The Other Michael

Mark Twain:

"Faith is believing what you know ain't so."

"Religion consists in a set of things which the average man thinks he believes and wishes he was certain of."

cheers,
Michael

diana

What interesting assertions: Faith is not contrary to reason and faith is above reason. Would you mind terribly much expanding on those two ideas, please?

Or maybe you could just tackle this one: Do you believe faith is based on reason? If so, then how is it above reason? If not, then what is it based on?

Thanks in advance.

d

danrael

Really?

The great Indian monk, Bodhidharma, who single-handedly brought Zen from India to China in the 5th century, says this about the teaching:

"A special transmission outside the scriptures;
Depending not on words and letters;
Pointing directly to the human mind ;
Seeing into one's nature, one becomes a Buddha"

In other words, "direct pointing to reality." as it is often described.

Wikipedia defines "empirical method" here:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Empirical_method

Do these two approaches sound alike? I don't think so.

Zen is concerned with realizing one's true nature. It is immediate, spontaneous enlightenment, without words, without thought.

Empricism is concerned with experimentation, trial and error, experience, and the collection of large amounts of data. It is scientific in its approach.

Zen is not concerned with acquisition of data; if anything, it's method involves being unattached to any particular idea or thing. "Emptiness" is often referred to in Zen.

Empiricism is concerned with verification via the senses.

Zen is concerned with a reality beyond the senses.

Empiricism is based upon observation, rather than intuition.

Zen is intuitive in its approach.

and on, and on, and on.......

danrael

Bingo! You hit it right on the nose! Now how in the world did you know that? You must be psychic, of course!

danrael

Since there is only one world, then the natural and the supernatural both exist seamlessly within that one world; the supernatural is not another world beyond the natural world, but a part of it. The "whole other order of reality" you mention is only a mental construct. The idea of the supernatural is incoherent, yes, but only to the rational mind. When you no longer view reality with the rational mind, you gain access to another dimension of reality, which includes the natural world; one then views reality as it is; in its totality, and not in its parts. Perception of reality is not reality. Reality itself can only be realized when one drops one's notions of it as perceived via the senses; ie; perception.

So what does this have to do with the supernatural? All he is saying is that he is seeing reality exactly for what it is; no more, no less. In Zen, it is called having "no gaining idea".

"....and Oz never did give nothin' to the Tin Man,
that he did'nt, did'nt already have............
America

Jobar

I know all the words to that song. It's about my favorite karaoke performance.

Danrael, Tolkien's Middle-Earth is a mental construct, too. So is Dante's Inferno. So is every single fictional 'world' ever imagined, or that ever will be imagined.

I'm not putting down fiction, here. I'm a lifelong fan of fiction. But I always stay very clear on the division between fiction and fact. One of the things we skeptics are trying to do, here on II and in the world at large, is to show that the mythologies by which so many live their lives are fictions, not facts.

It's not that people can actually live their lives in anything other than the real world. But when they try to live as if the myths they believe are in fact reality, then they very often do damage to themselves, to others, and to the world itself. We see those who insist that the world was created in six literal days, less than ten thousand years ago; we see those who are willing to kill themselves and as many others who don't believe as they do as possible, because they've been taught that a never-ending paradise awaits them after death in battle against the infidel. And many other such destructive insanities.

All such myth-inspired madness relies on the assertion that the supernatural is in some sense real. We think that the root of many- perhaps most- of the ills which men inflict upon themselves is exactly this assertion.

So I ask a third time- what do you find good and true and believable, that is supernatural? If you have no answer to my question, are you sure you want to defend this confusion of fantasy with fact?

BadBadBad

The supernatural exists, just not so that you can tell.

That other dimension of reality you speak of is what we call fantasy.

John A. Broussard

I have no idea. It's just the way the world is. When someone comes up with a non-empirical method of finding something out, I'll be standing in line to find out what it is.

danrael

I guess you missed the point of my quoting that excerpt from the song; I was not saying that the Oz story is true, though the story itself serves a very important function; I was merely responding to your quote about Buddha and what he did not gain from awakening, as the Tin Man also came to realize that he already had what he sought.

I agree with your statements that belief systems have done great harm. No argument. But you are associating the idea of the supernatural only with fantasy, simply because you cannot verify its validity empirically, whereas I am associating it with reality itself, the validity of its existence being approaced intuitively.

danrael

.......at least not via of the empirical approach.



Let's not be ridiculous: how can the other dimension of reality be fantasy? If it is fantasy, it is not reality!

The other dimension of reality is the silent, invisible world, and requires a different approach than that which the "rational" mind can afford. By the way, as the rational mind is a self-created principle, and creates its own standards, such as the "empirical method", how do you test for it's own validity, since you would have to rely on the rational mind itself? Just curious.