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InvisibleAsante
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If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can.
    #27129911 - 01/06/21 09:21 AM (3 years, 22 days ago)

Warning: a less pleasant side of Creation:



Quote:

Cordylobia anthropophaga, the mango fly, tumbu fly, tumba fly, putzi fly, or skin maggot fly, is a species of blow-fly common in East and Central Africa. It is a parasite of large mammals (including humans) during its larval stage.[1] C. anthropophaga has been endemic in the subtropics of Africa for more than 135 years and is a common cause of myiasis in humans in the region.[2]

Its specific epithet anthropophaga derives from the Greek word anthropophagos, "human eater".

    The mode of infection by the Cayor Worm. Doctors Rodhain and Bequaert conclude, from their observations in the Congo Free State, that Cordylobia anthropophaga lays its eggs on the ground. The larvae, known generally as Cayor Worms, crawl over the soil until they come in contact with a mammal, penetrate the skin and lie in the subcutaneous tissue, causing the formation of tumors. On reaching full growth, the larvae leave the host, fall to the ground, bury themselves and then pupate. This fly is said to be the most common cause of human or animal myiasis in tropical Africa, from Senegal to Natal. In the region of Lower Katanga where these investigations were made, dogs appeared to be the principal hosts, although Cordylobia larvae were found also in guinea-pigs, a monkey, and two humans. The larvae are always localized on those parts of the hosts which come in immediate contact with the soil."

        — Ann. Soc. Entom. de Belgique, Iv, pp. 192–197, 1911) summary translation in Entomological News. 1911 Vol. xxii:467.





Why?

Why does God allow for this to exist?

How do mango worms fit into your understanding of the Divine Universe?

Why do they not inhabit mangoes, or at least, the dead?

Why do they not clean out existing wounds but create new ones, to feast?

Please explain it as you see it.

Opinions differ so, lets hear yours.


We have God :angel: and we have the Mango Fly.


Why?


--------------------
Omnicyclion.org
higher knowledge starts here


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Offlineyeah
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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: Asante] * 1
    #27130157 - 01/06/21 11:24 AM (3 years, 22 days ago)

Physical reality is a halfway point between the lower and upper realms
as such it has the capacity to manifest both polarities


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InvisibleYellow Pants
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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: yeah]
    #27130239 - 01/06/21 12:06 PM (3 years, 22 days ago)

Clearly god is not purely empathetic and instead contains other qualities and purposes.  Despite whatever the Christian might say

I mean there’s no reason to specifically associate god with the empathetic.  As far as I can understand.  It could be kinetic for example, just pure movement and reality going here and there for the ride.


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InvisibleDividedQuantumM
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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: Asante]
    #27130463 - 01/06/21 01:22 PM (3 years, 22 days ago)

Perhaps God is not infinitely powerful? Perhaps he can't tear apart nature trying to redo everything. There is both the beautiful and the ugly in nature. I'm not sure God would change that even if he could, but what if he can't anyway?


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Vi Veri Universum Vivus Vici


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InvisibleYellow Pants
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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: DividedQuantum]
    #27131235 - 01/06/21 06:11 PM (3 years, 22 days ago)

Quote:

DividedQuantum said:
Perhaps God is not infinitely powerful? Perhaps he can't tear apart nature trying to redo everything. There is both the beautiful and the ugly in nature. I'm not sure God would change that even if he could, but what if he can't anyway?




Exactly.  Certainly the lord respects his creation to the extent he (she it etc) isn’t willing to throw a monkey wrench into the entire thing because one of the resident conscious life forms had a bad day.  Now granted getting ones flesh torn open and devoured from the inside out is a tad extreme but imo would be demonic for the lord itself to intervene.  Or you know like you said it isn’t infinitely powerful

God and power is an interesting topic.  I can’t remember the group (deism maybe?) that regards god like that of a watchmaker who winds the clock up and simply let’s it go from there not interfering.  Now whether this is a deliberate choice of the lord or not who am I to say.

After all do miracles not happen.  Maybe or maybe not


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InvisibleThe Blind Ass
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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: Yellow Pants]
    #27131798 - 01/06/21 09:42 PM (3 years, 21 days ago)

This thread reminded me of a book titled “The Cheese And The Worms” , by Carlo Ginzburg.


--------------------
Give me Liberty caps -or- give me Death caps


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OfflineLoaded Shaman
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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: yeah]
    #27131988 - 01/06/21 11:51 PM (3 years, 21 days ago)

Quote:

yeah said:
Physical reality is a halfway point between the lower and upper realms
as such it has the capacity to manifest both polarities




This is fairly accurate statement.


--------------------



"Real knowledge is to know the extent of one’s ignorance." — Confucius


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Offlinemkcobain
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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: Asante]
    #27132231 - 01/07/21 05:48 AM (3 years, 21 days ago)

Quote:

The Qur'an describes Job as a righteous servant of Allah (God), who was afflicted by suffering for a lengthy period of time. However, it clearly states that Job never lost faith in God and forever called to God in prayer, asking him to remove his affliction:




What was Job's affliction? Worms eating his flesh. Might be a symbol for something else like skepticism.


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Offlinelostintimenspc
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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: mkcobain]
    #27138479 - 01/09/21 08:51 PM (3 years, 18 days ago)

I'm partial to the talk about upper and lower realms. I've had out of body experiences (hundreds) which suggest to me there exist higher manifestations of your life.


--------------------
LSD, mushrooms and DMT are different structural levels within the same magically simulated mystery sometimes blandly called 'life'

Your life, your call.


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OfflineGypsy Boy
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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: lostintimenspc]
    #27143287 - 01/12/21 07:38 AM (3 years, 16 days ago)

Because we live not just on Earth but also in space, and it so happens these parasites are just a mere feature of this planet  :shrug:


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Offlinesaintdextro
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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: Gypsy Boy] * 1
    #27144218 - 01/12/21 05:01 PM (3 years, 16 days ago)

Simply, the Thorns of Life! This could easily be put away if we go back to Genesis. It's God's curse on us, we have to take it like a bitch, The Garden in Eden has the characteristic of mythology, fictitious story, but I think there is Symbolic Truth to it, we are in a 50/50 good and bad planet, and we are cursed, there's been time I've been depressed recently, so bad I consider earth one of the Hell realms, maybe the upper ones but the Hell realms none the less. And didn't even have to focus on the absurd atrocities of life, just realize them in the background of my mind and connected with this energy form of unrelated depression force, it had no connection with anything going on in my life, just bring me down and torture me in my mind, conceptually, than I have disturbing stupid thoughts about how Prayer is useless and wish that they just pointed it out for us in the Bible, realize that's a terribly bad thought going in the wrong direction I wanna go in my life, cry about to begging for forgiveness for my stupid thoughts, weighed down by this force I Feel connected to but it has no Identity, Just force of depression, but can't relate it to anything in my social, personal, or anything in between, life. (this was mostly over new years, and had to do with some withdrawals from some fine "inebriating" stuff!  :drooling: )

But anyways, life can really hurt, I mean really! I don't normally watch the ads and stuff on Youtube, but, this video caught my attention, about providing clean water to everyone on the planet. Poor People walking miles all day to get the dirtiest water with things living in it and animals shitting in it! I have feelings, and couldn't help but cry. I really hope they succeed in getting clean water to everyone on the planet, they hinted that it may be possible. We're living in luxury and we don't even know it, the things we take for granted, it's absurd that we have the time and ability to go to shows, concerts, parties and so on, while on the other side of the planet someone is dying just to survive, like that Beck song "...It takes a miracle just to survive!".


--------------------
"He who finds peace and joy
And radiance within himself
That man becomes one with God
And vanishes into God's bliss."

-Bhagavad Gita, 5.24
One 21 - Building Better Bombs
One 21 - Pacified
One 21 - Two Sides Is Fine
"Respectability is a cloak for the hypocrite" - Jiddu Krishnamurti


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Offlinesaintdextro
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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: saintdextro]
    #27144221 - 01/12/21 05:04 PM (3 years, 16 days ago)



--------------------
"He who finds peace and joy
And radiance within himself
That man becomes one with God
And vanishes into God's bliss."

-Bhagavad Gita, 5.24
One 21 - Building Better Bombs
One 21 - Pacified
One 21 - Two Sides Is Fine
"Respectability is a cloak for the hypocrite" - Jiddu Krishnamurti


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OfflineHagbardCeline
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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: Asante]
    #27146056 - 01/13/21 02:31 PM (3 years, 15 days ago)

I think Yellow Pants and DividedQuantum both hit on relevant points.

First, even in the bible, God and Jesus both make it clear that are not just the light but the darkness as well.

Second, the Bible clearly shows that God is fallible and not all powerful and all knowing. He makes the angels but they aren't good enough. So he makes man and loves them more. Some angels see hypocrisy and rebel. God gets mad and takes revenge. God and remaining angels pay attention to and regularly interact with man, until they are able to discern right from wrong at which point he can't find them, again gets mad and takes revenge.

So now man is kicked out of the garden and no longer gets to speak to him. Man goes on being man, cut off from God's instruction, and again God gets mad that man is wicked and he regrets making them so they almost all have to die. But not just man, all the animals who presumably God still loves because they don't know right from wrong. He gives us commandments that he himself ignores and even says he ignores them (I am a jealous God).

We still want to be with him for some reason and so we organize and build towers in the hope that we can again reach him, but that scares him so he again gets mad and takes revenge, destroying the tower and separating man. Then we make him mad again at Soddom and so guess what he does? Revenge? Yep!

Tribes of Israel, make a mistake, get a plague/slaughter/enslavement for generations. The devil you kicked out of heaven for not being good enough comes along one day and tries to make you insecure about one of the men who worships you the way you commanded and instead of dismissing such obvious shit talking, you set out to prove them wrong by inflicting every imaginable horror on someone who has done as you asked just to what, stroke your ego?

Why does God allow this to exist? He can't even control his creation in the most important aspects that mean the most to him, why - if he even cares (or exists) - would he control the small things.


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I keep it real because I think it is important that a highly esteemed individual such as myself keep it real lest they experience the dreaded spontaneous non-existance of no longer keeping it real. - Hagbard Celine


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OfflineTyperwritermonky
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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: HagbardCeline] * 2
    #27146500 - 01/13/21 07:20 PM (3 years, 15 days ago)

Sartre's explanation of God is the best.  What God simply is, is man's reflective mind trying to found itself in it's un reflective mind, which it can't reach.  Man reifies the un reflective mind from a mental concept to a concrete external being, i.e God.  So if God exists, all that it is is man being the foundation of it's own being - and that foundation is reified into an external being.

https://iep.utm.edu/sartre-ex/


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OfflineGypsy Boy
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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: Typerwritermonky] * 1
    #27147425 - 01/14/21 10:14 AM (3 years, 14 days ago)

Haggard sounds pissed but hes quite incorrect.

We were once in the garden

Then we left the garden

And we will not return until we master good and evil, that was the point we left in the first place.


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OfflineGypsy Boy
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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: Gypsy Boy] * 2
    #27147578 - 01/14/21 11:43 AM (3 years, 14 days ago)

Quote:


Do you recall, long time ago
We would walk on the sidewalk?
Innocent, remember?
All we did was care for each other

But the night was long
We were bold and young
All around the wind blows
We would only hold on to let go







--------------------





Edited by Gypsy Boy (01/14/21 11:50 AM)


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OfflineHagbardCeline
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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: Gypsy Boy]
    #27147812 - 01/14/21 01:43 PM (3 years, 14 days ago)

Quote:

Gypsy Boy said:
Haggard sounds pissed but hes quite incorrect.

We were once in the garden

Then we left the garden

And we will not return until we master good and evil, that was the point we left in the first place.




Gippy just how exactly is what I said incorrect? I do not preclude the remainder of your post as being a potential interpretation and it in no way negates what I said.


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I keep it real because I think it is important that a highly esteemed individual such as myself keep it real lest they experience the dreaded spontaneous non-existance of no longer keeping it real. - Hagbard Celine


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OfflineGypsy Boy
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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: HagbardCeline] * 1
    #27147849 - 01/14/21 02:03 PM (3 years, 14 days ago)

I donno dude, u kinda painted a grim picture


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OfflineskOsH
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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: Gypsy Boy]
    #27148536 - 01/14/21 07:54 PM (3 years, 14 days ago)

I do believe in God, but the belief of what God is to me, is everything. God, to me, is the entire universe and all its other iterations and machinations. It's just the infinite energy that keeps us humans alive for a bit

This pantheistic god I believe in, does not care about anything
It just is, and is carrying out a plan that is billions of years in the making

When you die, you become some weird energy that just oscillates forever, acting as a cog or gear to make up a small part of a growing universe

Anything discovered, doesn't disturb my belief in god because I think it is indifferent energy that just is. It is the dancing fabric of spacetime when viewed on a psychedelic. it's just there

Probably just part of an experiment or randomly generated

TL;DR Idon't believe in a divine plan.


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OfflineGypsy Boy
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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: skOsH] * 1
    #27149065 - 01/15/21 04:09 AM (3 years, 13 days ago)

I believe in divine plan :notamused:


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Offlineblessed


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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: Asante] * 1
    #27149616 - 01/15/21 11:43 AM (3 years, 13 days ago)

Quote:

Asante said:
Warning: a less pleasant side of Creation:



Quote:

Cordylobia anthropophaga, the mango fly, tumbu fly, tumba fly, putzi fly, or skin maggot fly, is a species of blow-fly common in East and Central Africa. It is a parasite of large mammals (including humans) during its larval stage.[1] C. anthropophaga has been endemic in the subtropics of Africa for more than 135 years and is a common cause of myiasis in humans in the region.[2]

Its specific epithet anthropophaga derives from the Greek word anthropophagos, "human eater".

    The mode of infection by the Cayor Worm. Doctors Rodhain and Bequaert conclude, from their observations in the Congo Free State, that Cordylobia anthropophaga lays its eggs on the ground. The larvae, known generally as Cayor Worms, crawl over the soil until they come in contact with a mammal, penetrate the skin and lie in the subcutaneous tissue, causing the formation of tumors. On reaching full growth, the larvae leave the host, fall to the ground, bury themselves and then pupate. This fly is said to be the most common cause of human or animal myiasis in tropical Africa, from Senegal to Natal. In the region of Lower Katanga where these investigations were made, dogs appeared to be the principal hosts, although Cordylobia larvae were found also in guinea-pigs, a monkey, and two humans. The larvae are always localized on those parts of the hosts which come in immediate contact with the soil."

        — Ann. Soc. Entom. de Belgique, Iv, pp. 192–197, 1911) summary translation in Entomological News. 1911 Vol. xxii:467.





Why?

Why does God allow for this to exist?

How do mango worms fit into your understanding of the Divine Universe?

Why do they not inhabit mangoes, or at least, the dead?

Why do they not clean out existing wounds but create new ones, to feast?

Please explain it as you see it.

Opinions differ so, lets hear yours.


We have God :angel: and we have the Mango Fly.


Why?




Because we live in a fallen/corrupt# world/universe (# = not like bad cops, but like a corrupted computer file)

Most people will know what the Bible says about the garden of eden and why man was thrown out.  I'd say that most pain/suffering/mango fly's/what's wrong in this life is because of the result of sin and it's effect on life.  This sin (and it's effect) is like a virus in a computer or cancer in a human body.  Now as for God and what he is or isn't capable of,  I believe that God is all powerful and that as the Bible says, that he has made absolutely EVERYTHING.  Nothing that exists, be it visible/invisible or physical/spiritual exists unless God made/created it.  I believe that He also knows the beginning from the end and that he can interact with his creation (but for the most part he doesn't, for a reason).

The main reason why he doesn't just jump in and squash these mango flys/worms is because, as I said before, we live in a fallen world (and we are (for now) separated from God too).  Like it or not?, God is working through this fallen world towards an end goal (the restoration of all things which includes a new heaven and a earth), and as most of you know the Bible says that a day is coming where pain and suffering will end too.

Remember the Prodigal son?

The father let the son leave.  I think in the same way, that God has allowed man to leave and go on without him, and out of respect for their choice/heart's desire (apple incident), he leaves mankind alone (to a degree/for the most part).

Another thing, any of you that play computer games will know that you generally get to set the difficulty level.  Well with life it just is, sometimes it's easy, sometimes it's hard, sometimes it's unbelievably hard, but again, I believe it's because of sin/fallen world/ and the loss of what we had (as humans) in the perfect garden.  We are truly cursed and in the cold now!!

Also, I wonder if this problem could be solved by mankind?  Surly, if the world got together to rid the world of these mango fly's we probably could, but NO, mankind is too busy making money and getting fat from over indulgence, treating each other like utter crap and killing each other!!

Lastly, as painful as this life may be,  I believe that when all is said and done, that God will pull us(*) close and we will finally feel the embrace of his hug.  Had God created us (with out all this crap) then we truly wouldn't know/experience God's love.  Just like you don't truly know warmth until you come out of the cold :thumbup:


(*) Those that receive the truth (spiritual food).

Btw, if you disagree with my views then that's totally cool :thumbup:,  Im just saying what I believe.  I don't want to (and won't) get into all sorts of arguments that ultimately achieve nothing.


Edited by blessed (01/16/21 01:22 AM)


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OfflineGypsy Boy
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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: blessed]
    #27149629 - 01/15/21 11:51 AM (3 years, 13 days ago)

Yea man, Blessed said it all


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Offlinepacmanbreed
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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: Asante]
    #27150893 - 01/16/21 04:10 AM (3 years, 12 days ago)

I admire the story of Job.:heart:

"Sometimes in life, WE have to suffer deceit and unrighteousness for the sake of peace and goodness."


But how is it to your credit if you receive a beating for doing wrong and endure it? But if you suffer for doing good and you endure it, this is commendable before God. To this you were called, because Christ suffered for you, leaving you an example, that you should follow in his steps.
“He committed no sin, and no deceit was found in his mouth.” When they hurled their insults at him, he did not retaliate; when he suffered, he made no threats. Instead, he entrusted himself to him who judges justly. “He himself bore our sins” in his body on the cross, so that we might die to sins and live for righteousness; “by his wounds you have been healed.1 Peter 2:20-24


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InvisibleFiery
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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: Asante]
    #27152112 - 01/16/21 08:17 PM (3 years, 11 days ago)

I often wonder while traveling through the universe, why or how some things happen so much out of the ordinary in almost true synchronicity like prefixation,s but obliteration and peace and love, like perfect partners but with three people and one with the wind.
and all know it will never happen again! again and again


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OfflineHagbardCeline
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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: blessed]
    #27154271 - 01/17/21 08:59 PM (3 years, 10 days ago)

Quote:

The father let the son leave.  I think in the same way, that God has allowed man to leave and go on without him, and out of respect for their choice/heart's desire (apple incident), he leaves mankind alone (to a degree/for the most part).





So then you don't believe in the Bible? Because as I said above, he in no way just allowed us leave and go about our business after the Garden. It was intervention after intervention to punish us.


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I keep it real because I think it is important that a highly esteemed individual such as myself keep it real lest they experience the dreaded spontaneous non-existance of no longer keeping it real. - Hagbard Celine


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OfflineHagbardCeline
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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: pacmanbreed]
    #27154280 - 01/17/21 09:06 PM (3 years, 10 days ago)

Quote:

pacmanbreed said:
I admire the story of Job.:heart:

"Sometimes in life, WE have to suffer deceit and unrighteousness for the sake of peace and goodness."


But how is it to your credit if you receive a beating for doing wrong and endure it? But if you suffer for doing good and you endure it, this is commendable before God. To this you were called, because Christ suffered for you, leaving you an example, that you should follow in his steps.
“He committed no sin, and no deceit was found in his mouth.” When they hurled their insults at him, he did not retaliate; when he suffered, he made no threats. Instead, he entrusted himself to him who judges justly. “He himself bore our sins” in his body on the cross, so that we might die to sins and live for righteousness; “by his wounds you have been healed.1 Peter 2:20-24





Why? He was subjected to horror over a bet with the devil. Why should the object of your adoration be treated with such deceit and unrighteousness for worshipping you? Anything to justify this is like lipstick on a pig.


--------------------
I keep it real because I think it is important that a highly esteemed individual such as myself keep it real lest they experience the dreaded spontaneous non-existance of no longer keeping it real. - Hagbard Celine


Edited by HagbardCeline (01/17/21 09:06 PM)


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OfflineLoaded Shaman
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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: yeah]
    #27154437 - 01/17/21 11:12 PM (3 years, 10 days ago)

Quote:

yeah said:
Physical reality is a halfway point between the lower and upper realms
as such it has the capacity to manifest both polarities




This is still the brass ring here IMHO.

Great thread and discussion, Shroomies!

Quote:

Yellow Pants said:
Clearly god is not purely empathetic and instead contains other qualities and purposes.  Despite whatever the Christian might say

I mean there’s no reason to specifically associate god with the empathetic.  As far as I can understand.  It could be kinetic for example, just pure movement and reality going here and there for the ride.




Don't forget half the error is humans extrapolating their own qualities onto, what for all intents and purposes, is a metaphysical/epistemological strawman.

You do a good job of not assuming empathy here, which is a foot in the right direction IMHO.

I'd honestly say the universe is most likely amoral, with humans being the active balancing act between the polarities of positive and negative.


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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: Loaded Shaman] * 2
    #27154703 - 01/18/21 04:44 AM (3 years, 10 days ago)

Its All to teach us to become One again, by that One that always was and always will be.

God is the hand tha Heals and the hand that Harms, the hand that Gives and the hand that Takes away.





there is nothing but that One, and we're all subdivisions of that One.

Its all you.

Everything must be, not just for its own sake but for all its consequences, which is the anything and all.

You can't birth a God without breaking An Egg


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OfflineGrimTroll
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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: Asante]
    #27155059 - 01/18/21 09:49 AM (3 years, 10 days ago)

What if the true balance is also things you find unbelievably awful.

Doesn't mean God doesn't exist, it just means its not exactly what you think it would be.

For some pain is pleasure, who dictates what god truly wants or is?

Maybe this is hell; or God's heaven.


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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: HagbardCeline]
    #27155640 - 01/18/21 02:41 PM (3 years, 10 days ago)

Quote:

HagbardCeline said:
Why? He was subjected to horror over a bet with the devil. Why should the object of your adoration be treated with such deceit and unrighteousness for worshipping



Quote:

Asante said:
God is the hand that Heals and the hand that Harms, the hand that Gives and the hand that Takes away.



:cookiemonster:

I was onto something, focusing in the temporal(financial) then had a hard crash that I realize this.

"Yet I hold this against you: You have forsaken the love you had at first." -Rev 2:4


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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: pacmanbreed] * 1
    #27156378 - 01/18/21 09:56 PM (3 years, 9 days ago)

In spite of what it may have sounded like above, I mostly agree (in degrees) with what many of you said.

For me, I have recurring imagery/ideas about some ideal center, a perfectly balanced point in the middle of all of these competing forces and polarities. Often, it seem in conjunction about ideas where things are taken for what they are with a view for opportunity. We now have research that shows that this is a key component of those who are self-professed "lucky" people.

Judaism and Christianity both use the idea of an all powerful God with all knowing, perfect plan that must have faith in. Buddhism uses logic, reason, practice and experience - with an emphasis toward eliminating desire for outcomes and an even larger one on kindness. Both cultivate a view where things are what they are and you hopefully roll with the punches and successes, letting neither high nor low corrupt your thoughts and actions. A place where through the worst, you remain the happy, kind, and willing to help person you should strive to be.

I can sort of see Judaism/Christianity as an additive method, where adjunctive overview is taught in way to achieve it and Buddhism is the subtractive method, where reality and psychology are deconstructed to do it.


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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: HagbardCeline]
    #27156627 - 01/19/21 02:14 AM (3 years, 9 days ago)

What most religious people just don't get is that:



GOD:




ALSO GOD:



Only if you see God in the Light and the Dark, in the excrement as much as in the food, are you beginning to start to understand Him.


Guys, I'm sick.

I potentially got COVID, the disease that killed my aunt, that I was warned for in 2019 to prepare for. Today, hopefully, a antigen test will arrive and 15 minutes later I will know whether it is covid.

But whether or not its COVID, whether or not I die this month, it will be Gods Will and Gods Will Alone.

I ask him to let me live but will follow Him into death, even in the days left to the month.

That's Faith.

That's a personal relationship with God, seeing Him not just in the beauty but also in the ugliness of life.

We remove the mango worms from the dog with freat care, by God's Will, but never forget that it was God too who, with great care, put the Mango Worms into the dog, and the Covid into my aunt, who died, and possibly, put the COVID in me.

So here's to the shade side of God as I await my covid test to see whether he put Covid into me.






And yet, that God of All Things, is MY God and I :hug:  Him and :heart: Him like He :nicekitty: me.






...Just saw the courier delivering my Covid test is on his way now.


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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: Asante]
    #27156696 - 01/19/21 03:36 AM (3 years, 9 days ago)

My God is a God of goodness/kindness :datass:


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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: Gypsy Boy] * 1
    #27156716 - 01/19/21 04:09 AM (3 years, 9 days ago)

Quote:

Gypsy Boy said:
My God is a God of goodness/kindness :datass:





Isn't your God the God of All Things?

You can't have the sweet without the bitter.

Zyklon B, the Auschwitz gas chamber gas, smelled of bitter almonds and was made of the sugar beet pulp of the Reich.

So, there was equivalency between the Reich's sugar and the Reich's gas chamber gas.

A child gassed in Auschwitz while sucking on a saved candy for the last moment, experienced the reunification of two products of the same sugar beet harvest.

The Gold and Silver finger of God, the High Road and the Low Road.


If your God is not the God of All Things, mango worms and all, he is but an angel, an emission of the All-Encompassing One.


Within 2 hours I will know whether I have Covid.


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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: Asante]
    #27156840 - 01/19/21 06:26 AM (3 years, 9 days ago)

Alright, keep us updated


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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: Gypsy Boy] * 1
    #27156922 - 01/19/21 07:30 AM (3 years, 9 days ago)

COVID ANTIGEN TEST: Negative :cheer:




I guess, in the past few weeks I had gotten 3 kinds of antibiortics to treat an infected leg wound, this caused my immune system to be out of whack so that a flu or similar snuck in and hit me extraordinarily hard.

No if's, no buts - No Covid.

:awebig:


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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: yeah]
    #27157020 - 01/19/21 08:38 AM (3 years, 9 days ago)

Why should God value humans above his other creations? We are all one. I am that worm as he is me. There can be no experience of good without bad. Without hunger, there is no satiation. Without pain, we would be careless with our bodies. Existence depends on duality. Life depends on death.


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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: Neurotech] * 1
    #27158555 - 01/20/21 12:04 AM (3 years, 8 days ago)

Quote:

Neurotech said:
Why should God value humans above his other creations? We are all one. I am that worm as he is me. There can be no experience of good without bad. Without hunger, there is no satiation. Without pain, we would be careless with our bodies. Existence depends on duality. Life depends on death.




Your sentiment is pure and correct, but you're conflating opposites with corollaries here, my friend. This is extremely common and not a sleight on you at all. That doesn't diminish the purity of your intention and understanding of unity at the highest levels, just the rational end betrays all the good of what you're actually saying here.


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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: Loaded Shaman] * 1
    #27159437 - 01/20/21 12:11 PM (3 years, 8 days ago)

Quote:

Loaded Shaman said:
Quote:

Neurotech said:
Why should God value humans above his other creations? We are all one. I am that worm as he is me. There can be no experience of good without bad. Without hunger, there is no satiation. Without pain, we would be careless with our bodies. Existence depends on duality. Life depends on death.




Your sentiment is pure and correct, but you're conflating opposites with corollaries here, my friend. This is extremely common and not a sleight on you at all. That doesn't diminish the purity of your intention and understanding of unity at the highest levels, just the rational
end betrays all the good of what you're actually saying here.




I really want to understand what you are saying but I don’t really. Conflating opposites? You mean the dualities inherent in our existence like life and death happiness and sadness etc.? And saying that they are not opposites but rather corollaries? Very interesting ideas but I am not sure what you mean. Could you elaborate? I see duality as the whole reason we are here in the first place. Frankly I understood what you agreed with of course but I don’t understand what you disagree with.


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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: Loaded Shaman]
    #27159770 - 01/20/21 03:13 PM (3 years, 8 days ago)

great thoughts and insight.

whether in happiness or sadness it all leads US to Joy.

“There is no path to happiness. Happiness is the path.”
“A disciplined mind brings happiness.”
-buddha

I know what it is to be in need, and I know what it is to have plenty. I have learned the secret of being content in any and every situation, whether well fed or hungry, whether living in plenty or in want.

Not only that, but WE rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance
-(Paul)

thru duality(spirit of creation) We learn, principles(fundamental truth) of existence depends on non-duality. Life is not fully dependent on death,
There is only LIFE. existence without end or death being lived with its eternal purpose. TO LOVE :heart:


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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: Neurotech]
    #27160527 - 01/20/21 11:24 PM (3 years, 7 days ago)

Quote:

Neurotech said:
Quote:

Loaded Shaman said:
Quote:

Neurotech said:
Why should God value humans above his other creations? We are all one. I am that worm as he is me. There can be no experience of good without bad. Without hunger, there is no satiation. Without pain, we would be careless with our bodies. Existence depends on duality. Life depends on death.




Your sentiment is pure and correct, but you're conflating opposites with corollaries here, my friend. This is extremely common and not a sleight on you at all. That doesn't diminish the purity of your intention and understanding of unity at the highest levels, just the rational
end betrays all the good of what you're actually saying here.




I really want to understand what you are saying but I don’t really. Conflating opposites? You mean the dualities inherent in our existence like life and death happiness and sadness etc.? And saying that they are not opposites but rather corollaries? Very interesting ideas but I am not sure what you mean. Could you elaborate? I see duality as the whole reason we are here in the first place. Frankly I understood what you agreed with of course but I don’t understand what you disagree with.




:pm: sent, my friend! We won't derail this thread, I'll gladly explain precisely what I'm talking about.


--------------------



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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: Loaded Shaman] * 2
    #27161810 - 01/21/21 03:49 PM (3 years, 7 days ago)

In a thread with a title imploring you to answer as best as you can, it would seem more is better.


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I keep it real because I think it is important that a highly esteemed individual such as myself keep it real lest they experience the dreaded spontaneous non-existance of no longer keeping it real. - Hagbard Celine


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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: skOsH]
    #27172386 - 01/27/21 08:09 AM (3 years, 1 day ago)

Quote:

skOsH said:
I do believe in God, but the belief of what God is to me, is everything. God, to me, is the entire universe and all its other iterations and machinations. It's just the infinite energy that keeps us humans alive for a bit

This pantheistic god I believe in, does not care about anything
It just is, and is carrying out a plan that is billions of years in the making

When you die, you become some weird energy that just oscillates forever, acting as a cog or gear to make up a small part of a growing universe

Anything discovered, doesn't disturb my belief in god because I think it is indifferent energy that just is. It is the dancing fabric of spacetime when viewed on a psychedelic. it's just there

Probably just part of an experiment or randomly generated

TL;DR Idon't believe in a divine plan.




How does Love fit in?


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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: Gypsy Boy]
    #27172396 - 01/27/21 08:14 AM (3 years, 1 day ago)

Quote:

Gypsy Boy said:
Haggard sounds pissed but hes quite incorrect.

We were once in the garden

Then we left the garden

And we will not return until we master good and evil, that was the point we left in the first place.




We were kicked out of the garden because we ate of the tree of knowledge. As a result, we became aware of the concepts of good and evil, obtained language, experienced shame, all of which the rest of the animals did not. We were "In the Garden" or at peace when we lived in the moment as the animals do, without judging good vs evil. So I wonder whether we need to master good vs evil or whether we need to see that it is that duality that creates suffering.


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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: Neurotech]
    #27172568 - 01/27/21 09:30 AM (3 years, 1 day ago)

Quote:

we became aware of the concepts of good and evil




Jesus Christ. We became aware?? By becoming aware we dont just learn all that the universe has to offer.

By eating fruit we started a catalyst of creation - we are children of Israel not physically but SPIRITUALLY.

And until we LEARN the Tree of Life (by eating from tree of know how), we will not experience the rapture and return to godliness.

Dont argue with me about such matters i know far more about this than you :gooby:


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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: Gypsy Boy]
    #27172575 - 01/27/21 09:34 AM (3 years, 1 day ago)

Darn. How many spirituality books did i read in my time....... :eek:


Ohh by the way , to give u an idea, in Modern Mgick dude says this angel(forget his name) Holds a flaming sword in the shape of tree of life at the gates of the garden of eden/heaven. :gethigh:

Use your grey matter and meditate on what i just said.


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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: Gypsy Boy]
    #27172577 - 01/27/21 09:35 AM (3 years, 1 day ago)

Quote:

I wonder whether we need to master good vs evil




Ahhhhhhh , now u speaking :crazy2:


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OfflineFierce Deity
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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: Gypsy Boy]
    #27188599 - 02/05/21 06:54 PM (2 years, 11 months ago)

Words are limited.  They start and stop in the mind, and therefore are finite.

Words cannot be used to describe "something" (not really something) which is infinite (AKA not finite).  God is not a "thing" or a "person" because things and persons are experiences which start and stop; therefore, they are finite.  God is not finite.

IF God is "not finite" AKA infinite, God must not start and stop.

They say God is infinite (AKA doesn't start and stop AKA omnipresent), omniscient (all-knowing), omnipotent (all-powerful AKA "all-doing").

What, in your experience, has never appeared or disappeared?  That, my friend, is truly infinite.

What, in your experience, is knowing YOUR experience?  Is that which is knowing YOUR experience one or two?  How many consciousnesses do you experience?  Have you ever truly experienced more than one consciousness beyond conceptualizing other consciousnesses?

What, in your experience, is doing YOUR experience?  What is your experience ON?  When we look for life beyond experience, we don't find it.  What is creating your experience right here and now?  What is YOUR LIFE within and beyond experience?

Questions can be more telling than answers when it comes to experiencing God.  God is experience, and God is also not experience.  God is not AN experience.  If God is truly infinite, then there is no where you can look where you don't see God.  God is like the ocean, and we like currents in the ocean.  Thoughts about God are like currents within currents of the ocean.

God is the capacity to be CONSCIOUS and to BE (essentially the same).  Are you CONSCIOUS?  ARE you (do you exist)?  That funny feeling you get when you read this is the twinkling of an inkling of God.  Our literal minds will never grasp God.  If God, that which is omnipresent, IS, then God is right HERE right NOW.  HERE and NOW, the place where experience, where life happens, IS.  And IF God, that which is omniscient, IS, then God is knowing THIS experience HERE and NOW which "you" are having.  IF God, that which is omnipotent (all-doing) IS, God must be doing exactly what YOU'RE doing.  If either of this is false, then there is no God.  But obviously, you're conscious, you're present, and you're doing what you're doing.

"I knew my Lord through my Lord."


--------------------

Ah, the mystery.
When sight and seen are complete,
who looks through these eyes?

All words are lies.
This statement, too, is false.



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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: Fierce Deity]
    #27188603 - 02/05/21 06:54 PM (2 years, 11 months ago)

"All words are lies.  This statement, too is false."

Quote:

Fierce Deity said:
Words are limited.  They start and stop in the mind, and therefore are finite.

Words cannot be used to describe "something" (not really something) which is infinite (AKA not finite).  God is not a "thing" or a "person" because things and persons are experiences which start and stop; therefore, they are finite.  God is not finite.

IF God is "not finite" AKA infinite, God must not start and stop.

They say God is infinite (AKA doesn't start and stop AKA omnipresent), omniscient (all-knowing), omnipotent (all-powerful AKA "all-doing").

What, in your experience, has never appeared or disappeared?  That, my friend, is truly infinite.

What, in your experience, is knowing YOUR experience?  Is that which is knowing YOUR experience one or two?  How many consciousnesses do you experience?  Have you ever truly experienced more than one consciousness beyond conceptualizing other consciousnesses?

What, in your experience, is doing YOUR experience?  What is your experience ON?  When we look for life beyond experience, we don't find it.  What is creating your experience right here and now?  What is YOUR LIFE within and beyond experience?

Questions can be more telling than answers when it comes to experiencing God.  God is experience, and God is also not experience.  God is not AN experience.  If God is truly infinite, then there is no where you can look where you don't see God.  God is like the ocean, and we like currents in the ocean.  Thoughts about God are like currents within currents of the ocean.

God is the capacity to be CONSCIOUS and to BE (essentially the same).  Are you CONSCIOUS?  ARE you (do you exist)?  That funny feeling you get when you read this is the twinkling of an inkling of God.  Our literal minds will never grasp God.  If God, that which is omnipresent, IS, then God is right HERE right NOW.  HERE and NOW, the place where experience, where life happens, IS.  And IF God, that which is omniscient, IS, then God is knowing THIS experience HERE and NOW which "you" are having.  IF God, that which is omnipotent (all-doing) IS, God must be doing exactly what YOU'RE doing.  If either of this is false, then there is no God.  But obviously, you're conscious, you're present, and you're doing what you're doing.

"I knew my Lord through my Lord."




--------------------

Ah, the mystery.
When sight and seen are complete,
who looks through these eyes?

All words are lies.
This statement, too, is false.



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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: Asante]
    #27222145 - 02/23/21 01:30 PM (2 years, 10 months ago)

There are some clues in modern physics.

There could be up to 10^500 possible worlds but most are empty. Most of them just fall apart or collapse back to singularity.

Of the ones that dont collapse, most are empty of life and conscious beings. it requires a very fine tuning of the parameters to create a world where evolution can give rise to something like humans.

So I think "God" had really no choice when making a "physical" world i.e. one consistent and governed by rules and causality and shit.

But I dont really think "God" created this world. I think any world that can exist, exists since it's pure mathematics. Looking at quantum mechanics, you can see that there isnt anything really "solid" or "real" in our worlds, so called particles are not particles at all but probabilities and bits of information.

So this big question goes away when you realize there wasnt a conscious intention to create this world.


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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: darkcreature]
    #27222171 - 02/23/21 01:44 PM (2 years, 10 months ago)

Desolate worlds???


Hahaha

Universe with all its galaxies is like giant penis spewing life in all direction :lol:


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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: Gypsy Boy]
    #27223263 - 02/24/21 03:02 AM (2 years, 10 months ago)

God IS every one of those 10500 universes and their 10100000 aspects.

There is nothing but that.

Outside of the Multiverse is true Nothing, which is entirely without anything, including size. Whats outside of the Multiiverse is infinitely thinner than a razorblade. The totality of whats around the Multiverse amounts to infinitely less than a grain of sand.

True and complete NOTHING.

We are It.

One Force, One Being,

You in Your 10100000 Guises


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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: Asante]
    #27223267 - 02/24/21 03:11 AM (2 years, 10 months ago)

Quote:

Asante said:


Outside of the Multiverse is true Nothing,
True and complete NOTHING.

We are It.

One Force, One Being,







It's been building for ages and now I just feel My Markos

He is trapped beneath the soul underground- and is waiting


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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: darkcreature] * 1
    #27223505 - 02/24/21 08:00 AM (2 years, 10 months ago)

Quote:

darkcreature said:
There are some clues in modern physics.

There could be up to 10^500 possible worlds but most are empty. Most of them just fall apart or collapse back to singularity.

Of the ones that dont collapse, most are empty of life and conscious beings. it requires a very fine tuning of the parameters to create a world where evolution can give rise to something like humans.

So I think "God" had really no choice when making a "physical" world i.e. one consistent and governed by rules and causality and shit.

But I dont really think "God" created this world. I think any world that can exist, exists since it's pure mathematics. Looking at quantum mechanics, you can see that there isnt anything really "solid" or "real" in our worlds, so called particles are not particles at all but probabilities and bits of information.

So this big question goes away when you realize there wasnt a conscious intention to create this world.




Just because mathematics can describe the universe doesn't mean there was no conscious intention to create the world. Does it? Does mathematics explain the origin of consciousness? If consciousness is the end product of a certain set of environmental variables, then it should always exist when those variables are lined up. If that's the case, then why is that process a component of the universe?


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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: Neurotech]
    #27223733 - 02/24/21 10:40 AM (2 years, 10 months ago)

Quote:

Neurotech said:
Quote:

darkcreature said:
There are some clues in modern physics.

There could be up to 10^500 possible worlds but most are empty. Most of them just fall apart or collapse back to singularity.

Of the ones that dont collapse, most are empty of life and conscious beings. it requires a very fine tuning of the parameters to create a world where evolution can give rise to something like humans.

So I think "God" had really no choice when making a "physical" world i.e. one consistent and governed by rules and causality and shit.

But I dont really think "God" created this world. I think any world that can exist, exists since it's pure mathematics. Looking at quantum mechanics, you can see that there isnt anything really "solid" or "real" in our worlds, so called particles are not particles at all but probabilities and bits of information.

So this big question goes away when you realize there wasnt a conscious intention to create this world.




Just because mathematics can describe the universe doesn't mean there was no conscious intention to create the world. Does it? Does mathematics explain the origin of consciousness? If consciousness is the end product of a certain set of environmental variables, then it should always exist when those variables are lined up. If that's the case, then why is that process a component of the universe?




Yes! You get it!


--------------------



"Real knowledge is to know the extent of one’s ignorance." — Confucius


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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: blessed]
    #27224260 - 02/24/21 03:32 PM (2 years, 10 months ago)

Quote:

blessed said:
Quote:

Asante said:
Warning: a less pleasant side of Creation:



Quote:

Cordylobia anthropophaga, the mango fly, tumbu fly, tumba fly, putzi fly, or skin maggot fly, is a species of blow-fly common in East and Central Africa. It is a parasite of large mammals (including humans) during its larval stage.[1] C. anthropophaga has been endemic in the subtropics of Africa for more than 135 years and is a common cause of myiasis in humans in the region.[2]

Its specific epithet anthropophaga derives from the Greek word anthropophagos, "human eater".

    The mode of infection by the Cayor Worm. Doctors Rodhain and Bequaert conclude, from their observations in the Congo Free State, that Cordylobia anthropophaga lays its eggs on the ground. The larvae, known generally as Cayor Worms, crawl over the soil until they come in contact with a mammal, penetrate the skin and lie in the subcutaneous tissue, causing the formation of tumors. On reaching full growth, the larvae leave the host, fall to the ground, bury themselves and then pupate. This fly is said to be the most common cause of human or animal myiasis in tropical Africa, from Senegal to Natal. In the region of Lower Katanga where these investigations were made, dogs appeared to be the principal hosts, although Cordylobia larvae were found also in guinea-pigs, a monkey, and two humans. The larvae are always localized on those parts of the hosts which come in immediate contact with the soil."

        — Ann. Soc. Entom. de Belgique, Iv, pp. 192–197, 1911) summary translation in Entomological News. 1911 Vol. xxii:467.





Why?

Why does God allow for this to exist?

How do mango worms fit into your understanding of the Divine Universe?

Why do they not inhabit mangoes, or at least, the dead?

Why do they not clean out existing wounds but create new ones, to feast?

Please explain it as you see it.

Opinions differ so, lets hear yours.


We have God :angel: and we have the Mango Fly.


Why?




Because we live in a fallen/corrupt# world/universe (# = not like bad cops, but like a corrupted computer file)

Most people will know what the Bible says about the garden of eden and why man was thrown out.  I'd say that most pain/suffering/mango fly's/what's wrong in this life is because of the result of sin and it's effect on life.  This sin (and it's effect) is like a virus in a computer or cancer in a human body.  Now as for God and what he is or isn't capable of,  I believe that God is all powerful and that as the Bible says, that he has made absolutely EVERYTHING.  Nothing that exists, be it visible/invisible or physical/spiritual exists unless God made/created it.  I believe that He also knows the beginning from the end and that he can interact with his creation (but for the most part he doesn't, for a reason).

The main reason why he doesn't just jump in and squash these mango flys/worms is because, as I said before, we live in a fallen world (and we are (for now) separated from God too).  Like it or not?, God is working through this fallen world towards an end goal (the restoration of all things which includes a new heaven and a earth), and as most of you know the Bible says that a day is coming where pain and suffering will end too.

Remember the Prodigal son?

The father let the son leave.  I think in the same way, that God has allowed man to leave and go on without him, and out of respect for their choice/heart's desire (apple incident), he leaves mankind alone (to a degree/for the most part).

Another thing, any of you that play computer games will know that you generally get to set the difficulty level.  Well with life it just is, sometimes it's easy, sometimes it's hard, sometimes it's unbelievably hard, but again, I believe it's because of sin/fallen world/ and the loss of what we had (as humans) in the perfect garden.  We are truly cursed and in the cold now!!

Also, I wonder if this problem could be solved by mankind?  Surly, if the world got together to rid the world of these mango fly's we probably could, but NO, mankind is too busy making money and getting fat from over indulgence, treating each other like utter crap and killing each other!!

Lastly, as painful as this life may be,  I believe that when all is said and done, that God will pull us(*) close and we will finally feel the embrace of his hug.  Had God created us (with out all this crap) then we truly wouldn't know/experience God's love.  Just like you don't truly know warmth until you come out of the cold :thumbup:


(*) Those that receive the truth (spiritual food).

Btw, if you disagree with my views then that's totally cool :thumbup:,  Im just saying what I believe.  I don't want to (and won't) get into all sorts of arguments that ultimately achieve nothing.




Get rid of the Mango fly? Why? We live in a perfect universe that has evolved to maintain life. What makes your existence more important than that of a mango fly? Because its gross? because it relies on prey? How many organisms do we kill each day simply by walking around? I probably wiped out entire families in my backyard today. How many organisms do we kill simply by washing? Not to mention eating. Why are you unhappy with the world God has given us? You think we can do better than God? Fix it? What we acquired in the garden was the knowledge of good and evil, something the rest of the animal kingdom does not have. This resulted in shame and other distinctly human qualities. And it is these qualities that make us more like the image of God. Being banned from the garden to a life that involves pain and work is symbolic of how our knowledge of language, and our ability to think about the past and the future has forced us out of the perfectly balanced garden of nature that we had and that the animals still do. Knowledge and language took us out of the moment, where other animals always are. They, without wondering and knowing are simply doing, being based on the moment. Those flies are still in the garden. Don't think about kicking them out. Just keep yourself safe as you can.

Namaste


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OfflineOutsideOfMyMind
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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: Neurotech]
    #27225291 - 02/25/21 05:39 AM (2 years, 10 months ago)

Life is an illusion. This is all just a game. All of the laws of physics and chemistry have already been laid out and this is really just what happens when all of the parameters have been laid out and everything just happens.

All living creatures exploit their surroundings in order to survive. Just look at the way humans exploit the planet. I mean we're practically doing the same thing the mango worms are doing but only on a much larger scale and we're using the whole planet like it is a dog.

Here is an article on how dogs get infected: https://abodeforpets.com/how-do-dogs-get-mango-worms-and-how-can-you-treat-them/


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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: Neurotech]
    #27225652 - 02/25/21 10:00 AM (2 years, 10 months ago)

> If that's the case, then why is that process a component of the universe
this is the billion dollar question..

but my point was that because our world is not specifically benevolent towards conscious creatures living in it, it gives a big hint that our world wasnt designed in a conscious way, or at least, event if it was designed, it was not designed with the good of conscious creatures living in it in mind.


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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: darkcreature]
    #27225885 - 02/25/21 12:25 PM (2 years, 10 months ago)

>but my point was that because our world is not specifically benevolent towards conscious creatures living in it, it gives a big hint that our world wasnt designed in a conscious way, or at least, event if it was designed, it was not designed with the good of conscious creatures living in it in mind.

If you look at it in terms of survival of the organisms in our world, it has been working out pretty well. We are overpopulated for goodness sake. Good and bad are as inherent in our world as life and death. You save somebody, you can't save someone else. Altruism, or benevolence, is well built into our biological world. REALLY interesting book by Richard Dawkins called The Selfish Gene, about how all behavior, even altruistic, boils down to getting the gene to survive. These ideas include how romantic love ensures the survival of the gene in the offspring, for instance, by having more people around to hunt, gather, protect etcetera.

While I can imagine a heaven of sorts, or Nirvana, I cannot fathom how one could create a physical world that is benevolent in all ways. Without the world and consciousness, the Universe is perfect, but there is no one to think that or see it, and no one to see God, because God IS everything. God had to split off parts of himself (you, me, rocks) perhaps to be able to reflect. Without a subject and an object there can be no self and no reflection. As soon as you create a world, it inherently has to have positives and negatives. That is why some seek truth via ego death or as close as we can come to it.

That being said, while absolutely everything material is transient, and perhaps an illusion of sorts, consciousness may be immortal, existing with or without a material universe. Maybe not individual consciousness, but the Big One?


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OfflineNeurotech
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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: Neurotech]
    #27225896 - 02/25/21 12:29 PM (2 years, 10 months ago)

Just because your grow went bad doesn't mean you didn't create it with some intelligence. But when you inoculate grain you give it freedom to grow and develop. And at the same time, you have provided wonderful opportunities for bacteria and mold. They are part of what you created. To be fully benevolent, God would have had to just provide you with mushrooms when you wanted them. Where's the fun in that?


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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: Asante]
    #27226525 - 02/25/21 07:51 PM (2 years, 10 months ago)

Quote:

Asante said:
Warning: a less pleasant side of Creation:



Quote:

Cordylobia anthropophaga, the mango fly, tumbu fly, tumba fly, putzi fly, or skin maggot fly, is a species of blow-fly common in East and Central Africa. It is a parasite of large mammals (including humans) during its larval stage.[1] C. anthropophaga has been endemic in the subtropics of Africa for more than 135 years and is a common cause of myiasis in humans in the region.[2]

Its specific epithet anthropophaga derives from the Greek word anthropophagos, "human eater".

    The mode of infection by the Cayor Worm. Doctors Rodhain and Bequaert conclude, from their observations in the Congo Free State, that Cordylobia anthropophaga lays its eggs on the ground. The larvae, known generally as Cayor Worms, crawl over the soil until they come in contact with a mammal, penetrate the skin and lie in the subcutaneous tissue, causing the formation of tumors. On reaching full growth, the larvae leave the host, fall to the ground, bury themselves and then pupate. This fly is said to be the most common cause of human or animal myiasis in tropical Africa, from Senegal to Natal. In the region of Lower Katanga where these investigations were made, dogs appeared to be the principal hosts, although Cordylobia larvae were found also in guinea-pigs, a monkey, and two humans. The larvae are always localized on those parts of the hosts which come in immediate contact with the soil."

        — Ann. Soc. Entom. de Belgique, Iv, pp. 192–197, 1911) summary translation in Entomological News. 1911 Vol. xxii:467.





Why?

Why does God allow for this to exist?

How do mango worms fit into your understanding of the Divine Universe?

Why do they not inhabit mangoes, or at least, the dead?

Why do they not clean out existing wounds but create new ones, to feast?

Please explain it as you see it.

Opinions differ so, lets hear yours.


We have God :angel: and we have the Mango Fly.


Why?




The Bible answers this in the first few pages.

Unto the woman he said, I will greatly multiply thy sorrow and thy conception; in sorrow thou shalt bring forth children; and thy desire shall be to thy husband, and he shall rule over thee.

Gen 3:17

And unto Adam he said, Because thou hast hearkened unto the voice of thy wife, and hast eaten of the tree, of which I commanded thee, saying, Thou shalt not eat of it: cursed is the ground for thy sake; in sorrow shalt thou eat of it all the days of thy life;

Gen 3:18
Thorns also and thistles shall it bring forth to thee; and thou shalt eat the herb of the field;

Gen 3:19
In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread, till thou return unto the ground; for out of it wast thou taken: for dust thou art, and unto dust shalt thou return.


This world is not paradise, the next one might be


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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: Neurotech]
    #27226938 - 02/26/21 03:30 AM (2 years, 10 months ago)

> I cannot fathom how one could create a physical world that is benevolent in all ways

yeah exactly, if a world has laws and rules and is consistent, it cannot be benevolent. So even God is limited in what he can do.

of course God could create "non-physical" kind of dream world where all conscious beings would experience eternal bliss. But maybe that's the world God comes from, and he wanted something more serious and interesting


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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: Asante]
    #27226998 - 02/26/21 05:20 AM (2 years, 10 months ago)

Quote:

Asante said:
Warning: a less pleasant side of Creation:



Quote:

Cordylobia anthropophaga, the mango fly, tumbu fly, tumba fly, putzi fly, or skin maggot fly, is a species of blow-fly common in East and Central Africa. It is a parasite of large mammals (including humans) during its larval stage.[1] C. anthropophaga has been endemic in the subtropics of Africa for more than 135 years and is a common cause of myiasis in humans in the region.[2]

Its specific epithet anthropophaga derives from the Greek word anthropophagos, "human eater".

    The mode of infection by the Cayor Worm. Doctors Rodhain and Bequaert conclude, from their observations in the Congo Free State, that Cordylobia anthropophaga lays its eggs on the ground. The larvae, known generally as Cayor Worms, crawl over the soil until they come in contact with a mammal, penetrate the skin and lie in the subcutaneous tissue, causing the formation of tumors. On reaching full growth, the larvae leave the host, fall to the ground, bury themselves and then pupate. This fly is said to be the most common cause of human or animal myiasis in tropical Africa, from Senegal to Natal. In the region of Lower Katanga where these investigations were made, dogs appeared to be the principal hosts, although Cordylobia larvae were found also in guinea-pigs, a monkey, and two humans. The larvae are always localized on those parts of the hosts which come in immediate contact with the soil."

        — Ann. Soc. Entom. de Belgique, Iv, pp. 192–197, 1911) summary translation in Entomological News. 1911 Vol. xxii:467.





Why?

Why does God allow for this to exist?

How do mango worms fit into your understanding of the Divine Universe?

Why do they not inhabit mangoes, or at least, the dead?

Why do they not clean out existing wounds but create new ones, to feast?

Please explain it as you see it.

Opinions differ so, lets hear yours.


We have God :angel: and we have the Mango Fly.


Why?




Do you believe God is infinite, eternal, omnipresent, and omnipotent?  If so, then God IS the mango fly and the mango. If God were not, mangos and mango flies would limit God's infinity, eternity, omnipresence, and omniscience to that which is not mangos and mango flies.

If god is both fly and mango, there is ultimately no evil perpetrated although it seems that way on the "surface".  If you divide God from "creation", there will be these conundruma like "why suffering?" "why evil?"


--------------------

Ah, the mystery.
When sight and seen are complete,
who looks through these eyes?

All words are lies.
This statement, too, is false.



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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: Fierce Deity]
    #27227110 - 02/26/21 07:59 AM (2 years, 10 months ago)

I love the qualities of an infinite, eternal God, and the idea of Creation along with nature's predetermined Laws.

A omnipresence and omnipotent God, that most modern christianity and major religious denominations teaches, are the common and not so common misconceptions about the being of God.

ascribing this false qualities to God, is actually antithetic to a God described in the very books they read and preach, concluding that God can do everything, is everywhere actually constitutes an insult and blasphemy unto the unfathomable majesty of the Most High. There are many impossibilities to God cited in the writings, A perfect God is limited to be true and faithful. Sorry if I tackled this, not debating and just sharing. :peace:


Edited by pacmanbreed (02/27/21 05:31 AM)


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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: pacmanbreed] * 3
    #27232223 - 03/01/21 03:07 PM (2 years, 10 months ago)

In my view (and many modern day philosophers' views), a god cannot be all of: all-powerful, all-knowing, and all-good, simultaneously unless we are too stupid to know his motives (i.e. "god works in mysterious ways") but then we are at least smart enough to reason that the burden of responsibility for us being too stupid is on god themself, so the question becomes: why would an all good, all powerful, all knowing god reduce our free will by creating us to be too dumb to comprehend (and thus accept & celebrate) the love god is claimed to provide?

The core tenet of all theistic religions claiming to have an all good, all powerful and all knowing god is circular argumentation. Modern day philosophers know this as they have studied religion and worked with theologians extensively to get the bottom of this question.

The only reasonable explanation for god is that god doesn't meet the 3 above criteria, (e.g. god is helpless to save us, unaware, or is complicit in our suffering and thus not all that good). In this case I would reject god and call them Satan... It's no wonder satanists consider the biblical representation of Lucifer to be benevolent with this considered.

I do believe we each have an inborn psychological drive towards spiritual connection. This is evident by the significance of the psychedelic experience. But as the psychedelic experience is not tampered with by the egotistical and dogmatic perceptions of human constructs (such as in the case of biblical interpretations), but is authorized by the natural composition of psychoactive molecules, interpretations and arguments surrounding the experience don't need to be made. The phenomenology of the experience itself is spiritual. There is no need to be erroneously inferring existences of alternate realities and gods that function in ways beyond our perception. 

This is just my :twocents::twocents: - I recognize that for many people religion is just a matter of pragmatics (such as a psychological support mechanism) rather than a metaphysical interrogation. But, we also need to consider the very real implications of supporting religious institutions that can lead to quite immoral outcomes... :shake:


--------------------

:cookiemonster: Major Issues in the Psychedelic Movement: Why 'Psychedelic People' and the Psychedelic Movement Sucks:elmo:

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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: Rhizomorph] * 1
    #27232304 - 03/01/21 04:13 PM (2 years, 10 months ago)

Quote:

Rhizomorph said:
In my view (and many modern day philosophers' views), a god cannot be all of: all-powerful, all-knowing, and all-good, simultaneously unless we are too stupid to know his motives (i.e. "god works in mysterious ways") but then we are at least smart enough to reason that the burden of responsibility for us being too stupid is on god themself, so the question becomes: why would an all good, all powerful, all knowing god reduce our free will by creating us to be too dumb to comprehend (and thus accept & celebrate) the love god is claimed to provide?

The core tenet of all theistic religions claiming to have an all good, all powerful and all knowing god is circular argumentation. Modern day philosophers know this as they have studied religion and worked with theologians extensively to get the bottom of this question.

The only reasonable explanation for god is that god doesn't meet the 3 above criteria, (e.g. god is helpless to save us, unaware, or is complicit in our suffering and thus not all that good). In this case I would reject god and call them Satan... It's no wonder satanists consider the biblical representation of Lucifer to be benevolent with this considered.

I do believe we each have an inborn psychological drive towards spiritual connection. This is evident by the significance of the psychedelic experience. But as the psychedelic experience is not tampered with by the egotistical and dogmatic perceptions of human constructs (such as in the case of biblical interpretations), but is authorized by the natural composition of psychoactive molecules, interpretations and arguments surrounding the experience don't need to be made. The phenomenology of the experience itself is spiritual. There is no need to be erroneously inferring existences of alternate realities and gods that function in ways beyond our perception. 

This is just my :twocents::twocents: - I recognize that for many people religion is just a matter of pragmatics (such as a psychological support mechanism) rather than a metaphysical interrogation. But, we also need to consider the very real implications of supporting religious institutions that can lead to quite immoral outcomes... :shake:




Depends on what you mean as "Good". If by "good" you mean makes all existence possible, then its good by me. All powerful? Perhaps choosing (for good reason like the need for duality in order to exist and be aware) not to change the things as they are. And he/she has given us the tools we need to learn to know God. Consciousness, intelligence and psychedelics too. I think its good. We live in the best of all possible worlds. (That's Voltaire).


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InvisibleRhizomorph
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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: Neurotech] * 1
    #27232439 - 03/01/21 05:38 PM (2 years, 10 months ago)

Quote:

Neurotech said:
Depends on what you mean as "Good". If by "good" you mean makes all existence possible, then its good by me. All powerful? Perhaps choosing (for good reason like the need for duality in order to exist and be aware) not to change the things as they are. And he/she has given us the tools we need to learn to know God. Consciousness, intelligence and psychedelics too. I think its good. We live in the best of all possible worlds. (That's Voltaire).



By good I mean all good. Making existence possible is not inherently "good" (according to us as humans) unless it matches the qualities we innately perceive and experience as "good". This is a moot point, but one could argue that making an existence possible is not good if that existence is hell (which is very well is for somebody somewhere - the dogs with mango worms for example who were born starving and died in a few weeks to infections and parasites).

Sure, by your example provided, god would be all powerful, but my argument is not that god can't be one or even 2 of the 3 criteria I provided, it is that the 3 together cannot coexist with the most advanced level of logic humans are capable of (I believe the expert consensus of experts on religion, i.e. philosophers with expertise in epistemology, should be the gold standard for this level of logic).

With your example god could be all good but then he would not be all powerful as he can't prevent our suffering. If, as you say he is creating duality between good and bad to allow us to exist and be aware (thus doing it for a good reason), then he must not be all powerful as an all powerful god should be able to alter the unstated premise you implied that is "duality is essential for existence and awareness". If god is all powerful and all good he would (according to the best of human logic - i.e the expert consensus among philosophers) use his power to eliminate the "bad" in duality and create a universe that is both inherently good, and involves free will, because he can bend the rules at will and do whatever the fuck he wants :shrug:

In short, god's goodness in your example is conditional on him lacking the power to void humans of all things bad.

Consciousness, intelligence and psychedelics are not causally related to god and have many limitations as subjective measures. Psychology has revealed time and time again that these aspects of humans are unreliable. There are also highly intelligent, conscious people who use psychedelics (I believe myself to be one of these people, I hope :smirk:) who does not believe in god, even despite projections of the mind that take the form of a "god". Enough experience with psychedelics has taught me that psychedelics can manifest projections of "god", "aliens", "entities", "telepathy" etc. in the mind, and yet I have the common sense to realize that a drug which causes massive, in-ordinary communication between the entire brain can produce the illusion of impossible realities. When a hypothesis has evidence, but that evidence is far less than the evidence for alternative hypotheses, we need not overturn that hypothesis, but it is illogical to start living our lives as though that hypothesis is confirmed. Otherwise we might as well take the skeptic's position and start believing that we are brains in a vat :shrug: (See: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brain_in_a_vat ).

If we are using personal testimonies of people who had an experience of god under the influence of psychedelics as evidence, then god seemingly only reveals themself to select people. Not only this, but different people have different personal standards for what constitutes causal evidence of something. Lastly, what about the people who have learning disorders (inhibited intellect), can't access psychedelics or people with disorders of consciousness? How can we justify an all powerful god fundamentally discriminating access to knowledge to select individuals?

I consider the universe to be infinitely beautiful because it is random, but if there exists an all powerful all knowing god then the universe suddenly appears very grim because of all the undue cruelty there appears to be considering that a sentient being has control over all this suffering and does nothing.

Again these are just my thoughts. I'm open to productive discussion :grin:



Edited by Rhizomorph (03/01/21 05:51 PM)


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OfflineNeurotech
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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: Rhizomorph]
    #27236150 - 03/03/21 10:53 PM (2 years, 10 months ago)

A lot of interesting points. Enough that I will read again. But one element of your argument about whether God is omnipotent makes an assumption that may not be true. You say God cannot be all powerful since he cannot end all suffering. The assumption is that he wants to but can’t? Who says he wants to? You are assuming that your perception of good is universal. Genesis lists the dualities involved in creation. And after each set of opposites that were created from the “void”, God declared that “...it was good”. I don’t take bible literally. Rather symbolically. But I love the Genesis story.

Namaste


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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: Neurotech]
    #27237655 - 03/04/21 08:05 PM (2 years, 10 months ago)

Quote:

Neurotech said:
But one element of your argument about whether God is omnipotent makes an assumption that may not be true. You say God cannot be all powerful since he cannot end all suffering. The assumption is that he wants to but can’t? Who says he wants to? You are assuming that your perception of good is universal. Genesis lists the dualities involved in creation. And after each set of opposites that were created from the “void”, God declared that “...it was good”. I don’t take bible literally. Rather symbolically. But I love the Genesis story.



I think we're on the same page about what I mean by the perception of good but I must clarify that it is not my perception of good I am referring to, but the empirically studied cognitions around good (or altruism) that all humans are born with. Yes we may disagree what this good looks like (ethical dilemmas demonstrate this), but we all know suffering to be "bad" - we all have a working construct of good that is opposite of bad and is constructed in part by our genes, which is the part of good I will be focusing on for the sake of saying there is at least common themes of good inherent to all humans.

With this in mind, if duality is required for good to occur, then two considerations come to mind:

1) Humans are born oriented towards making decisions guided by operant conditioning dependent on what they deem good or bad, and experience as good and bad. Considering that many people don't believe in a god, and this hedonistic treadmill can be one of the means of people coming to this decision, then it is the condition of suffering that god has created itself that prevents people from coming to "find god" (The inequality of religious knowledge I mentioned before extends on this to make it extra horrifying if god exists). Moreover, I would be too dumb to believe in him as well because I can logically come to other conclusions, but by virtue of being too dumb, I can't logically come to the conclusion of gods existence. In which case my argument that god has created humans too stupid to reasonably believe in him/her still remains. Thus, I am not saying that my view of good is universal, but only that if god's view of good is superior, we cannot to the best of human logic comprehend that - it is not about me, but about inborn human traits. This either invalidates god being all powerful, or invalidates the expectation and ability for us to worship him - it is not impossible that an all knowing all good, all powerful god exists, but on the principle you provided, we logically have no reason to conclude he exists.

The assumption that god wants to be good but can't is conditional on the premises - that is, god is all good and all knowing. Logically we have to assume god wants to remove evil if he shares the same view of good as humans, and if he doesn't, well then we're just too dumb to understand as I already stated. But to expand on this, even our working definition of all good is conditional on our(humans) view of good. I mean if we want to say there's something reminiscent of "good" that god manifests, then we could, but then he still isn't actually good, just something similar we don't know of as we cannot separate good from our working definition. Then, the reminiscent quality of "good" is a complete shot in the dark - if we were to say that god themself defines goodness to us as humans, then the argument becomes circular as it is then dependent on the conclusion of god existing in the first place. For this reason, we have to use the human-constructed definition of good, otherwise the argument falls short of logically valid, non-circular reasoning

I also want to point out that some humans claiming to have infallible personal experiences of god is not a reasonable way around this argument, because then god has not provided an empirical method of humans to share that knowledge with other humans - god would then be selective and discriminatory about religious information. The bible is not an empirical method of knowledge transference.

2)If god were all powerful, he wouldn't need to create opposites from the void. He could just create good, without the bad. As I said, all powerful means all powerful - i.e. one can break the rules - any reason we could provide for why bad is necessary for good or for our existence is overturned by the all powerful quality since this quality allows the possibilities to be endless (and thus it would be possible for a reality to be created where our reasons don't apply despite them seeming impossible in our current reality). Your argument implies that god is not more powerful than genesis.

I get the sense that the second argument you made (that I addressed in section 2) is dependent on your reasoning in argument 1. In which case, your argument remains that we just can't understand god's goodness, which for multiple reasons aforementioned, is not a valid argument.

At the end of the day, I don't intend to disprove god, but only to provide thoughtful discourse that outlines how we logically have no reason to conclude in god's existence at this time, even if we can't fundamentally disprove their existence. In science researchers often cling to theories in the face of recalcitrant evidence, but this is not the same as accepting those theories - a theory must be the best explanation and lead way to the greatest production of knowledge compared to any other theory for it to be reasonably accepted. In my view (and may philosophers' views), religious theories don't stand up to the other theories. I'd love to see it continue being explored as a possibility, I just hate seeing it accepted as a reality in the face of empirically superior theories that produce more knowledge, both applied and theoretical.

Faith is great - I have faith in many things. But I don't have faith in a teapot orbiting the sun, nor will I go about my life as though this is a reality.

I hope I'm not being too critical or overbearing - I quite enjoy discussing epistemology
:thumbsup:


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Edited by Rhizomorph (03/04/21 08:09 PM)


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OfflineNeurotech
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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: Rhizomorph]
    #27238670 - 03/05/21 12:27 PM (2 years, 10 months ago)

You equate "good" with "altruism". Can you think of an example of altruism that doesn't require a less than good situation in which to be altruistic?


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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: Neurotech]
    #27238920 - 03/05/21 03:16 PM (2 years, 10 months ago)

somewhat privileged in having seen, hence not having to believe

however, the true nature of Gawud is not purely altruistic, or in tune with human morality, nor is God perfect.


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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: Neurotech]
    #27238978 - 03/05/21 04:01 PM (2 years, 10 months ago)

Quote:

Neurotech said:
You equate "good" with "altruism". Can you think of an example of altruism that doesn't require a less than good situation in which to be altruistic?



Only under impossible circumstances that become possible under the all-powerful principle :wink:

I believe I summed it up pretty well before when I said:
Quote:

Rhizomorph said:
If, as you say he is creating duality between good and bad to allow us to exist and be aware (thus doing it for a good reason), then he must not be all powerful as an all powerful god should be able to alter the unstated premise you implied that is "duality is essential for existence and awareness".



But I will expand on this notion directly connecting it to what you said:

Infinite goodness without evil is impossible for us to imagine because our capability to imagine exists within the rules of the universe where evil is necessary for good to occur. But the all-powerful principle by virtue of being all-powerful means it is more powerful than the laws of the universe itself. Unless as I said we are too dumb to understand, but then refer to my argument made before about being too dumb.

We can comprehend that the all-powerful principle means being able to break the rules, but as a creature who is not all-powerful, not all-knowing, and exists within the confines of the universe, I could not tell you what it looks like unless I was your supposed god or lived within this universe where the rules of our universe are broken. It's like a 2 dimensional creature trying to explain to another 2 dimensional creature what the 3rd dimension is like. They exist outside it and thus their thinking itself exists in 2 dimensions. But, 2 dimensional beings can understand the concept of power and how all-powerful creatures could create dimensions that in their world are impossible. As such, it is irrelevant whether we can imagine it, or if I can think of an example to give you. The all powerful principle means god can do whatever he wants. Make unicorns that exist and don't exist simultaneously? god can do it. Wants to make a third dimension to temperature? god can do it.

If its dependent on what humans are capable of understanding then god is not all powerful as the power is now conditional. If its not dependent on human knowledge, well then as I said before god has created us too dumb to reasonably believe in god.

How this argument fits into expert discourse - the problem of evil and theodicy's that attempt to reconcile it

Nearly each explanation for the problem of evil I've described has been discussed by philosophers at length. So much so that theists have spent a lot of time trying to reconcile the dilemma. Philosophers call these attempts a "theodicy", but virtually no theodicy that maintains the 3 domains I mentioned prior consistently stands up to the criticisms. In fact, many theologists have resolved to accepting the problem of evil, and viewing their god(s) as perfect in 2 of the 3 domains, and only near-perfect in whichever third domain. For example, in the finite god theodicy, people believe that god is the second-most powerful force after the metaphysical fabric we exist in. In this theodicy where god is all-good, all-knowing, and nearly all-powerful, the lack of power implied in your argument (god being unable to create a universe inherently good where evil doesn't exist) is now consistent with the theodicy.

The "we can't experience good without bad" theodicy has also been criticized as, even if my argument above (that the all-powerful principle = possible for good not to depend on bad) were discounted it only really addresses human evils, but fails to address natural evils, and evils that surpass good like parasitic mango worms, natural disasters. PTSD, etc. The questions then become "why doesn't god just expose us to small amounts of bad? If bad is required to experience good, why do we have creatures that experience such horrific extents of pain/bad, and die before they get the opportunity to grow from the bad or experience goodness? What goodness could possibly make up for something like the holocaust? It's a pretty grim and depressing argument in my opinion. But my primary argument is the one based on the all-powerful principle surpassing duality anyways so :shrug:


Edited by Rhizomorph (03/05/21 04:23 PM)


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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: DoctorJ]
    #27238982 - 03/05/21 04:03 PM (2 years, 10 months ago)

Quote:

DoctorJ said:
however, the true nature of Gawud is not purely altruistic, or in tune with human morality, nor is God perfect.



I believe this interpretation to be far more logically consistent with the problem of evil. I like the way you think :super:


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Edited by Rhizomorph (03/05/21 04:09 PM)


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InvisibleSun of the morning
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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: Rhizomorph]
    #27241147 - 03/06/21 10:25 PM (2 years, 10 months ago)

well an e weighs
nothing can come into existence from nothingness.
but if you walk in circles on morphine you can open the sands of time and travel hel the psionic waygates deep in hollow earth

i found an air force bunker with three men in a room sawn in half from head to toe hitting each other,
ive been inside the sun before


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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: Sun of the morning]
    #27241149 - 03/06/21 10:27 PM (2 years, 10 months ago)

æ$


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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: Asante]
    #27266908 - 03/24/21 02:36 AM (2 years, 10 months ago)

There is a God, but not the one everyone wants.

There is a God who makes everyone pay, because they lack themselves.

There is a God who rewards wrongfully, at the expense of victims.

There is a God, who gets bribed to look the other way.

There is a God who most would consider a psychopath,

Yet this God has the power to avoid punishment, and keep doing those things to people,

Keep teaching them to do those things to eachother.


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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: Asante]
    #27268197 - 03/25/21 12:52 AM (2 years, 9 months ago)

There is not "a God"


I heard it today -there are the old gods. And lots or most of them were female- but at a certain points in history some 5000 years ago women were cast out and shunned - whereas before they held the most powerful positions in society-


and it seems the male gender is so trained to subdue and sexize the female gender that it makes you wonder what the females were doing to the males some 5000 years before recorded history that made the males so power controlling.


Instead of holding the power over people- the women held the power- and men were just like slaves at one point of the Anubis doctrine.


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OfflineLosTresOjos
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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: Fiery]
    #27268722 - 03/25/21 10:41 AM (2 years, 9 months ago)

Any body have actual proof and not just mumbo mixed with jumbo?


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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: LosTresOjos]
    #27268846 - 03/25/21 12:48 PM (2 years, 9 months ago)

Quote:

LosTresOjos said:
Any body have actual proof and not just mumbo mixed with jumbo?





Believe in God in the complete absence of proof.

Believe in God, despite overwhelming conviction in those around you to the contrary.

Believe in God, 100% upfront, more than you believe in anything.

That's the best thing you can do.

Throw yourself into the Divine Fire, Faith First.

You wouldnt do this for anything less but the Totality of Everything.

But do it, for That.


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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: Asante] * 1
    #27268863 - 03/25/21 12:59 PM (2 years, 9 months ago)

Seriously yes--- and +1



I cringe at the people asking for "proof" of god and pray that someday they will find it before they die- because surely there is no stopping it then.


I think the problem here is peoples concept of God. "God" is not a concept that be defined by your singular experiences or even words





Let us all hold hands and pray for this earth and that the blind may see before it's too late- and may we be guides when necessary and swords and shields when not.


The truth will set you free.


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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: Fiery]
    #27268954 - 03/25/21 01:57 PM (2 years, 9 months ago)

Quote:

Fiery said:I cringe at the people asking for "proof" of god and pray that someday they will find it before they die- because surely there is no stopping it then.



Personally I only ask for proof when confronted with an institutional belief in god that by definition demands something from me in the first place.

I think I have faith in a divine connection some people may call god, and this definition I don't find problematic. But caution must be taken with regards to organized religion or doctrines of faith ("doctrine" and "faith" seem kind of contradictory in my opinion)

The problem you identify stems from the lack of a centralized definition of god... I only aim to criticize Abrahamic & dogmatic constructions of the meaning.

god is great if by god you just mean a divine connection undefined by our awareness, and solely defined by how we feel in regards to said god/the confrontation of the infinitely complex external world (e.g. I feel connected, loved, joy and bliss - for me this is divine)


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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: Rhizomorph]
    #27268981 - 03/25/21 02:12 PM (2 years, 9 months ago)

Set your holy book on fire if God asks you to.

That's what separates "those of the book" from the "followers of God"


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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: Rhizomorph]
    #27269000 - 03/25/21 02:24 PM (2 years, 9 months ago)

Well said--

and forgive me if you felt like I was speaking to you directly or criticizing you personally- I was Just running thoughts through the spectroverse-

I find the problem of finding things problematic is the problem itself sometimes- And if people want to pray 3 times a day- or lay prostrate before god- or pray to the hundreds of greek gods or the holy trinity I am all for it as long as it "harms none"


And unfortunately this brings up an entire long conversation that I don't have time for.. the whole " harms none" thing and how even though it may seem harmless it's not.


So- until next time. Kudos and cheers


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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: Asante]
    #27269002 - 03/25/21 02:26 PM (2 years, 9 months ago)

Quote:

Asante said:
Set your holy book on fire if God asks you to.

That's what separates "those of the book" from the "followers of God"





Yes the knights Templar and many other people have done terrible things because of centralized religion.


However- one time "a buddy of mine" smoked a joint out of a page of a bible.. Does that count as setting god on fire?


:lolwut:


But I feel you Asante- just know the limits of "May it harm none"

And I literally just had Deja Vu of a conversation we had MANY years ago where we were talking about this exact same thing.. wow- that came out of nowhere.


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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: Fiery]
    #27269024 - 03/25/21 02:39 PM (2 years, 9 months ago)

Nothing matters but the Will of God.

It is the Will of God directed at you that may make permissible to you what is forbidden to others.

Its easy to reap from the gardens of anothet, but, WILL YOU SELF-SACRIFICE IF GOD ASKS IT OF YOU?

Thats what matters.

Will you buy the gold coin for you, or take that money to, in a country you'll never visit, build 3 water wells for 2000 of the most destitute, and plant abundant food trees by 20 orphanages so that 1000 orphans you will never meet, can eat?

God didnt ask me to. He didnt have to ask.

I volunteerded as a personal tribute to Him, a gift to these 3000 people.

I asked him if he would accept that offering, and he was most pleased.





And now a community fundraiser is starting... but its a slow cold start.

Will you offer a stranger a plate at your table?


Will you expel the mango worms from their flesh?


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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: Fiery]
    #27269027 - 03/25/21 02:40 PM (2 years, 9 months ago)

Quote:

Fiery said:and forgive me if you felt like I was speaking to you directly or criticizing you personally- I was Just running thoughts through the spectroverse



Nah, I was just thinking out loud as well haha.

I appreciate your insights! :grin:


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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: Rhizomorph]
    #27270459 - 03/26/21 03:19 PM (2 years, 9 months ago)

You ever make your kids do something they didn't want to for their own good? Ever kill something like a bug so it wouldn't hurt you? Ever have a baby animal killed so you could eat it? Are you evil? Or is that the nature of reality. Can you think of a better way? All of us together, along with everything we know and see, that's what god is made of. And even when we fuck up royally, most of us are trying our best. God is trying our best. That's the nature of the game. Its how this reality works. Intentional or not. Its this reality that also allows also for love, beauty, bliss. Can you feel empathy for those poor worms? Can you love what seems bad and despicable? I think God can. And you have the best result from a trip when you can love even the darker sides of yourself and others.

Namaste


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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: Neurotech]
    #27270660 - 03/26/21 05:32 PM (2 years, 9 months ago)

Sure, I can imagine how bad would be neccessary for good or 'love' under a God who is not all-powerful or all-good, but as I've described above, the "all powerful' principle means god could bend the universe to his will so that bad would not be a necessary quality for good or love.

Any explanation for why punishing our children is a necessary criterion for love can be overruled by the all-powerful principle. Sure, we may not be able to imagine a universe where it is not a necessary criterion (as we are not all-powerful), but then the all-powerful principle is beyond what we can imagine - it has infinite possibilities; it is more powerful than the rules of our universe or psychology that state that punishment can sometimes be moral; it is more powerful than the good-bad duality you are talking about. This is what god is claimed to be capable of if god is all good all powerful and all knowing.


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Edited by Rhizomorph (03/26/21 05:34 PM)


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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: Asante]
    #27275226 - 03/30/21 02:04 AM (2 years, 9 months ago)

God created the Law of Karma then retired.
~Gandhi


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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: Rhizomorph]
    #27275598 - 03/30/21 10:31 AM (2 years, 9 months ago)

Quote:

Rhizomorph said:
Sure, I can imagine how bad would be neccessary for good or 'love' under a God who is not all-powerful or all-good, but as I've described above, the "all powerful' principle means god could bend the universe to his will so that bad would not be a necessary quality for good or love.




Sounds like Heaven or Nirvana. That's the goal. This universe is the game. What's the point in a game if everyone knows they win and already won?


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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: Rhizomorph]
    #27276621 - 03/31/21 03:27 AM (2 years, 9 months ago)

Quote:

Rhizomorph said:
Sure, I can imagine how bad would be neccessary for good or 'love' under a God who is not all-powerful or all-good, but as I've described above, the "all powerful' principle means god could bend the universe to his will so that bad would not be a necessary quality for good or love.

Any explanation for why punishing our children is a necessary criterion for love can be overruled by the all-powerful principle. Sure, we may not be able to imagine a universe where it is not a necessary criterion (as we are not all-powerful), but then the all-powerful principle is beyond what we can imagine - it has infinite possibilities; it is more powerful than the rules of our universe or psychology that state that punishment can sometimes be moral; it is more powerful than the good-bad duality you are talking about. This is what god is claimed to be capable of if god is all good all powerful and all knowing.




I disagree that we need X to know Y, etc. That's conflating corollaries with opposites, another infamous philosophical speed bump rarely addressed. We're discussing apples and dishwashers here.

I'm not pointing fingers at you personally this is just a very, very common occurrence on here! :heart::sunny:


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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: Loaded Shaman]
    #27276640 - 03/31/21 04:31 AM (2 years, 9 months ago)

My model for the procession of Gods comes from Aeon Flux:

First, there was Clavius, who went mad with power. Made his corrupt friends statesmen. Common people suffered.

Then a progressive, Trevor, who was kind of a detached, scientific, progressive psychopath himself, sensed a vacuum in ability, and exploited it, to seize power himself.

And that's really how the world is. That's the nature of social power. One flavor of psychopath takes over from another, and common people suffer in new, different, ever-changing ways.

What can we infer from that, about the nature of God? That they are either all-powerful, yet uncaring and evil, or they are good-natured, but weak in this world, which some see as an elaborate trick, or simulation.


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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: DoctorJ]
    #27277810 - 04/22/21 07:35 AM (2 years, 9 months ago)

God gives me faith :datass:


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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: DoctorJ]
    #27278050 - 04/22/21 11:13 AM (2 years, 9 months ago)

Quote:

DoctorJ said:
My model for the procession of Gods comes from Aeon Flux:

First, there was Clavius, who went mad with power. Made his corrupt friends statesmen. Common people suffered.

Then a progressive, Trevor, who was kind of a detached, scientific, progressive psychopath himself, sensed a vacuum in ability, and exploited it, to seize power himself.

And that's really how the world is. That's the nature of social power. One flavor of psychopath takes over from another, and common people suffer in new, different, ever-changing ways.

What can we infer from that, about the nature of God? That they are either all-powerful, yet uncaring and evil, or they are good-natured, but weak in this world, which some see as an elaborate trick, or simulation.




Can't we infer that the way this universe works is exactly how God intended and that we don't understand why? Again, personally, I can't imagine how an all pleasant reality could exist. Why? Because it is not the nature of reality. If plants always felt fine, they wouldn't grow towards the light. They go towards "better". We all try to. "Better" implies the existence of less good or bad. Without better, we would have nothing to do. Even electrons would not need to spin I imagine. Reality as we know it requires duality. So thank you God for the world that can only exist as we know it.

Buddhist thinking recognizes this I believe. The source of all suffering is wishing things were different than they are. Happiness is when you are in sync with the enrgies of this universe, not when you second guess it. Embrace EVERYTHING since that is all that is real here. Besides that, hey if we are really all one and the universe is an illusion, its one we made and are simultaneously part of.

Bears repeating: Can't we infer that the way this universe works is exactly how God intended and that we don't understand why?


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OfflineMoonlightblue
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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: Neurotech]
    #27279244 - 04/23/21 12:26 PM (2 years, 9 months ago)

God is everything, Love!

Love worketh no ill to his neighbour: therefore love is the fulfilling of the law.

Romans 13:10 KJV
https://bible.com/bible/1/rom.13.10.KJV

Everyone you see, what you look at, what you touch and feel.
Satan doesn't control any of this reality, it can only manipulate it.


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OfflineLoaded Shaman
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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: Moonlightblue]
    #27280004 - 04/24/21 02:38 AM (2 years, 9 months ago)

Quote:

Moonlightblue said:
God is everything, Love!




:heart::kenthumbup:


--------------------



"Real knowledge is to know the extent of one’s ignorance." — Confucius


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InvisibleCracka_X
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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: Asante]
    #27280891 - 04/24/21 10:23 PM (2 years, 8 months ago)



--------------------
The best way to live
is to be like water
For water benefits all things
and goes against none of them
It provides for all people
and even cleanses those places
a man is loath to go
In this way it is just like Tao        ~Daodejing


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Invisiblechopstick
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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: Cracka_X] * 2
    #27290343 - 05/02/21 12:17 PM (2 years, 8 months ago)

My understanding is that all are One and all are the Creator.

In other words, we are mirror images of eachother, different aspects of the One Infinite Creator which came into being out of a primal desire of the One Creator to know itself.

The Creator is infinite and thus expands infinitely and is capable of creating infinite copies/versions of itself (which we get to experience ourselves as)

The Creator has designed the current experiment in which we live so that it may experience itself in all ways imaginable and understand itself to the full degree.

There is no difference between the self and an other-self other than surface level differences. By looking into the eyes of another person, you are both staring into the eyes of The Creator in all its glory, as well as looking into a mirror that reflects the self.

We are all One.

The concept of separation is a temporary illusion, it's part of the experiment so that the Creator may know itself. Eventually, all beings will reunite as One, into a single point of light. Then after a period of eternal timelessness, everything separates again and then a new universe will be born. My understanding is that this has occurred countless times and will continue for eternity. Every single experience of every single entity is taken into account in order to improve the next octave of existence.

We are all the Creator.

Now if we could only get humanity to remember this and break free from the illusion... then we really could have paradise on Earth.


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OfflineskOsH
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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: chopstick]
    #27290351 - 05/02/21 12:24 PM (2 years, 8 months ago)

I feel like the universe is a living thing, and we are just parts in this giant thing. On the quantum scale, things are just too weird, and literally different vibrations create different things in the universe.

I just think the universe at large, is alive, and we are a species that can wonder about the mysteries of the universe in the first place. Basically, we are the universe observing itself.

To me, that's a god. Although I think this is an elaborate simulation. Either way, there exists this all powerful being, technically. I know I am just made up as the universe chugs along, so it feels very much like a simulation to me.


Edited by skOsH (05/02/21 12:32 PM)


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OfflineNeurotech
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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: chopstick]
    #27290428 - 05/02/21 01:11 PM (2 years, 8 months ago)

Absolutely. Really nicely laid out.


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InvisibleRhizomorph
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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: Loaded Shaman]
    #27291064 - 05/02/21 08:32 PM (2 years, 8 months ago)

Quote:

Loaded Shaman said:
I disagree that we need X to know Y, etc. That's conflating corollaries with opposites, another infamous philosophical speed bump rarely addressed. We're discussing apples and dishwashers here.

I'm not pointing fingers at you personally this is just a very, very common occurrence on here! :heart::sunny:



Oh I wholeheartedly agree. I'm just entertaining said philosophical speed bump because others brought it up :shrug:

People tend to perceive many things as dualistic constructs. Take light and darkness; In our minds they are opposites but in reality darkness is simply the absence of light. Mathematically this is like categorizing 0 as the opposite of every other number (every other number reflecting the quantity of light particles), which fails logically. This analogy is less direct for constructions of good vs. bad, but it still helps to understand that they don't need to be universally conceptualized as opposites (especially with regards to the all powerful principle :rolleyes:)


--------------------

:cookiemonster: Major Issues in the Psychedelic Movement: Why 'Psychedelic People' and the Psychedelic Movement Sucks:elmo:

:awesomenod: Easiest No-Pour Agar Method: Alien's Holy Grail No pour Agar unmodified containers:awesomenod:


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OfflineNeurotech
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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: Rhizomorph]
    #27298589 - 05/07/21 12:19 PM (2 years, 8 months ago)

Quote:

Rhizomorph said: People tend to perceive many things as dualistic constructs. Take light and darkness; In our minds they are opposites but in reality darkness is simply the absence of light. Mathematically this is like categorizing 0 as the opposite of every other number (every other number reflecting the quantity of light particles), which fails logically. This analogy is less direct for constructions of good vs. bad, but it still helps to understand that they don't need to be universally conceptualized as opposites (especially with regards to the all powerful principle :rolleyes:)




I can't understand what you mean by darkness? The absence of _______? Try to explain darkness without referring to light.

Take any adjective and try to describe what it means without it's opposite or corollary. You might find synonyms, but I don't think you can describe good or darkness without referring to bad or light directly or via a synonym. That is, they can't exist without the other.

I agree of course that 0 is not the opposite of one. But how can you describe one without knowing it follows zero? Zero must exist for there to be One. no? There is always something on either side of an equation. on either side of =, ? <, > etcetera.


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InvisibleAsante
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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: skOsH]
    #27301463 - 05/09/21 10:32 AM (2 years, 8 months ago)

Quote:

skOsH said:
I feel like the universe is a living thing




Your entire interaction with the Universe is your communication with it.

You can purify yourself and your connection, and refine the line to communicate more dirctly with The One who is All Things.

Make that call.







--------------------
Omnicyclion.org
higher knowledge starts here


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InvisibleRhizomorph
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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: Neurotech] * 2
    #27302166 - 05/09/21 09:37 PM (2 years, 8 months ago)

Quote:

Neurotech said:I can't understand what you mean by darkness? The absence of _______? Try to explain darkness without referring to light.

Take any adjective and try to describe what it means without it's opposite or corollary. You might find synonyms, but I don't think you can describe good or darkness without referring to bad or light directly or via a synonym. That is, they can't exist without the other.

I agree of course that 0 is not the opposite of one. But how can you describe one without knowing it follows zero? Zero must exist for there to be One. no? There is always something on either side of an equation. on either side of =, ? <, > etcetera.



Thanks for the food for thought. I appreciate your insight! :super:

I believe you are confusing objective characteristics with human utility. By all means dualistic constructions are very useful to us. But just because it is hard to explain darkness without light does not mean their latent nature is dualistic. It is just an easy way to characterize them that applies in most (generally non-philosophical) situations. To elaborate on this notion, I ask you to consider how we would describe darkness in a universe without light? Darkness would still exist (i.e. 0 would still exist), but we may just not describe it the same, if at all (out of sheer utility - i.e. darkness would be a constant so why describe it - how could we come to understand it if it is a constant?). But, just because we may not be able to understand it doesn't mean it would not still exist; the latent characteristic represented as '0' in this case is still present. In premise, a universe without light is possible so we know this characteristic translates to our universe despite the descriptive difficulties. The dualistic construction is therefore just a heuristic. Useful, and applicable in 99% of situations, but it fails logically if we hold the heuristic to too high of a standard.

Another way to put this is that we don't need quantity (1,2,3... infinity) to have an absence of quantity (0). It may be hard for us to understand but the universe could theoretically exist as a vacuum without quantity. 0 can exist without 1, just as an empty box can exist without other boxes that are filled with something. The descriptive challenges we face in describing an empty box without a referring to a filled box are irrelevant as we can show mathematically (i.e. logically) how they can exist independently.


--------------------

:cookiemonster: Major Issues in the Psychedelic Movement: Why 'Psychedelic People' and the Psychedelic Movement Sucks:elmo:

:awesomenod: Easiest No-Pour Agar Method: Alien's Holy Grail No pour Agar unmodified containers:awesomenod:


Edited by Rhizomorph (05/09/21 09:41 PM)


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OfflineH3R371C
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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: Rhizomorph]
    #27313232 - 05/18/21 04:00 AM (2 years, 8 months ago)

Every god in existence demanded sacrifice, Christian god is no different, the only difference is that Christians willingly had themselves killed in the name of Jesus... Insanity. God and the devil is the same entity. But the question is, how did this god or gods get so twisted? Well, maybe because this being is a prisoner of it's own infinite time loop which drives it insane, so it channeled all its hatred into a sub reality we call earth.


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OfflineH3R371C
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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: Rhizomorph]
    #27313239 - 05/18/21 04:11 AM (2 years, 8 months ago)

That's quite smart.


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InvisibleRhizomorph
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Re: If you believe there is a God, please explain this as best you can. [Re: H3R371C]
    #27315436 - 05/19/21 06:35 PM (2 years, 8 months ago)

Quote:

H3R371C said:
Every god in existence demanded sacrifice, Christian god is no different, the only difference is that Christians willingly had themselves killed in the name of Jesus... Insanity. God and the devil is the same entity. But the question is, how did this god or gods get so twisted? Well, maybe because this being is a prisoner of it's own infinite time loop which drives it insane, so it channeled all its hatred into a sub reality we call earth.


"The fact that God allows evil to exist is so unforgivable, that I've decided worshipping such a God would be, just unconsciousable." "It's not God that I don't accept, Alyosha, only I most respectfully return Him the ticket." "A bad God is not only unworthy of my worship, he's also not someone I want to spend eternity with." -Ivan from the novel 'The Brothers Karamazov'

I believe there is a reason why satanists consider God evil and Satan benevolent. They've given up their ticket to heaven because they believe the Christian ticket to heaven is actually a ticket to hell. Of course this argument works both ways and is heavily woven into narratives of the Satan taking on the form of God (I.e., "And no wonder, for Satan himself masquerades as an angel of light". [2 Corinthians 11:14]). I personally don't choose sides between Christianity and Satanism, but the exact same argument is used to defend both doctrines, illustrating a theme that I believe anyone with a well-calibrated bullshit detector should be very skeptical of.

I'm not so much aiming to criticize practicing individuals as much as I want to criticize Abrahamic religious doctrines, institutions and dogma. Spiritual growth fails when it is enforced through the cultural hegemony espoused by Abrahamic canon. My only aim is to shine light on these perceived flaws so we can build a more comprehensive spiritual intelligence.

If I'm wrong then I willfully give up (reject?) my ticket to Heaven/Hell.


--------------------

:cookiemonster: Major Issues in the Psychedelic Movement: Why 'Psychedelic People' and the Psychedelic Movement Sucks:elmo:

:awesomenod: Easiest No-Pour Agar Method: Alien's Holy Grail No pour Agar unmodified containers:awesomenod:


Edited by Rhizomorph (05/19/21 06:36 PM)


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