HelenM

Thanks for answering, jaliet. That's about what I would have guessed: that in a previous 'discussion' with you she had realized that she was not easily going to knock down your arguments against the Bible .

Mutual respect of differing beliefs goes a long way, I find, in a relationship. So I'm glad to hear that you seem to have that.

It's very unlikely that you'll find my husband posting here, if that was your other question . Two places you're unlikely to find him are discussion boards and church

love
Helen

Ted Hoffman

Helen
This, I think, is very funny:
But then I did not get the association btwn you and SteveD - why did Amos put your names together?

[ January 25, 2002: Message edited by: jaliet ]</p>

HelenM

Hi jaliet

If you look at the post of SteveD's that Amos quoted you can see that my name was in SteveD's post - so it just came out that way.

Or, I suppose a theist would say, it was Providential

love
Helen

Amos

Helen you're so smart! I very much agree with Steve's point and that of the Church in this matter and your name was left there by mistake.

Amos

sandlewood

I also had trouble understanding what you are saying here. I agree with Huginn that you need to define some terms. But I think I can make a guess at what you are getting at. I think you're proposing that all things exist with a kind of duality. It is like mind/body dualism except that it applies to everything, not just human brains. The word "material" us used here to mean that which is matter or energy. The chair that I'm sitting on is made up of matter. But it also contains something else in addition. It contains the information about the form of a chair. It is like a blueprint or a recipe that describes how matter needs to be arranged in order for it to actually be a chair. This is a separate "thing" or essence and can be separated from the matter of the chair itself. This is what you are calling "information". This information is not made of matter or energy; it's something else and so you're calling it "immaterial". Perhaps this is all akin to Plato's forms as well.

I think your claim is that since this essence is a separate thing in itself, it can be separated from the matter. It can exist separately. And this is your reasoning that a god can exist. It is this simply this essence without any matter.

I have several objections to this theory. There is no reason to think that there is any separate blueprint or information associated within the thing itself. This information exists in our mind. The information is the result of our viewing the chair, recognizing its form and storing the information away in our brain so that we can distinguish chairs from tables, or so that we can build a chair when we want to. I think rather that you're projecting this information onto the thing itself so that it seems to manifest as a separate entity, when actually it is not. It's like saying that the number "one" exists somewhere. It doesn't. It's a concept, an idea.

The chair itself, the matter of the chair, doesn't need any separate "information" to hold it together. As a more basic example, consider what happens when carbon atoms attach to each other to form a diamond. Is there now anything there in addition to the carbon atoms to specify that this is now a diamond? Why does there need to be? Isn't it now simply particular arrangement of carbon atoms and nothing more? Yes, there is the "information" that when carbon atoms are arranged in this particular way they form something that we call a diamond. But this information is not a separate entity itself that is attached to the diamond. It's knowledge that exists in our mind. If you want to apply Occam's Razor, this would be a good place for it. There is no basis for thinking that there is any extra information component in objects.

There are multiple assumptions made along the way. The first is the one described above, that this information component exists and is a separate entity. From that follows the assumption that this information can exist separately apart from the material substance itself. From that follows the assumption that there are "information entities" that not only are separate from the material substance but that don't associate with any material components at all (such as a God). From that follows the assumption that since such information entities exist, there is one that is a God and which created the universe. So there are many jumps of reasoning going on here that have no basis.

I think one thing to keep in mind is that there is a difference between coming up for a nice theory about how a god could exist and coming up with evidence that one in fact does exist. I see a lot of arguments that attempt to show how it is possible that a god might exist and how it would make sense. That isn't enough if you cannot also provide some evidence that your theory is true.


P.S. Whenever I read your posts, I can't help but think of this episode of Nova called <a href="http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/transcripts/2812mind.html" target="_blank">Secrets of the Mind</a>. In it, a neuroscientist describes how some people seem to perceive deep meaning in every object they see. If true, it would explain a lot about religious belief.

Tharmas

Sandlewood I believe you have it exactly. Mr. Cipriani’s argument boils down to:

1. Surely there is X
2. Therefore, God

X can be anything you want, "information," "mind," "essence," "logos," "nous," "elan vitale," whatever. The point is, as you demonstrate, it's presupposing some form of dualism. In a nutshell Cipriani is trying to sneak by with “If dualism, then God.” As an argument, as a proof of god, that is of course trivial and old hat. Ever since the Nineteenth Century, since Nietzsche, one must start with “existence precedes essence.”

Interestingly, you could still do a definition of god within an “existence precedes essence” philosophy, but it would have to be based on Pantheism or at the very most a sort of Marcionite heresy. But that’s another story.

Mr. Cipriani has definitely proved to be one of the more interesting characters to come along on these boards in a while. I’m disappointed that so much of the seeming interest turns out to be, on closer examination, mere quirkiness. If that’s ad hominem, so be it. I mean it as much directed to his poetry as anything. To me the least interesting of the post-Moderns are the formalists, if only because they’re so seldom any good, and I’m certainly making no exceptions for what I’ve seen here. One needs an incredible ear to write metrically. Actually that last sentence stands just as well minus the adverb. But I digress...

Ted Hoffman

Sandlewood and Tharmas
You have voiced the thoughts I had about Albert's words. I just wanted him to make his meaning clear so that we don't have to guess his meanings or make any presumptions about what he meant.

I find it quite disapointing that Albert has chosen to watch as we try to unravel his meaning instead of stepping in and making what he meant clear. It's like some kind of mischief he is playing on us.

Albert I would really appreciate it if you could just provide a date when you will answer the questions I asked you at the beginning of this topic. As it is, we could easily get sidetracked into other discussions. Your answers will provide us with the fodder that this thread requires.

Amos

Jaliet, Tharmas and Sandlewood

If in your world existence precedes essence we should be glad that we can sit on a chair while writing on a keyboard--which is not really true, you would argue, because we call it a chair because we can sit on it and call it a keyboard because it has keys on it. Agreed, but this seems backwards to me.

Where you go wrong is to ascribe existence to essence itself as if it was a blueprint for something. This would be true for the blueprint- maker who's job is to make a blueprint for a chair. If the chair-maker does not have a physical blueprint to follow he must have the idea of the chair in mind before he can make the chair. This is called creation and the chair is the created. Hence essense precedes existence.

When he is finished making this chair and we find it tempting to sit on it we agree with the chairmaker that the essence of the chair presents itself to us in its design and comfort for us to sit on. This makes us the consumer of the chair and if we dare to become "heavy duty lightweight consumers" we might even refer to the design and comfort of chairs as the evolution of chairs through history. Hence existence precedes essence.

This same is true with all of nature which has a mind of its own and exists according to the idea it has in effort to survive. This idea is changed with each generation and it is only because we think that we are the only ones with a brain that we call this evolution.

If essence precedes existence the enlightened mind would see the intelligent design behind nature in which the different species adapt to changing circumstances in effort to cope with these changes to ensure their survival. Such mind would call this God or the idea of God.

If existence precedes essence the stupified mind would see natural selection behind nature. He would call this survival of the fittest and thinks that nature has the ability to select those that should not survive. Such mind would then go searching for the evidence and the possible conditions why this is true.

The disagreement here (the missing link) can be found in the history of evolution if we look long enough and while searching for this we might even find a piece of the ark (or arks). None of this will ever prove the existence of God because at best it shows that God was there.

The missing link can also be found in the consolation of philosophy if we dare to become intimate with God.

Amos

Ted Hoffman

Amos
I believe you've got the existentialist concept backwards. What Soren Kierkegaard meant when he said existence precedes essence was that the chair must exist in the mind of the chairmaker before it can have any essence. Essence being intrinsic or indispensable properties that serve to characterize or identify something.

The chair does not show up then the carpenter decides on its height etc. First, it exists in his mind then he gives it its essence, which make up the chair.

But then again Albert has not explained what he meant or what he was referring to when he talked about the immaterial making up the material.
So we are just speculating.
You say :
I dont believe anyone has done what you are saying above Yet. Thanks to Albert.
Albert was suggesting splitting words like "supernatural" to super and natural. I think what he wanted to put across was that we use immaterial properties (what he referred to as info) to describe/ create the material.

Either way, the chair must exist (for non-creators) before their eyes, before they can describe it, or describe its essence. So either way, existence precedes essence. From both the creators viewpoint, or from the non-creators.

[quote]If essence precedes existence the enlightened mind would see the intelligent design behind nature in which the different species adapt to changing circumstances in effort to cope with these changes to ensure their survival. Such mind would call this God or the idea of God.[/qoute]
the concept of "existence precedes essence" can be applied to man-made things very well.

Look at mountains and try to apply the concept. Mountains are formed by tectonic plates activity etc. There is no intelligence behind the formation of mountains. They are just a result of a combination of the right circumstances/ conditions.
We rely on the existence of mountains to describe their essence. But can we assume they existed in a creators mind because "existence precedes essence?". I don't think so. That doesn't mean existence precedes essence is a wrong concept, but it does not apply in all situations.

There is no reason to believe that intelligent life can only come from intelligent "life".

What you have referred to as the "mind of God" is what I call evolution coupled with survival for the fittest. Adaptation is an evolutionary mechanism, and doesn't have to have someone pulling the strings for it to occur.

Amos, you use the word natural selection as if you do not fully grasp how it takes place. Its simple, the weaker organisms die during the competition for scarce resources (Do you want to tell us that death is also a machinery of God?). When they die, they dont mate and they die with their genes and hence their genes are not passed on. The survivors, those better adapted, live on, mate and pass their genes. When this happens for millions of years, a particular trait among a species will be completely eliminated. This does not require intelligent manipulator in order to take place. It is simply logical.

Jobar

Well, I wrote out a long post and managed to lose it. I wanted to say that I have started a topic in Philosophy called 'One Song' to discuss some of the questions about pantheism, and to take up for Albert some. He is one man, attempting to reply to all of us. The questions are deep and complex. He has a life to live away from the keyboard. And he is addressing a (somewhat at least) hostile audience. Who can blame him for being as slow and cautious as a long-tailed cat in a roomful of rocking chairs?! Give him room and time- the topic will not go away!

[ January 26, 2002: Message edited by: Jobar ]</p>