many ideas, although it is not my personal need. I need only be saved from myself, and perhaps the devils in other people, or the world systems themselves. But that is because i am clear as to where the responsibility lies for my actions.
    i fall short of an ideal, the world falls short of an ideal, the world as it is is what it is and has no responsibility, so the world can fall short with no negative connotation. I can't however. Because I "could" have done better. Also there is what i believe to be a metaphysical aspect of existence that i have literally no keys for. Other dimensions, spiritual or physical, I have no ability to move into or among them as far as i know.
    sure, we could assume that messing around in maya is something we SHOULD do. Then the buddhas are all just other players and nirvana is just another samsara I guess. Then the bodhisattva delusion isn't just a state with some delusion but is actually just as complete a delusion as all other states. The cow almost becomes a higher being than the bodhisattva at that point, at least the cow expends its energy for valid purposes.

    i don't think this changes anything. Whose principle is it? One you got from someone? One you synthesized? Who tells you when you are allied with principle? Yourself, or a leader.
    i agree that principles are sturdier constructions than relationships generally (although the exceptions are there for both categories, relational and principle). After that though, essentially you must trust someone, or yourself, to work through the LIVING of trusting a principle anyway. I believe that particular abstraction doesn't really change the reality.
     
  9. wynn ˙ Valued Senior Member

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    But what is?


    I'm not sure I experience the teacher-student relationship in religio-spiritual contexts entirely as a matter of giving up one's freedom and responsibility.
    Certainly, if one is an average Westerner who goes to India and submits to a guru, then this can be a matter of giving up one's freedom and responsibility.
    But traditionally at least, teacher-student relationships in some religio-spiritual contexts, are on principle much saner, much like someone who is already good at something seeking a teacher to help him get even better at it.


    To use your words: If the world is "an amazing learning tool" in relation to which you feel "grateful and happy" - then the world is not flawed. If it serves a purpose, then it is not flawed.


    What ideal, whose ideal?

    Why would you need to live up to that ideal?
    What purpose would be served by living up to that ideal?

    How can you be sure you are not already living up to that ideal, or aren't in the process of living up to that ideal?


    Whenever you do a math calculation, such as your finances, do you first run to all your math teachers and check with them whether you have calculated correctly?

    Chances are, you don't. Some fields of knowledge are such that they give a person a measure of self-sufficiency, and it is a self-sufficiency that generally does away with problems of whether to trust oneself or others. Mathematics, grammar, cooking are good examples.

    Things get trickier with spirituality/religion. But that may be simply because one hasn't learned the basics of it yet, even though one is already an adult.
    I think one of the problems that we in the modern West face is that our development is so uneven. We learn maths and grammar etc. early on, but life skills and spirituality/religiosity tend to be left far behind for many people, and catching up later on can be very difficult, sometimes impossible.


    How we think about things can change how we act, and our actions do change our reality.

    It's rather abstract to think of "trusting a principle" because the psychological momentum of trust in "trusting a principle" is minimal in comparison to the trust one may have in people. So principles, on principle (!) have much less baggage with them than relationships with people, which should making principle-based reasoning easier than people-based reasoning.


    I think that is an abstraction, and not a necessary one.

    It's not like we are blank slates in a void who then somehow have to, by force of trust, get out of that void and become inscribed.

    This whole trust issue sounds to me as when that naive Westerner goes to India and there she has to "just trust" some old dirty guy who comes along and claims to have the keys to heaven.

    When talking about trust, several issues seem to be conflated - trust itself, the effort required to take the action, the results of the action, expectations about the action and the results. These things need to be thought of separately, not conflated.
     
  10. cole grey Hi Valued Senior Member

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  11. davewhite04 Valued Senior Member

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    No.

    Stupid thread, fueled by a huge ego problem.
     

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