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Ravus
Not an EggshellWalker
Registered: 07/18/03
Posts: 7,991
Loc: Cave of the Patriarchs
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Power of Belief
#3747199 - 02/07/05 07:02 PM (19 years, 1 month ago) |
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It was Salvador Dali who said that, to help him achieve such abstract surrealistic paintings, he would simulate insanity while painting, with the knowledge in the back of his head that it was just simulated insanity for the purpose of art. Some psychologists then pointed out that it was impossible to tell the difference between a person who simulated insanity and knew in the back of his mind he wasn't insane, and a person who was insane and convinced himself that he simulated it.
As most people see it, beliefs have no bearing on the actual truth of a situation. Whether or not someone is simulating insanity or is actually insane is not changed by what he or she thinks, some would say. But to this the argument could be pointed out that in such situations like insanity, they rest fully on the threshold of the doors of perception, and without belief insanity would not even exist. You must believe someone to be insane, and even then it is extremely subjective.
This applies to mostly any human beliefs. Whether or not Jesus found strength during his torture by being given it from a God, or by deluding himself with a strong belief in God and a conviction that he was receiving power from God, doesn't change the reality. For all human purposes, it doesn't even matter, because it has no bearing on the actual situation and the events that would follow it.
Following this course of thought, if the existence of God or simply the delusion of a prophet doesn't change reality, how could anything else? Reality is not chosen by truths, but rather by our convictions. Truth has never taken the front seat in human beliefs and logic, and in fact all logic, thought and even existence requires huge leaps of faith just to get started at being the most belief-starved skeptic. We must leap over the fact that we may just believe something so strongly that we are deluded by it, and that it has no actual existence, for if we pursued this logic to its end, we would finally come to the conclusion that even our own existence is not necessarily a truth.
"I think therefore I am" requires the strongest of convictions, and those who insult others for the leaps of faith they make must first examine their own reality, for all of human existence is assumptions, subjective perceptions and simple beliefs.
"We have arranged for ourselves a world in which we can live - by positing bodies, lines, planes, causes and effects, motion and rest, form and content; without these articles of faith nobody could now endure life. But that does not prove them. Life is no argument. The conditions of life might include error."
"Over immense periods of time the intellect produced nothing but errors. A few of these proved to be useful and helped to preserve the species: those who hit upon or inherited these had better luck in their struggle for themselves and their progeny. Such erroneous articles of faith... include the following: that there are things, substances, bodies; that a thing is what it appears to be; that our will is free; that what is good for me is also good in itself." -Nietzsche
-------------------- So long as you are praised think only that you are not yet on your own path but on that of another.
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Gomp
¡(Bound to·(O))be free!
Registered: 09/11/04
Posts: 10,888
Loc: I re·side [primarily] in...
Last seen: 1 year, 28 days
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Re: Power of Belief [Re: Ravus]
#3747260 - 02/07/05 07:15 PM (19 years, 1 month ago) |
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now, that's exactly why time-travel, such as memory travel is possible, even if you went back and shot your own parents, you would do it in perceptions, and a truth would follow as direct result of doing it. creating a scenario of repeated truth, changed. leaving the other truth, un touched and un altered, and you would still be as alive as your parents, unless they are dead of course. the history we learn to 'believe' in school, is not the way it happened, but the way the truth, was believed to be. tampering with truth, is a lie.. :P ha-ha BTW:no intention to go of-topic, if i did.
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Ravus
Not an EggshellWalker
Registered: 07/18/03
Posts: 7,991
Loc: Cave of the Patriarchs
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Re: Power of Belief [Re: Gomp]
#3747366 - 02/07/05 07:40 PM (19 years, 1 month ago) |
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It's possible, reality lies in our belief of it and not the truth of the situation. If you were hit by a truck, revived, and before you gained consciousness put in a secluded Hawaiian garden with bales of marijuana and mushrooms around you, sheets of acid hanging from trees and beautiful naked women all around, you would easily believe you had died and went to Heaven, when you are just as alive (even more I'd bet) than ever.
Sorry for putting my fantasies in there
-------------------- So long as you are praised think only that you are not yet on your own path but on that of another.
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Gomp
¡(Bound to·(O))be free!
Registered: 09/11/04
Posts: 10,888
Loc: I re·side [primarily] in...
Last seen: 1 year, 28 days
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Re: Power of Belief [Re: Ravus]
#3747464 - 02/07/05 08:06 PM (19 years, 1 month ago) |
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hehe
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shroomydan
exshroomerite
Registered: 07/04/04
Posts: 4,126
Loc: In the woods
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Re: Power of Belief [Re: Ravus]
#3748179 - 02/07/05 09:53 PM (19 years, 1 month ago) |
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Quote:
This applies to mostly any human beliefs. Whether or not Jesus found strength during his torture by being given it from a God, or by deluding himself with a strong belief in God and a conviction that he was receiving power from God, doesn't change the reality. For all human purposes, it doesn't even matter, because it has no bearing on the actual situation and the events that would follow it.
How does this follow? What are the implied premises? It seems to me that if true power was coming from God then he could endure it. If there was no power from God, then his delusion would not have been powerful enough to let him forgive those who were killing him. I see an implied premise of determinism, that it could not have happened any other way. Nietzsche would be displeased.
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Ravus
Not an EggshellWalker
Registered: 07/18/03
Posts: 7,991
Loc: Cave of the Patriarchs
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Let Nietzsche be displeased . The most useless thing any philosopher can have is followers to distort and bog down their true words like the Christians have done to Jesus.
I disagree with your statement. If his true power was coming from God he could've endured it, that's possible, and if his true power was coming from his own belief in God he also could've endured it. You do not believe Jesus was strong enough to forgive his enemies without God shooting bolts of energy into him? I believe that you seriously underestimate the power of the human mind and its beliefs, Jesus recognized the power of forgiveness, and the belief in God just strengthened his convictions, but whether or not God exists I would bet a man like Jesus could've forgiven his enemies either way.
Do you think Socrates needed God when he said he was willing to be put to death for his beliefs? He didn't resist, he didn't avoid the penalty, he didn't flee, but rather he drank the poison and accepted his fate with no anger or sadness or remorse. Humanity does not need God, for it already has the power of forgiveness and acceptance within itself. Only in the best of men, however, does it shine through.
There was no implied premise of determinism in my statements. I said that whether Jesus got his strength from God, or from his own convictions, it makes no difference. Jesus' strong belief in forgiveness and God would have given him enough strength, even if God does not exist. Whether or not Jesus' death could've happened any other way (if indeed he was crucified, which itself is a matter of dispute to many) does not matter much to me, because it has already happened. If events were different the outcome would've been different, but as it stands I am only discussing what did happen, and how the existence of God is not even necessary to the story compared to the power of Jesus' own convictions.
-------------------- So long as you are praised think only that you are not yet on your own path but on that of another.
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shroomydan
exshroomerite
Registered: 07/04/04
Posts: 4,126
Loc: In the woods
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Re: Power of Belief [Re: Ravus]
#3748363 - 02/07/05 10:23 PM (19 years, 1 month ago) |
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Well, at least you thought it through.
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