Ojuice5001

The Roman gods have connections to the natural, human, conceptual, and magical worlds. Hence they explain the coherent nature of the universe in a way that other conceptions of the universe can't. Almost all other philosophies end up positing a universe that is alien to humanity, whether it is the mechanical universe of the materialists or the hot-and-cold-blowing deity of the Christians. If these worldviews cannot be proved, why choose them over the ordered universe posited by Roman paganism? I have felt the sense of connection to purposeful powers higher than myself, and I think today's Christian and atheist population would benefit from connection to the Roman gods.

Perchance

Couldn't all of this apply to most other religions, though? (Or at least to other polytheistic religions).

Then we're back to, "Why any religion?"

-Perchance.

Ojuice5001

In Egypt, Carthage, the Americas, or New Guinea, the gods seem more removed from humanity than European gods. They may be intelligent, and yet somehow it seems harder to identify with them or believe that they identify with us. The gods of Asia are seem to be purely spiritual beings that humans can relate to only by denying their material aspects.

Now I would say that the religions of the Norse or Africans are at least almost as good as those of southern Europe. But if you belive that humans can and should identify with the gods and the universe, the choices can be narrowed down to the non-Abrahamic faiths of Europe and Africa.

Bible Humper

It seems to me that the most logical polytheistic faith is the Celestial Bureaucracy of Chinese myth. According to this ancient(extinct?) religion, everything imaginable and unimaginable has a bureaucrat responsible for it, and his authority is perfectly proportional to the role of whatever it is his "office" deals with.

These pantheons with less gods seem to have certain aspects of the universe over/under represented by being/not being the personal domain of a certain deity.

These bureaucrats seemed to be pretty standard deities to me, I don't know exactly what you mean by "spiritual beings" though.

Maybe some of the Christian members will resurrect the arguments which helped them defeat these gods in the minds of the Romans the first time!

Bible Humper

Just wanted to add a hilarious observation lpetrich offered the first time I mentioned the Celestial Bureaucracy, with it's myriad offices, that "Man creates god(s) in his own image indeed!"

[ October 27, 2002: Message edited by: Bible Humper ]</p>

Eudaimonist

What magical worlds? I'm not aware that any exist.

I'm not impressed by Christian attempts to "explain" the universe by something that itself begs explanation. I don't think replacing God with gods helps matters any.

By alien to humanity, do you mean unsatisfying to the emotions? I'd prefer to discover what exists than to project our own psychology onto the universe like a movie projector shining onto a screen. As we come to know what exists, we can deal with the issue of making that existence nice and cozy for us humans.

Personally, I don't feel alienated living in a natural universe because I don't treat the universe as something I'm supposed to have a relationship with -- I have human beings for that. Human society makes for a human world.

I'm not sure what level of proof you are looking for, but metaphysical naturalism is persuasive enough to me. I don't feel stuck at the level of pure metaphysical agnosticism.

I'm happy for you. I'm also quite happy with my own worldview, which I do not perceive as alien to myself, and I don't need your polytheism any more than I need Christianity.

Perchance

Here comes my favorite question ( ):

Why?

Do you think this is also true for people raised within the culture?

What about gods like Kali, who seem very strongly physical?

What does "identifying with the gods and the universe" mean?

-Perchance.

Autonemesis

What explanation? As far as I can tell, Roman pantheology merely displaces the "whence" question to exactly the same place as does Abrahamic faiths - but merely adds the plural. But that "answer" is still as unsatisfactory with many gods as it is with one god. What exactly do you claim Roman pantheology "explains" that is not already explained in greater detail and with greater relevance to the human condition by scientific naturalism?

Appealing to ignorance and calling it God or calling it gods, is no philosophy at all.

Ojuice5001

Because they don't have the appearance of free will (I'm not saying whether or not free will is actually an illusion), like humans. The gods of the Greeks appear to have a lot of free will, and everything valuable in a less personal conception of the gods (like Egypt) also entered Roman thought through the Etruscans. Consider, too, how the gods are represented in art. Greek and Roman gods are pictured as human; other cultures have a greater tendency to think of the gods as having the head of an animal, or four arms, etc.

Maybe not. But I think the above is a case for suspecting that the answer is "yes, to some extent."

They are significant exceptions, but nothing more. If the general trend of a pantheon is towards excessive spiritization, the exceptions can only do so much to counteract this.

It means seeing the things in the world as being very different, yet highly relevant to each other. I think Christianity and materialism have too great a tendency to allow humanity and the other things in the world to be irrelevant to each other.

Ojuice5001

I think Roman pantheology explains a different aspect of the world than science. Science tells us how causes and effects operate. That's a large part of the explanation for any event. But on the other hand, why did they play out in the exact way that they did, instead of some other way? It is not a given that knowledge of natural causes and effects can do this.

Put it this way. Suppose the rabbit population in a forest grows by 150% in two years. It is true that the causes are warm weather, a dearth of rabbit pathogens, etc., and yet I ask, why did it happen this way? It would also be compatible with science's discoveries if there had been cold weather and a relatively high number of rabbit pathogens. When trying to answer this, personal gods who favor the growth of rabbits seem to be a more satisfying answer than "Well, in some way that you can't talk about in detail, there weren't a lot of rabbit pathogens around this year."