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28006. TheWizardOfWhimsy - 3/15/2006 10:16:15 PM The definitions I've used have to do with the roots of the words and are, I hope, much more elastic in their meaning.
One can have a philosophical belief or a rational faith in something. One's focus is one's prerogative. One can have a false rational belief about anything. What's your point?
Are you looking for a neat, black and white, right or wrong kind of answer?
The word "water" will never quench your thirst or get you wet–it can only point to the experience of it. Under that qualification, who can criticize someone's belief if they have never experienced what the believer has.
That's why I like Zen. It's a philosopy, a cosmology and a religion that only points to eternal patterns in the moment, helping one to appreciate and comprehend them as they unfold.
28007. thoughtful - 3/15/2006 10:39:13 PM See, to me, rational faith is an impossibility. 28008. TheWizardOfWhimsy - 3/15/2006 10:50:07 PM Why? Haven’t you ever had a mystical experience that defies reason? Do you think falling in love is rational? If I said to you that something was a controlled accident or that someone was a sophisticated primitive, wouldn't your mind be able to grasp such contradictions?
t-ful, you're too smart and aware to have an inflexible mind. 28009. TheWizardOfWhimsy - 3/15/2006 10:53:28 PM I have a rational faith that death is nature's way to help us all eventually relax.
I can't prove it, but I believe it and have faith that from a certain relative viewpoint, I'm correct. 28010. anomie - 3/15/2006 11:10:57 PM I think a rational faith is unnecessary. If one is rational, he doesn't need faith. If one has faith, rational arguments mean nothing.
Otherwise, this reminds me of the atheiest vs agnostic discussions. Picking nits over definitions.
Religion plays fast and loose with many word references anyway. I'm always surprised when religious people think what they're saying makes perfect sense. 28011. anomie - 3/15/2006 11:12:55 PM Death = Relaxation? Not only can you not prove it, but I don't think you can even make a rational argument for it. It's unclear to me why you would want to. 28012. anomie - 3/15/2006 11:14:10 PM In fact, wouldn't we call you a "stiff" at that point?
(couldn't resist) 28013. thoughtful - 3/15/2006 11:22:28 PM Sorry, no. Call me inflexible then. Zero is zero. Zero cannot be nonzero.
Faith to me means accepting that for which there is no evidence. Faith means an unquestioning belief to the point where even questioning it means that you've lost your faith. Thus it can never be examined rationally. Faith is an extremely strict and tough standard in my view.
This is not to be confused with the fact that people can be irrational and people can be wrong and people can be irrational for rational reasons.
If I had a 'mystical' experience such as seeing a ghost, I wouldn't have faith in it. I would however question it as something I experienced or at least thought I experienced for which I may not currently have an explanation. But that doesn't mean not looking for one, or not believing that an explanation exists. Just as at one point in human history, fire was a mystery. One could respond with faith in accepting the existence of fire and treating it with reverence and awe but never understanding it's nature, or one could respond with reason, questioning what makes fire, what snuffs fire, what the chemical processes of fire are and so on.
And love can be either rational or irrational, but that's not the same as faith. 28014. TheWizardOfWhimsy - 3/15/2006 11:26:02 PM Hah!
It was a half-serious joke, but I didn't say death is equivalent to relaxation. I was merely pointing out that death was an end to the struggle for survival. I have no doubt that the compulsion to believe in God, for some people, is often because they (or their egos) can't personally (and rationally) accept death. 28015. anomie - 3/15/2006 11:30:01 PM Would be nice though. I never claim to know what is or isn't on the other side. Existence on this side is no more likely than the other. 28016. TheWizardOfWhimsy - 3/15/2006 11:34:41 PM Well, using your own logic and criteriaI, although "zero" is a concept and faith is a concept, one is a number and can't be something else, while faith has multiple meanings. You're obviously adamant, t-ful; but I'm not trying to change your mind. You can argue for your own limitations as long as you like. I was only trying to answer your question and express what I meant. 28017. thoughtful - 3/15/2006 11:41:20 PM I like to think there is some kind of life after death...otherwise it's all such a colossal waste, which of course it may very well be. But I don't like to think that.
But I would hardly call that faith.
And while i often think of the gods playing with my life...things like making sure i hit every red light when i'm running late for an appointment...it most likely is just the randomness of events and the biased way with which I perceive them.
But I would hardly call that faith. 28018. thoughtful - 3/15/2006 11:46:49 PM Yes, wiz, if you want to call me limited by facts and logic, then I fully confess to being so.
You may not have been trying to change my mind, but I was trying to change yours.
But alas you seem to be quitting the discussion so soon. 28019. TheWizardOfWhimsy - 3/15/2006 11:51:23 PM There is life after death–just not for those who've died! Besides, why would you even care?
You're alive now and any thoughts about an afterlife ( again, using your own reasoning) are irrational and unprovable–mathematically or verbally.
28020. TheWizardOfWhimsy - 3/15/2006 11:51:56 PM x-post! 28021. TheWizardOfWhimsy - 3/15/2006 11:58:58 PM I not only won't quit the discussion, but I submit that there is no life after death and yet paradise for anyone who wakes up to what their ego really is–a total illusion. That is to say, that the ego is an invention foisted upon every person--a persona (or a mask) that is conditioned illusion prescribed by our cultural institutions. This all comes from Zen and Taoism, btw. 28022. thoughtful - 3/16/2006 12:10:10 AM There are reasons of comfort, which i suppose is part of faith. But faith requires that you accept those without question.
Me I seek comfort in some irrational thoughts while fully recognizing it is for an emotional need...which makes those irrational thoughts useful for rational reasons.
I like to think my dad is watching over me...I like to think he's someplace having a great time with all his friends and people he loved who predeceased him. I like to think that he's somehow restored to the man of his joyous youth and not the man with serious health problems and depression of his later years. Of course I know nothing of this and have no way of learning it. But it comforts me to think it. A salve to my own conscience for the things I could've done better as his daughter.
Perhaps some would call that faith. But I don't think it such. 28023. thoughtful - 3/16/2006 12:13:41 AM Interesting. Clearly zen.
But I don't see where ego is culturally foisted upon us. I see ego existing in its rawest form in every child from birth which gets tempered with age and exposure to culture and socialization. 28024. TheWizardOfWhimsy - 3/16/2006 12:23:06 AM We're in a kind of time-delayed limbo here.
I like to think my dad is watching over me...I like to think he's someplace having a great time with all his friends and people he loved who predeceased him. I like to think that he's somehow restored to the man of his joyous youth and not the man with serious health problems and depression of his later years. Of course I know nothing of this and have no way of learning it. But it comforts me to think it. A salve to my own conscience for the things I could've done better as his daughter.
I have all of those yearnings and I feel the same way about my Mom.
Nevertheless, your yearnings are all true in that your life in time is eternally taking place. These are all irrational ideas, but true for anyone who can see what my words are pointing to. 28025. TheWizardOfWhimsy - 3/16/2006 12:52:32 AM But I don't see where ego is culturally foisted upon us . . .
The word persona comes from the Greek word for the megaphone-masks that were worn by actors in their plays. We are taught and conditioned to invent our unique personas and then encouraged to be consistent in our roles so that our culture can maintain its power and influence.
The ego is a total, and I mean TOTAL invented illusion, but because its a habit of our mind (like looking through colored glasses and not realizing it) we think it's the way everything really is. Cultural imprinting gives us all unconscious (and therefore unquestioned) basic assumptions that make seeing through this hallucination near impossible–that is, until we drop the illusion-- and take off the glasses.
We are first given a name (a label) and our family conditions us to behave in acceptable ways. Once learned, we go on to each successive stage of "development." More ego-imprinting. Our family, teachers, friends, spouse, colleagues etc., all teach us what we think we are.
But all of this ego-imprinting is an illusion because it divides us and removes our ability to respond to experience directly--that is, as a divided self (in R.D. Lang's terminology). "Good I" reprimands "Bad me!" That's why your ego can't tolerate not being a "better daughter" to your Dad.
But once you see that the ego creates what it has been programmed to desire and learn not to identify with this invention of "me," you get a glimmer of liberationd--or on the road to "enlightenment" in Zen terms.
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