Judging God from a limited perspective....

Discussion in 'Religion Archives' started by Pineal, Dec 5, 2011.

  1. Pineal Banned Banned

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    This is a label applied to many non-theist critiques of God's behavior, choices, 'architecture', morals, perfection, etc.

    But it seems to me this cuts both ways.

    Theists seem to always have explanations - or excuses one might argue - basically serving the fuction of showing how everything is really OK in the universe, God has not done anything wrong, justice is really served, etc.

    But this estimation, on the part of theists, is also being made from a limited perspective.

    And we know that humans can err in deciding things are perfect/just/ really OK that are not. (anything from how they judge political figures to their parents to certain accomplishments to decisions they or others have made)

    So why is it OK for theists from their limited states to decide, and even more so often explain how, things are really OK, just, perfect,

    but it is not OK or is hubristic when it is non-theists (or theists for that matter) being critical.

    Another way to couch the issue is to ask:
    those of you who deem God to have been perfect in all actions and decisions, how do you know this is not simply a projection based on need, precisely as children can think their parents are perfect, until they no longer do, or as many adults think this or that dictator or other public figure, religious leader, etc. is perfect, seeing and conceiving to fit this need?
     
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  3. lightgigantic Banned Banned

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    There is an analogy of a fish seeing the reflection of the moon in the water and thinking its another fish (but one a bit bigger than me).

    IOW in the case of understanding something that operates out of an ontologically superior category, extrapolating from one's own self (whether its the case of critiquing god according to human standards - eg thou shall not kill etc - or engineering a god/guru to fulfill one's insignificant needs interests and concerns) cannot take one anywhere but the wrong direction.

    One actually understands such things through an authoritative system of knowledge to draw clues about their qualities. This is what enables a person (as many do on these forums) to talk about "ideal parenthood" while not being a parent or interactions and events of the cosmos while not being at the cutting edge of astronomy , or , in the case of theists, talk about issues surrounding god while not being god.
     
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  5. Pineal Banned Banned

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    Sure, I can see how the critique works in that direction. It just, it seems to me, works in the other direction also.

    Or coming up with ornate, convoluted justifications for an ontologically superior being is assuming that one facet of said limited person is free of the limitations AND is not being unduly affected by the other limited parts, DESPITE examples all around of how people do this.

    People not willing to challenge doctors' decisions because of the huge gap in expertise, when in fact on occasion such challenges would be correct.

    I assume you will say that this is a poor analogy because the doctor is still part of the same ontological category - a fallible human. But this estimation on your part is coming from a fallible human who thinks he can know that God has made no mistakes and is IN THIS PARTICULAR WAY not at all like humans.

    You and all the other 'doctors' could simply not be able to deal with a less than perfect diety and so limit the deity this way.

    Sure, one can talk about and speculate on these things. I am not suggesting people cannot do this. But people talking about ideal parents will often find, when confronted with examples that seem to fit their descriptions, that their ideals were flawed and confused, because what they imagine is not really something working in reality.

    As far as amateur astronomers, I think it is pretty clear they can make errors. As can expert professional ones.
     
    Last edited: Dec 5, 2011
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  7. kx000 Valued Senior Member

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    Judging Pineal from a limited perspective

    [/QUOTE]those of you who deem God to have been perfect in all actions and decisions, how do you know this is not simply a projection based on need, precisely as children can think their parents are perfect, until they no longer do, or as many adults think this or that dictator or other public figure, religious leader, etc. is perfect, seeing and conceiving to fit this need?[/QUOTE]

    This very well could be the case, but my faith tells me the twenty and four elders go to the floor to praise God in the end, so that tells me he stays course and things turn out as they always were suppose to be.
     
  8. Pineal Banned Banned

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    Perhaps that end will come faster or more easily when you realize God's mistakes and or challenge God on what seem to have been mistakes, feel your actual reactions to how things are - rather than explaining to these reactions that they are misguided and wrong, and admit your own reponsibility for participating and extending these mistakes.

    Good or even great endings are not dependent on perfect processes or the pretending that they are that way.
     
  9. lightgigantic Banned Banned

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    and this is different from ... or engineering a god/guru to fulfill one's insignificant needs interests and concerns
    Only if lodged within some other authoritative system of knowledge

    Its more the case that (valid) critiques of doctor's practices are made in reference to others doctor's practices as opposed to lodging claims like "he gave me the red pills when I just knew I should have got the green ones coz green is my favorite colour" or whatever
    Only if we insist on arguments based on our own needs, interests and concerns ...
    so any idea about ideal parenthood is just as flawed as any other?

    Doesn't matter.

    Discussion of such topics occur on the platform of an authoritative system of knowledge as opposed to one's innate desire to have a planet populated by sexy female humanoid robots or whatever
     
  10. Pineal Banned Banned

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    I am not sure if that was a statement or a question. The non-theist or judged whiny neophyte who does not find the God or guru they want can be seen as judging from a limited perspective. The 'satisfied' religious person, confident in the perfection of the God - which they perceive as a more subtle perfection than these neophytes/non-theists imagine - or the justness of the universe, etc. can be also seen as a limited perspective. Something this person has been trained to accept and wants to have make sense to them out of their own needs.

    Well, no. Doctors can make mistakes. or as another kind of example, Doctors can choose a treatment that works better on most patients but a particular patient senses that it is not right for them.

    I have a little more respect for the reasons patients can disagree with doctors, it seems. In fact, one does not need to have some other expert, unless one wants to count one's own intuition of bodily needs and perhaps some other kinds of sources of disagreement with an expert doctor.
    The need to have an infallible deity runs pretty deep.

    That's not really a response in context. You are saying people can speculate about the ideal parent that they are not. Sure, they can. But that is no guarantee what they are speculating about would work in reality. The critique holds.

    Well, this example came from you and is telling about an implicit false dichotemy in you. To me this indicates that you see yourself as having transcended such selfish, entrapped desires and so there can no longer room for you to be making assumptions about a God to fit your own needs. But you may simply have a more refined, line of last defense need, one you cannot yet face, that however much God is not satifying your body based desires, it would still be too much to face to have a God that is not perfect.

    Being ascetic, for example, or willing to go without what one judges as one's selfish or conditioned desires, does not mean other kinds of desires are absent also.

    There are many soldiers who have served dictators, whose perfection they considered a given, and yet at the same time these soldiers were willing to give up family, comfort, daily desires, sex, and even their lives to serve. What they were willing to give up has no bearing on what they were not able to face.

    In regard to those critical of God or of a hypothetical God, you categorically dismiss their critiques because of what they are. They simply cannot evaluate an ontologically superior being. But religious people do this all the time. They explain what God is really doing or how God is really functioning and via these explanations show, at least to their own satisfaction, that things are Ok, God is doing things correctly or is perfect.

    They have a facility to recognize a pefection beyond them and are not fallible in this instance.
    This opens the door for others to have a faculty that sees errors.

    I can see going on faith that it really is OK after all on some level that said theist cannot articulate or fully understand. What I cannot see making sense is said theist feeling they can 1) recognize things on an ontological level they are not on while non-theists (adn theists with other conceptions of God) cannot and 2) think they can articulate this.
     
    Last edited: Dec 5, 2011
  11. lightgigantic Banned Banned

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    which is just another way of saying "engineering a god/guru to fulfill one's insignificant needs interests and concerns" hence the definition is already incorporated in my original explanation of "heading in the wrong direction"

    Only because they have some clue (based on some body of authoritative knowledge) about what is right for them.

    For instance its not valid for a patient to sense that Chinese medicine is not good for them because it tastes awful.

    IOW valid analysis is contextualized by a knowledge base of what discomforts/reversals one can expect to encounter
    perhaps I shouldn't have used the word "doctor". The idea is that the pursuit of health is contextualized around valid issues that can render one's personal needs (like the need for green pills for example) invalid.

    IOW personal need only becomes a pro-active contributor to better health when it is dovetailed with the authoritative models of medical knowledge (or stuff that "actually" makes you better)
    I think if you try and explain what renders an ideal practicable (or even what renders the discussion of an ideal that is doable) you will find that we are both talking about the same sort of thing.
    Not really.

    I am just explaining how it does and doesn't function, much like I did with medicine and cosmology
    Personally I don't think I am incredibly spiritually advanced but even just theoretically understanding that the body is not the final last word of selfhood is pretty elementary stuff.

    IOW anyone who takes the body as the final last word in the pursuit of gratification is either a teenager or miserable.

    Sure ... thats why renunciation is often explained as operating out of the same frame work as sense gratification .... much like engineering a god based on personal needs operates out of the same frame work as rejecting a god based on personal needs.

    The general idea is that there are essential qualities of the self beyond mere acquisition/renunciation of sense objects (and the mental baggage that goes with such practices)

    and alternatively there are those who were not willing to give up family, comfort, daily desires, sex, and even their lives to serve. What they were not willing to give up has no bearing on what they were not able to face.
    :shrug:
    I dismiss them because they base god on what they are ... much like I dismiss taking pills according to what is one's favorite color

    Much like one cannot simply take whatever colored pills one thinks look attractive and expect to get better ...
    Its only a problem when they extrapolate from their own ontological state to god's that the problem ensues ... much like if one extrapolates from one's favorite colors to the chemist problems ensue
    Its only a problem if they "recognize" the perfection based on weakness of ego , etc ... much like recognizing the perfection of pills becomes a problem based on favorite colors

    Whenever we are in any sort of managerial position (Driving in heavy traffic, using chemicals that are poisonous to ingest, etc etc) , everyday life forces us to deal with many ontologically superior elements for the benefit of ourselves and those around us.

    IOW we can call upon the categorical authority of a system of knowledge (I say "authority" because many of us who clean the bathroom are not chemical engineers) to put aside our personal needs/interests/concerns ("I sure am thirsty and this toilet cleaner looks like cordial") because we know the pursuit of an ideal translates into benefit ... This is further highlighted by the folly children/intellectually disabled persons get themselves into because they cannot approach the categorical authority of a system of knowledge.
     
    Last edited: Dec 5, 2011
  12. wynn ˙ Valued Senior Member

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    What do you wish to accomplish by bringing up this concern?

    Yes, I am asking about your motivation - because this is crucial in how you approach interactions with people who claim to be theists (and others), and whether you will feel satisfied by their replies or not.


    Is it that you want respect from the theists?

    Is it that they should not challenge your stance?

    Is it that you want to make clear to them that given the weight of the topic, they need to interact differently with people?

    Is it ...?
     
    Last edited: Dec 5, 2011
  13. wynn ˙ Valued Senior Member

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    In Tibetan Buddhism, they have a teaching on the Six Confusions. Applied to communication, they are:

    1. Communication as drudgery
    2. Communication as war
    3. Communication as addiction
    4. Communication as entertainment
    5. Communication as inconvenience
    6. Communication as a problem



    Would you say any of these apply in how theists and non-theists communicate?
     
  14. wynn ˙ Valued Senior Member

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    I think a crucial part of believing in God is to believe that God does not make mistakes.
    If anything, oneself and other people may be making mistakes.

    To believe in a fallible deity is to believe that the deity, is, essentially, useless, and along with it, the belief in such a deity is useless too (albeit it may still serve the purpose of self-aggrandizement, for example).
     
  15. Pincho Paxton Banned Banned

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    My need is to understand everything critically. I suppose the main brain function of theists, and none-theists is actually the brain function that determines the critical approach.

    My critical energy is very high, I have to be so critical that even science isn't good enough for me to believe. I think that from my point of view a scientist is a theist.
     
  16. Pineal Banned Banned

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    846
    This wasn't the case for many pagan religions. Even in Hinduism deities make errors, if not perhaps whatever the totaldeity is, Vishnu or Brahma. And there are people for whom a fallible deity is OK. Also I think domination of Abrahamic theology has twinning infallibility and deity so tightly that people assume it must be the case and never even consider some other view.

    But in context I was making a specific point about what seemed to be an assumption - that for things to work out the way I want, God can never have made a mistake.

    I disagree, obviously. First of all that would mean that we are all useless and any expert is useless. Secondly an evolving and learning deity can become even more useful over time. And last, if it is the situation we have to deal with, then it doesn't matter how problematic this seems. We have to deal with it.

    Note: I don't want to get in a position where I am trying to or seem to be trying to get you to believe. I think there are appealing aspects to a fallible deity, but I will not mention them because of this. I am quite sure you would not find these points compelling, but I mention it to show I am drawing a line and avoiding something.

    If it's OK, I am going to no go further on the fallible deity issue, which I did, of course, introduce myself. If you want to go into it we could take it up in another thread, though I would participate with caution.
     
  17. Pineal Banned Banned

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    yes, but nothing to indicate how you would know you have avoided this.
    Well, no, see my examples.

    It could be a perfectly good intuitive reaction to a specific remedy, depending on how it tastes bad to them. IOW if they had felt fine about other remedies that tasted bad for them, for example. But here they feel their body is telling them something.

    Sure, but this does not rule out the above.

    You know, green pills is your example, not mine. I find this is a pattern of argument on your part. Choose what you consider a silly, irrational example and then treat it as if it is the other person's position.

    Again, no. Giving up one's will to one authority is not the only way to validly disagree with another one. We are not ciphers.

    Well, I want to point out again, that it was your example, what came to mind for you, not something presented by someone else and certainly not me in this context. In your first response above you

    But when you produce an example, it is the rather odd one of a desire for robotic female sexual partners AS IF this was a good example (even though, for example it leaves out all female heterosexuals). So of course I will take this as not really understanding the range of desires and in this case also, the range of fears that can be avoided: iow here the fear of a less than perfect God, or a fear that one cannot really determine whether God has been perfect or not.

    And the person who goes around thinking that he or she can explain how God is really infallible is likely another kind of miserable.


    Sure, they say that. At the same time if you look at practices, you see renunciation, and often the attendant smugness aimed at those who are less ascetic. You also see a conflation of desire with body desires, missing out all the spiritual desires and denied fears that can affect certainty about God's infallibility and also their ability to know that God is perfect.

    So you find them talking about how God really is perfect, how this can be deducted, noticed behind appearance, how it is working, how justice is served, etc. Because not only must they believe that God is infallible, but further that they can explain it.

    Despite the epistemological challenge they make categorically to non-theists.

    You raised the issue, as if there was a necessary connection. All I needed to show was it was not a necessary connection.

    Yes, I can see that many people do this so it is a useful example rather than a convenient way not to look at something.

    What you do repeatedly is criticize those critical of religions AS IF this explains why theists have the ability to understand how God is perfect and explain this. This is a non-argument, because the inability of non-theists to validly criticise a deity does not entail the ability of theists to understand why this is all OK.

    So you keep focusing on the non-theists, using the straw man green pill dislike argument, rather than explaining how theists have this ability beyond their ability to paraphrase scripture and guru or priest.
     
  18. Pineal Banned Banned

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    Sure, all of them. Other similies fit also.
     
  19. Pineal Banned Banned

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    My motivation in first responding to LG was that he essentially categorically dismisses negative reactions to God or scripture as only possibly coming from hubris. Non-theists, for example, who are disturbed by God's behavior - if there was a God - are being told, basically, they are too stupid to judge God.

    Theists however, including LG, consider themselves about to judge God, but positively. To see how really God is infallible and things are OK.

    They grant themselves these 2 abilities: the ability to perceive these things and the ability to explain them.

    I think that is hypocrisy and also a rather damaging one.

    If I shift it to a political arena, the perniciousness might be clearer. Those who love the government do not simply say why they love the government, they tell other people that they are epistemologically restricted from being able to criticise the government. While the government supporters consider themselves to have the abilities to see how it is working, how perceived problems are really not there or necessary evils.

    Here's the post that I first responded to...

    http://www.sciforums.com/showpost.php?p=2867897&postcount=13

    So, to more directly answer your questions:

    I wish theists (and non-theists as well) would stop using this kind of slightly elegant form of 'shut up'.

    (I will probably stop responding to LG at this point in this thread. It takes so much work for me to figure out how he is not really responding - using straw men arguments, hallucinated worst case counter-examples to be specific, and simply doing what I objected to in the first place as if this explained where theist abilities come from - that I do not want to go on.

    What do you think of the issue I am raising? Does it seem to you theists often have a double standard? That they rule out the non-theist or neophytes criticism or reactions on epistemological grounds, while they themselves, also fallible humans, seem granted the ability to surpass all the epistemological obstacles?
     
    Last edited: Dec 5, 2011
  20. wynn ˙ Valued Senior Member

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    No. We are talking about God, the Supreme Personality of Godhead. This is a unique position, hence no adequate analogy is possible.


    Then you're describing a demigod. Many people believe in demigods and find plenty of use in that.
    Some aspects of the Abrahamic concepts of God are actually descriptions of a demigod.

    Distinguishing bewteeen God and a demigod is pertinent for the thread topic at hand.
     
  21. wynn ˙ Valued Senior Member

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    That may be a more formal matter, a matter of principle: I, too, enter each discussion with the conviction that I am right or that I will be right; that I perceive things adequately and am able to explain them, or that I will perceive things adequately and will be able to explain them.


    I'm sure you do that too. It may perhaps sound egregious to spell it out like I did above; but without such confidence in one's abilities, it is barely possible to partake in a discussion to begin with.


    One thing I have learned with LG and a few other theists is that if I enter an exchange with them while I deem myself in any way incompetent, lacking, stupid, insecure, ugly, etc., then the exchange will go badly and I will end up feeling even more like shit.

    My deeming myself incompetent, lacking, stupid, insecure, ugly, etc. gives rise to a particular line of reasoning that is bound to lead to a dead end (where I would need to be nothing short of omnimax to resolve it), regardless whom I talk to.



    Can you elaborate this?
    Why exactly should they stop using this kind of shut-up?
    Have you read Schopenhauer's "Art of Being Right"?
     
  22. wynn ˙ Valued Senior Member

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    I think the crux of the problem here may be that you are asking the theists to explain something to you that they are not in position to do - in the sense that the two of you have not developed the kind of personal relationship where echange on the topic of basic theistic epistemology would be meaningful.
     
  23. Pineal Banned Banned

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    I realized that the issue around rejecting an authority, raised between me and LG, interested me, so I will start a thread in Philosophy on that subject. I am moving it there because my focus, and actually our focus here, was dealing with both religious and non-religious experts.

    I will call it Rejecting Authority
     

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