Religious belief is an untrue concept

So why do so many people, billions really, believe untruths about God, heaven, spirit, soul, angels, devils, and other unseen entities of which there is zero proof of their existence?

Because of the Cognitive Revolution, according to Yuval Noah Harari, a historian who has written three compelling books, Sapiens, Homo Deus, and 21 Lessons for the 21st Century (I've read all of them).

The February 17/24 issue of The New Yorker has a lengthy story by Ian Parker about Harari. Here's an excerpt from "The Really Big Picture." 

I think Harari is absolutely correct about religious belief being an example of how the evolved brains of humans enabled us to begin communicating untruths, which helped people to cooperate by binding them together in a shared fantasy.

in Chapter 2 of "Sapiens," Harari describes how, about seventy thousand years ago, Homo sapiens began to develop nuanced language, and thereby began to dominate other Homo species, and the world. 

Harari's discussion reflects standard scholarly arguments, but he adds this gloss: during what he calls the Cognitive Revolution, Homo sapiens became uniquely able to communicate untruths.

"As far as we know, only Sapiens can talk about entire kinds of entities that they have never seen, touched, or smelled," he writes, referring to myths and gods.

"Many animals and human species could previously say 'Careful! A lion!' Thanks to the Cognitive Revolution, Homo sapiens acquired the ability to say, 'The lion is the guardian spirit of our tribe.'"

This mental leap enabled cooperation among strangers: "Two Catholics who have never met can nevertheless go together on crusade or pool funds to build a hospital because they both believe that God was incarnated in human flesh and allowed Himself to be crucified to redeem our sins."

Here's another passage from The New Yorker story that I liked. Harari is a big believer in meditation of the Buddhist Vipassana variety. He frequently goes on retreats that last from 10 days to as much as a month.

Harari is correct: there's no such thing as an eternal essence. Belief in such a thing is another example of a mental concept that religious believers embrace because it makes them feel good. But truth is something different from feeling good.

"21 Lessons" includes extended commentary on the life of the Buddha, who "taught that the three basic realities of the universe are that everything is constantly changing, nothing has any enduring essence, and nothing is completely satisfying." 

Harari continues, "You can explore the furthest reaches of the galaxy, of your body, or of your mind, but you will never encounter something that does not change, that has an eternal essence, and that completely satisfied you... 'What should I do' ask people, and the Buddha advises, 'Do nothing. Absolutely nothing.'"

Comments

[Spence Tepper]

Hi Brian
What is the lifespan of Matter?

[Brian Hines]

Spencer, "Matter" isn't a thing. It is a concept. You'd have to specify exactly what type of material thing you're talking about for me to hazard an answer to your question. All forms of mater and energy came into being at the instant of the big bang, according to a central cosmological theory. Since, those forms have been continually changing.

[Spence Tepper]

Harari continues, "You can explore the furthest reaches of the galaxy, of your body, or of your mind, but you will never encounter something that does not change, that has an eternal essence,"

This is a very interesting but false idea.

The idea of something stable that doesn't change, like a triangle, or gravity, or other laws of physics and chemistry. The central limit theorem of statistics, or poisson's theorum of diameter and flow. Even addition and subtraction.

Our world is filled with eternal and unchanging things. Laws that never change, even though the world around us is constantly changing.

And new laws are being discovered all the time. New laws that are just as eternal, though we did not know about them before.

Even new connections between us and this creation are being discovered. Brain cells that respond to emf signals. Who knew?

And brain cells that generate emf signals.

Since we ourselves operate under these same absolute and unchanging laws, could our stories about an unchanging and ultimate power, and unrelenting laws under which we must live, be personifications of those eternal principles?

More things don't change than do. And all things we see changing are made of things that are eternal, and operate under eternally constant principles.

At the base of all this movement, is the immovable, unchanging and ultimate source of power. Even the building blocks of Matter, never change.

[j]

"This mental leap enabled cooperation among strangers: "Two Catholics who have never met can nevertheless go together on crusade or pool funds to build a hospital because they both believe that God was incarnated in human flesh and allowed Himself to be crucified to redeem our sins.""

1. It's funny how Jewish/Atheist scholars invariably pick out Christianity as the prime example of what's wrong with religion. They wouldn't dare to say a word against Judaism lest their careers be destroyed.

2. We have no idea if we have eternal essence or not. Neither the Christian or Buddhist scriptures is proof either way. Whether we're Buddhist or Christian or Atheist, we all certainly live as if we exist as distinct persons, even if we do countless 10 day Goenka retreats and feel we spy into the ephemeral non-self. The ultimate point of all this talk of the merits of no-self eludes me. It makes me think that the creed of no-self isn't any better or truer than belief in Jesus or Guru.

3. Didn't human cooperation far, far, far, predate Christianity or the motive social force of any kind of religion? Were the Greek and Roman empires built to please Zeus and Jupiter? In any case, is all human cooperation from family values to patriotism built on a lie? C'mon dude.

4. It's an oversimplification to say that Christians built hospitals just because of Jesus, quite as much as holding to the materialist notion that Abe Lincoln worked so hard to win the Civil War just because he wanted to get laid. Human beings do noble things because nobility is a mysterious part of being human. Trying to reduce everything we do to selfish religious or biological motives isn't all that useful.

[Spence Tepper]

When E=mc^2 is no longer so, or when it was not, then, perhaps, it can be said that nothing is eternal.

When the angles of an equal sided triangle are no longer exactly 30 degrees, or when, once upon a time, they were not, then, maybe we might conjecture that nothing is eternal.

When the circumference of any circle, through all of time, divided by the diameter of that circle no longer equals exactly pi, then maybe something isn't eternal.

If all these things and so much more are eternal, the very foundational assumption of all science. And it is only using these eternal things that we can understand any change, then what else is eternal?

Let's not confuse ripples on the pond with the existence of the pond, which most exist to have the ripples.

They ripples come and go. Pond is there, must be there. That doesn't change.

[Spence Tepper]

When you gaze at the surface of a pond, as an observer, wind, leaves, ducks, insects, speckles of sunlight on the water flickering through waving trees. Life in Motion. When you become the pond, the insect, the tree, it is all one whole unmoving complete entity.

Even Calculus describes time and movement as an infinite series of discrete and equal moments, each moment having no movement within it.

And the sum total? That whole period as one whole? The sum of the series? The completion? The entirety? Unmoving.

Be the pond.

[Spence Tepper]

This is why death is not to be feared. It is the summation of that infinite series of discrete moments between birth and death that is your life. It is becoming whole and complete. And in this incomprehensible way, though the series of infinite moments exists between two finite and unmoving points in the greater whole of creation, it is whole in and of itself. It can only become a completed whole upon death.

Whether you think you are finished, or desire so much more, whether you feel you are ready or not, whether you leave with a sense of perfect balance or a nagging imbalance, the Timeframe had been set when the first ripple crossed the pond. It is a perfect expression of all life whether you understand that perfection or not. Become the pond, understand the wholeness of life within you, become intimate with it. That is the experience of eternity. The experience of the end of those tiny discrete moments we call time. You can taste that right noe. And that final passage into that eternity is the completion that we call death.

[Dungeness]

@ "As far as we know, only Sapiens can talk about entire kinds of entities
@ that they have never seen, touched, or smelled," he writes, referring to
@ myths and gods.
@ ...
@ Harari is correct: there's no such thing as an eternal essence. Belief in
@ such a thing is another example of a mental concept that religious
@ believers embrace because it makes them feel good. But truth is
@ something different from feeling good.

Ah, I hear the persistent chant of priests: "Lock 'em up! I ain't seen
it so there's no such thing." ...or... "Now, now... go with these kind
chaps. They'll dose you with some scientific kool-aid to dislodge
those nasty myths, and you'll be fine in the morning... reading the
'New Yorker' by noon."

But, wouldn't you know it, mystics have a nut-house avoidance
protocol. They say "don't believe us. Just turn attention inside.
Follow a mindfulness discipline or a mantra, and/or a devotional
practice. But, if you see no proof of claims, drop such ridiculous
mishegoss. Unhesitatingly. Find another more promising path to
"feelin' good".

Otherwise, if you hang on to blind belief (or scornful disbelief) with
religious fervor, you risk becoming a "holy roller" on a soapbox (or
a blog) desperately trying to convince the "lost"... the poor chumps
who just can't see the self-evident truth you've found.

Bystanders will start to jeer, White-coats will coax you down off
your perch, promise a bedtime treat, and gently lead you away
to the van.

[Pema Tej]

Brian,

In Tibetan Buddhism, there are teachings which point to an unchanging essence, also known as the 'True Nature', or 'Emptiness'.

[world fact book]

According to sociologists Ariela Keysar and Juhem Navarro-Rivera's review of numerous global studies on atheism, there are 450 to 500 million positive atheists and agnostics worldwide (7% of the world's population), with China having the most atheists in the world (200 million convinced atheists).

[Meditator]

Different religions and therefore set respective beliefs circles around existence of super- natural powers or God which mostly have been founded later based upon the teachings of a Mystic.

Challenging these beliefs tantamount to challenging the Mystics of their empirical researches and their consequent conclusions which they laid before us and humanity to follow with closed eyes as hard super-natural facts beynd human comprehension about God and His subtle nature and reach. The conclusions can never be experimented on scientific principles or worldly logics through human physical senses but beyond that by oneself if possible.

Anyways conditions apply!

[Spence Tepper]

"Then slight ripples in this gas caused denser areas to clump together under gravity, eventually accumulating enough mass to collapse into stars and begin nuclear fusion.

"The radiation emitted by these first stars interacted with the leftover hydrogen gas around them, exciting the hydrogen atoms and knockingoff their electrons, creating positively charged hydrogen ions. Hence the name reionization epoch.

" Still, the details of how and when this happened are unknown.

"Nobody really knows when the first stars formed,"Bowman told SPACE.com. "That's one of the questions we're trying to get at." [Top10Star Mysteries]"

https://www.space.com/10447-ancient-radio-waves-hold-key-universe-light.html

The ripples in space time began with the formation of matter.

When you can find the time when hydrogen was not hydrogen, when radio waves were not, perhaps you can say nothing is eternal.

All of science, it's eyes, arms, legs and hands, all that it uses to see beyond, depends upon eternal principles, eternal laws.

cience is based upon the positive assumption that we don't know all that's there and in searching we not only find evidence of more of this material creation, but evidence that more is there we don't know; confirmation of the eternal laws that have uncovered more of creation, and even evidence of more eternal principles we didn't know existed but have always been.

See the ripples, become the pond.

[Spence Tepper]

Every time you witness these eternal laws in action, you are connecting with not only creation, but the eternal principles that made it, that are making it. That connection is already within you, and has always been so.

Just as matter, energy, information may transform, at the hands of eternal principles, but always exist, so we transform through time but can't be said to have a beginning or end in any physical way. We are part of this creation, moving through time, but always here in one form or another. Our beginning and end as individual personalities is only our human conception. We didn't begin at our birth and we do not end at our death. This personality has its lifespan, but even that isn't ours. Our emotions and thoughts are copies pumped out of templates and machinery hundreds of thousands of years old. And those templates will continue pumping out reproductions long after this particular iteration is decomposed and reformed into another set of clones thousands of years hence.

And those are all connected, not isolated.

Harari's confusion is mixing up human concepts of individual personality with the actual physical truth of eternal existence, eternal transformation, and eternal connection.

The notion that our individual identity has a birth and death and no physical continuation is a half - truth. We don't actually exist as individuals and never did.

[X17]

The ripples in space time began with the formation of matter.

Posted by: Spence Tepper | February 21, 2020 at 02:04 AM

Spence,

Are you doubly sure of this?

[Turan]

Hari's words (perhaps inadvertently?) seems to enter a domain that invites confusion. Just like any other religion Buddhism is a mixture of concepts and beliefs which is probably why forms such as Chan and Zen in particular usually avoid involvement in concepts that belong to science. The Buddha stated that he accepts what the wise (science, of the time) reveals and that he only teaches four things – There is suffering; The origin of suffering; Cessation of suffering; and The path to the cessation of suffering.

These four truths or tasks are something that anyone can investigate. The immutable laws of nature for example are the domain of mathematicians and physicists who study and present physics as being our best description of how the universe works, are not something that a Zen practitioner needs entertain.

Hari states “ . . that you will never encounter something that does not change, that has an eternal essence," A sweeping statement that, although describing the reality of all things that we experience in our daily lives has no place in theoretical or conceptual understanding.

To work with the four truths is simply to examine the four tasks that may enable one to see why our lives are largely a mixture of conflicts and confusions. A concept or belief can work for us some of the time but does not help much with the on-going basic human mind that seeks to find out what or who he or she is.

Our opinions, belief – and knowledge – (although interesting and maybe worthwhile in many fields) can serve to help keep the mind comfortable with its present state but may not help in understanding itself.

[X17]

The notion that our individual identity has a birth and death and no physical continuation is a half - truth. We don't actually exist as individuals and never did.

Posted by: Spence Tepper | February 21, 2020 at 02:26 AM

So how do we exist in this only universe we know of?

How do you know this other form we exist in?

[Um]

Only what cannot be changed, can be changed.

The unique is a variety of the same.

[John_S]

"When you can find the time when hydrogen was not hydrogen, when radio waves were not, perhaps you can say nothing is eternal."

In ther very beginning of the expansion of the universe ther was, according to the most accepted theories, a time, when there was only quarks and anti-quarks and so forth.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_Bang#Structure_formation

So, there was a time with no hydrogen, in conclusion: nothing eternal exists.

[Sonia]

@Turan

You wrote: “To work with the four truths is simply to examine the four tasks that may enable one to see why our lives are largely a mixture of conflicts and confusions. A concept or belief can work for us some of the time but does not help much with the on-going basic human mind that seeks to find out what or who he or she is.

Our opinions, belief – and knowledge – (although interesting and maybe worthwhile in many fields) can serve to help keep the mind comfortable with its present state but may not help in understanding itself.”

————
I often wonder WHY people believe what they believe. What need does it serve?

That said, I’ve been reading ‘Agnostic, A Spiritual Manifesto’ by Lesley Hazelton.

Hazelton writes: “There are times when we need to be irrational, and go beyond doubt. Times, you might say, of creative irrationality. No act of heroism would be possible if rationality were to hold sway and the imperative of self-preservation allowed to override the impulse to aid and assist a stranger. No act of generosity either. Nobody would ever fall in love, or place the interests of those they love above their own. Playing it safe, we would give up experiment and exploration, both physical and intellectual, and stick with what we know. We would be trapped in the zero-sum game known as prisoner’s dilemma, which is set up in such a way—two suspects interrogated separately—that the only logical solution is for each to confess and serve jail time instead of maintaining innocence and going free. We would never dare take a chance.”

————
For me, this highlights the dual nature of our brains—rational and creative. Left and right. Waking and dreaming. Day and night.

Hazelton continues: “While rationality weighs probabilities and acts accordingly, creative irrationality weighs them and acts nonetheless. Is that foolhardy? Perhaps. Admirable? Possibly. The only thing certain is there are no guarantees here, no assurance of reward. If assurance is what you want, then like the two prisoners in the famous dilemma, your sole option is the dead end of conviction.”

————
There is much irony in duality. Perhaps duality creates irony.

It’s the practical psychotherapeutic aspects of ACIM that I still find helpful and that have kept me from throwing the book out the window despite its New Agey oddness. It’s also, the effects of peace and stillness that Buddhist teachings give which have raised Buddhism to my top fave “religious” philosophies. It’s the practical personal experiences gained from these philosophies which make them “believable” (to me).

You can’t prove the unseen—you just know it works when you experience it. You can prove emotions (mostly unseen), you just feel them.

If mindfulness meditation works, do it. If prayer works, do it. People require proof of varying degrees. I just need proof that it works. That when I practice a certain behavior, there are tangible results. I’m not interested in theory. Not interested in anything that promises peace and joy and bliss after death if it can’t teach ways to find peace, calm and joy in this life. And that’s where my rational and irrational mind intersect. I’m very open minded but had an epiphany after reading this book—if a practice that you’ve fully followed doesn’t seem to work, then it doesn’t work.

[Sonia]

Sorry, the book title is ‘Agnostic, A Spirited Manifesto’. Lesley Hazelton is an award-winning author who focuses on the intersection of religion and politics (accidentaltheologist.com).

This book is so well written—poetically, scientifically and “factually”. Brilliant!

Brian, I really think you would love it!!

[Spence Tepper]

Hi X17
You asked
"So how do we exist in this only universe we know of?

" How do you know this other form we exist in?"

We don't. It's an illusion. A mental construction, like God and religion m

[Spence Tepper]

Spence,

Are you doubly sure of this?

No. Just what science tells us.. See link in my original comment

[Spence Tepper]

Hi John S
Yes let me amend my argument. If you can find a time when quarks didn't exist, only then might you claim nothing is eternal.

Of course all we know is based upon extrapolation of physical laws assumed to be were eternal.

The entire theory rests upon rules assumed to be eternal.

"If the observed conditions are extrapolated backwards in time using the known laws of physics, the prediction is that just before a period of very high density there was a singularity which is typically associated with the Big Bang....."

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_Bang#Structure_formation

" The known laws of physics can be used to calculate the characteristics of the universe in detail back in time to an initial state of extreme density and temperature.[7] Detailed measurements of the expansion rate of the universe place the Big Bang at around 13.8 billion years ago, which is thus considered the age of the universe.[8] After its initial expansion, the universe cooled sufficiently to allow the formation of subatomic particles, and later atoms. Giant clouds of these primordial elements (mostly hydrogen, with some helium and lithium) later coalesced through gravity, eventually forming early stars and galaxies, the descendants of which are visible today."

[j]

"Harari continues, "You can explore the furthest reaches of the galaxy, of your body, or of your mind, but you will never encounter something that does not change, that has an eternal essence, and that completely satisfied you... 'What should I do' ask people, and the Buddha advises, 'Do nothing. Absolutely nothing.'"

I've read a fair # of Buddhist scriptures. I can't recall one where the Buddha advised "do nothing" as a philosophy to live by. In fact, the Buddha supposedly counseled that householders should earn their living by right livelihood and practicing charity.

Right now a lot of people are enamored of the clean lines of streamlined Buddhist meditation. But from what I've seen, the whole no-self trip is usually just as unsatisfying as the God or Guru trip. For example, Jack Kornfield recently sent out of missive to his vipassana flock that everyone should stop trying to realize the no-self and focus on just being happy. In other words, all those years of 10-day retreats and digging for that non-dual pony while watching the breath leaves many people feeling just sad and empty. I lived years in the Bay area and know all about it.

I value the voices of the atheists who tell us that the God concept is a stupid idea, an atavistic impulse that the smart folk outgrow. I think they're partially correct, but not as correct as they think they are.

[X17]

Hi X17
You asked
"So how do we exist in this only universe we know of?

" How do you know this other form we exist in?"

We don't. It's an illusion. A mental construction, like God and religion m

Posted by: Spence Tepper | February 21, 2020 at 11:53 AM

So then what are we? What form do we exist in this universe?

Are we playing out a mental construct of something/someone? Are we an illusion living out that?

[X17]

Hi John S
Yes let me amend my argument. If you can find a time when quarks didn't exist, only then might you claim nothing is eternal.

Posted by: Spence Tepper | February 21, 2020 at 04:25 PM

Hi Spence,

Eternal being measured on the platform of time?

Eternal definition is without beginning or end; existing or continuing for ever.

This universe is estimated to be 13.8billion years old, so is eternal to be now defined to mean that which has existed unchanged for 13.8 billion years?

Also, Is the end of this universe under question within the scientific community?

[X17]

Hi John S
Yes let me amend my argument. If you can find a time when quarks didn't exist, only then might you claim nothing is eternal.

Posted by: Spence Tepper | February 21, 2020 at 04:25 PM

THE INFLATION THEORY
The Inflationary epoch during which time the energy density of the universe was dominated by a cosmological constant-type of vacuum energy that later decayed to produce the matter and radiation that fill the universe today. I.e. the time from 10^(−36) seconds after the conjectured Big Bang singularity to some time between 10^(−33) and 10^(−32 ) seconds after the singularity.

No quarks?

[X17]

Spence,

Are you doubly sure of this?

No. Just what science tells us.. See link in my original comment

Posted by: Spence Tepper | February 21, 2020 at 12:15 PM

Does the link talk of ripples in space time? Ripples in the gaseous state and radio waves is mentioned. But radio waves same as gravitational waves??

But my point was around your following comment

"The ripples in space time began with the formation of matter."

This is what I have questioned in a way. You actually state that ripples in space time began with the formation of matter when studies suggest that ripples in space time could explain the mystery why the universe exists (in matter form) - thereby suggesting that these ripples didn't begin with matter but could have actually resulted in matter existing in the first instance.

[Dungeness]

@ Are we playing out a mental construct of something/someone?
@ Are we an illusion living out that?

I believe mystics say we play out our own mental construct.
It was created in one "moment" beyond space-time. We, as
God (or totality of consciousness), crafted it to experience a
joyride in time-space. No "other" was "there".

So God plays many roles on the stage. To make the drama
spectacular, the actors forget they created the role. They
concentrate solely on the script. They have a little surgical
implant (the mind) to continually remind them the play must
go on and prevent them from going off-script or wandering
behind the curtain. At least till they get the hook or the play
ends.

Like the Big Bang, this drama was no singularity. There are
infinite stage dramas... beginning, continuing for a while,
then going dark when the curtain draws closed. Illusion is
our plaything till we've had enough of drama and walk out
of the theater.

[Pema Tej]

Hi Brian,

The original Buddhist cosmology talks of Heaven and Hell realms. These are texts from the Pali cannon, where the words are that of the Buddha himself.

It seems like the western Buddhists tend to pick and choose parts of the Buddhist teachings to suit their minds own leanings and fixation of ideas, as Harari has done here.

[Spence Tepper]

Hi X17
You wrote
"This is what I have questioned in a way. You actually state that ripples in space time began with the formation of matter when studies suggest that ripples in space time could explain the mystery why the universe exists (in matter form) - thereby suggesting that these ripples didn't begin with matter but could have actually resulted in matter existing in the first instance."

Hm. Well the link I provided says hydrogen, formed by quarks, (which was formed by pure energy). which had dispersed evenly then began to coalesce through the pull of gravity into matter. And as it became larger volumes of Matter, ripples in space time occurred. Space time is connected to matter and proportional to it. This is called the reionization phase.

[Spence Tepper]

Hi X17
You wrote
"thereby suggesting that these ripples didn't begin with matter but could have actually resulted in matter existing in the first instance."

I think you may be referring to vibration in the quantum fields, such as the Dirac from which electrons arose, the electromagnet field from which photons arose, and the inflaton, from which cosmic inflation arose. Vibrations in these fields yielded particles, but it is the development of Matter, largely from the fusion of hydrogen coalescing from its own internal gravitational pull, which is where space became no longer homogenous, that drives the existence and warp of space time.

Or so the theories go.

[Sonia Taylor]

I just sort of feel like when we are trying to define what “God” is we could just say “blah, blah, blah, and blah”.

That would make a lot more sense.

Why are we so obsessed with being so certain about the unknown? Am I the only person that sees how absurd this is??

All these arguments... it’s just our egos. God is whatever you believe God to be. You can’t prove it—you can’t “prove” there is a God or their isn’t one, and it doesn’t matter to anyone except yourself.

[Sonia Taylor]

The certainty of the very essence of uncertainty is absurd.

[Son📍a]

We think of God as the “all-knowing One”. But what is consciousness??
*******
Consciousness at its simplest is "sentience or awareness of internal or external existence". Despite centuries of analyses, definitions, explanations and debates by philosophers and scientists, consciousness remains puzzling and controversial, being "at once the most familiar and most mysterious aspect of our lives". Perhaps the only widely agreed notion about the topic is the intuition that it exists. Opinions differ about what exactly needs to be studied and explained as consciousness. Sometimes it is synonymous with 'the mind', other times just an aspect of mind. In the past it was one's "inner life", the world of introspection, of private thought, imagination and volition.[5] Today, with modern research into the brain it often includes any kind of experience, cognition, feeling or perception. It may be 'awareness', or 'awareness of awareness', or self-awareness. There might be different levels or "orders" of consciousness, or different kinds of consciousness, or just one kind with different features. Other questions include whether only humans are conscious or all animals or even the whole universe. The disparate range of research, notions and speculations raises doubts whether the right questions are being asked.

Examples of the range of descriptions, definitions or explanations are: simple wakefulness, one's sense of selfhood or soul explored by "looking within"; being a metaphorical "stream" of contents, or being a mental state, mental event or mental process of the brain; having phanera or qualia and subjectivity; being the 'something that it is like' to 'have' or 'be' it; being the "inner theatre" or the executive control system of the mind.”
*******

It is almost impossible to fathom a “loving God” allowing the world to play out the way it has, so we make up stories about God and why he allowed all of this to happen. There is no difference between religion and mythology. And when I say religion I mean all things mystical.

I love the hope that fairytales bring... I love the idea that there may be a grand divine purpose behind all of this bullshit suffering that will somehow make our lives complete. But the truth is NOTHING can justify the suffering of this world.

It’s all random chaos.

[Dungeness]

@ It is almost impossible to fathom a “loving God” allowing the world to play
@ out the way it has, so we make up stories about God and why he allowed
@ all of this to happen.

Someone once explained our outrage as integral to the dream.
With no pain, it becomes a saccharine melodrama. The world
prefers slasher movies in its diet.

The storytellers assure you on awakening you'll realize it was all a
dream and thank God it's over. Halleleujah, you've made to the
promised land. But, the mystic demands to wake up now, before
they usher you outta the church or a madman ensures you never
leave.

[Jen]

Sonia: "The certainty of the very essence of uncertainty is absurd."

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

“Uncertainty is an uncomfortable position. But certainty is an absurd one.”

"Doubt is not a pleasant condition,
but certainty is absurd."

― Voltaire

[um]

@ sonia
>>Why are we so obsessed with being so certain about the unknown? Am I the only person that sees how absurd this is??<<

Maybe it is comfortable to look in the distance when things nearby are not that pleasant.
Countries start wars, in order to escape facing the problems of their own.

[X17]

I think you may be referring to vibration in the quantum fields, such as the Dirac from which electrons arose, the electromagnet field from which photons arose, and the inflaton, from which cosmic inflation arose. Vibrations in these fields yielded particles, but it is the development of Matter, largely from the fusion of hydrogen coalescing from its own internal gravitational pull, which is where space became no longer homogenous, that drives the existence and warp of space time.

Or so the theories go.

Posted by: Spence Tepper | February 22, 2020 at 06:56 PM

Hi Spence,

So from singularity upto end of inflation nothing but energy ie no matter.

Shortly after inflation matter and anti matter in equal measure and yet by some magic (even if it's 1 in billion part) matter > antimatter and that's how we have a universe that exists today (made of matter).

If you want to treat neutral hydrogen as the start point of matter formation then we looking at 200-300k years after inflation if I am not wrong.

But aren't particles - matter and anti matter ? And which formed after inflation.

And yes one recent study suggests ripples in space time could have tilted it in favour of matter and so the universe existing in matter form.

[Sonia]

Hi Brian,

The original Buddhist cosmology talks of Heaven and Hell realms. These are texts from the Pali cannon, where the words are that of the Buddha himself.

It seems like the western Buddhists tend to pick and choose parts of the Buddhist teachings to suit their minds own leanings and fixation of ideas, as Harari has done here.

Posted by: Pema Tej | February 21, 2020 at 11:22 PM

Oh, well then I guess I’ll just scratch Buddhism off my list then. 😳

But seriously, what’s wrong with picking and choosing? Isn’t that exactly how new religions, sects, thought systems are born?

There’s a lot of practical wisdom in various ancient philosophies. Doesn’t mean it’s 100% gospel. What is? Like they say, don’t through the baby out with the bath water.

[Sonia Taylor]

Maybe it is comfortable to look in the distance when things nearby are not that pleasant.
Countries start wars, in order to escape facing the problems of their own.

Posted by: um | February 23, 2020 at 03:05 AM

I totally get that...

[Sonia]

Sonia: "The certainty of the very essence of uncertainty is absurd."

-------------------
“Uncertainty is an uncomfortable position. But certainty is an absurd one.”

"Doubt is not a pleasant condition,
but certainty is absurd."

― Voltaire
Posted by: Jen | February 23, 2020 at 12:00 AM

Love the quote. I think I may have done a poor job conveying my idea, but what Voltaire said is the essence of what I was trying to say.

That said, I’m sort of split in that if convictions about certain belief systems give people a sense of peace and hope and improve their lives and don’t negatively impact those around them, then that’s cool.

Convictions are good. But I think it’s important to keep one’s mind open to gaining further understanding... in every area of life.

I want to believe in unicorns but then I wake up and logic sort of just stares me in the face.

I like the idea of mixing rational thinking and imagination. Is that a thing? 🤔