The Idea of "God': How Do Different Approaches Work, or Not Work, Philosophically?

[JackDaydream]

Our own objective truth.

No, not objective. That's a misuse of the word, in the context of its use on a philosophy forum. But I'm fed up of saying this, and offering explanations as to why. The End.

Still I consider my model objectively truth, in the philosophical sense. Absolutely true, for everyone. But I don't expect anyone to accept it or think conformingly. The idea that we can't know the absolute truth is unacceptable for me. Precisely because I think I have found it. The holy grail...

It is fair enough for you to accept what appears to be to the objective truth. The problem may be where people try to enforce their model on others. In this respect, both theists and atheists can be dogmatic.

[Pattern-chaser]

It is fair enough for you to accept what appears to be to the objective truth. The problem may be where people try to enforce their model on others. In this respect, both theists and atheists can be dogmatic.

Dogmatism is to be avoided where possible, I think. But if I insisted on using "ghost" to refer to trees, I might expect to be challenged. It's not even that vocabulary is subject to some form of dogmatism, but at the same time, communication is only possible using language if we all stick roughly to commonly-accepted meanings for words. Yes, I am often guilty of 'stretching' the definition of a word - "loosening our vocabulary", as Michael McIntyre puts it - but to use a word, again and again, in a way that contradicts 'normal' usage can reasonably be expected to attract attention and comment, I suggest.

[JackDaydream]

It is fair enough for you to accept what appears to be to the objective truth. The problem may be where people try to enforce their model on others. In this respect, both theists and atheists can be dogmatic.

Dogmatism is to be avoided where possible, I think. But if I insisted on using "ghost" to refer to trees, I might expect to be challenged. It's not even that vocabulary is subject to some form of dogmatism, but at the same time, communication is only possible using language if we all stick roughly to commonly-accepted meanings for words. Yes, I am often guilty of 'stretching' the definition of a word - "loosening our vocabulary", as Michael McIntyre puts it - but to use a word, again and again, in a way that contradicts 'normal' usage can reasonably be expected to attract attention and comment, I suggest.

Thanks for the link to Michael McIntire and I will read it tomorrow. Part of the problem with the word God is that it comes with various connotations, including emotional associations. Even though you say about saying ghost to refer to trees, it may be that the idea of God is more ambiguous. Actually, trees are pretty clearcut because they can be identified so easily. Ghosts is a little more ambiguous because the term usually refers to discarnate entities, but is sometimes used to speak of memories.

I sometimes wonder if some people who say they believe in God and those who do not may have more in common and it is just a matter of framing. At one stage, I thought that this may all come down to language but now, think that it goes beyond that to conceptions and explanations about how reality works. But, nevertheless, even amongst those who say they believe in God there may be a distinction between those who maintain that this being is distant and those who maintain that it is possible to develop a personal relationship with this being. The Judaeo-Christian perspective does usually include the idea that a personal relationship can be established with the 'divine'.

[Pattern-chaser]

I believe I have a relationship with Gaia, whom I call "God", but how personal that relationship is, or could be, I'm not sure.




As for Prof. McIntyre, I just checked, and he refers to a "loosening of thinking", not vocabulary. I won the book, but had misremembered. I don't think it changes the sense of what I said, though.

Back in the 1920s, the great physicist Max Born was immersed in the mind-blowing experience of developing quantum theory. Born later remarked that engagement with science and its healthy scepticism can give us an escape route from mindsets and unconscious assumptions. With the more dangerous kinds of zealotry or fundamentalism in mind, he said38

“I believe that ideas such as absolute certitude, absolute exactness, final truth, etc., are figments of the imagination which should not be admissible in any field of science... This loosening of thinking [Lockerung des Denkens] seems to me to be the greatest blessing which modern science has given to us. For the belief in a single truth and in being the possessor thereof is the root cause of all evil in the world.”

Further wisdom on these topics can be found in, for instance, the classic study of fundamentalist cults by Flo Conway and Jim Siegelman.39 It echoes religious wars over the centuries. Time will tell, perhaps, how the dangers from the fundamentalist religions compare with those from the fundamentalist atheisms. Among today’s fundamentalist atheisms we have not only scientific fundamentalism, saying that Science Is the Answer to Everything and Religion Must Be Destroyed — provoking a needless backlash against science, sometimes violent — but also, for instance, atheist versions of what economists now call market fundamentalism.2

Market fundamentalism is arguably the most dangerous of all because of its financial and political power, still remarkably strong in today’s world. I don’t mean Adam Smith’s reasonable idea that market forces and profits are useful, in symbiosis with the division of labour and good regulation.25 Smith was clear about the need for regulation, written or unwritten.40 I don’t mean the business entrepreneurship that can provide us with useful goods and services. By market fundamentalism I mean the hypercredulous belief, the taking-for-granted, the simplistic and indeed incoherent mindset that market forces are by themselves the Answer to Everything, when based solely on ‘deregulation’ and the maximization of individual profit — regardless of evidence like the 2008 financial crash. Some adherents consider their beliefs ‘scientifically’ justified through the idea, which they wrongly attribute to Darwin, that competition between individuals is all that matters.1 That last idea isn’t, I should add, exclusive to the so-called political right.2

Understanding market fundamentalism is important because of its tendency to promote not only financial but also social instability, not least through gross economic inequality. And the financial power of market fundamentalism makes it one of the greatest threats to good science, and indeed to rational problem-solving of any kind because, for a true believer, individual profit is paramount, taking precedence over respect for evidence — evidence about financial and social stability, or mental health, or pandemic viruses, or biodiversity, or the ozone hole or climate or anything else. The point is underlined by the investigations in refs. 24 and 41.

Common to all forms of fundamentalism, or puritanism, or extremism is that besides ignoring or cherry-picking evidence they forbid the loosening of thinking that allows freedom to view things from more than one angle. Only one viewpoint is permitted, for otherwise you are ‘impure’. You’re commanded to have tunnel vision. The 2008 financial crash seems to have made only a small dent in market fundamentalism, so far, though perhaps reducing the numbers of its adherents. Perhaps the COVID-19 pandemic will make a bigger dent. It’s too early to say. And what’s called ‘science versus religion’ is not, it seems to me, about scientific insight versus religious, or spiritual, insight. Rather, it’s about scientific fundamentalism versus religious fundamentalism, which of course are irreconcilable.

Such futile dichotomizations cry out for more loosening of thinking. How can such loosening work? As Ramachandran or McGilchrist might say, it’s almost as if the right brain hemisphere nudges the left with a wordless message to the effect that ‘You might be sure, but I smell a rat: could you, just possibly, be missing something?’

It’s well known that in 1983 a Russian officer, Stanislav Petrov, saved us from likely nuclear war. At great personal cost, he disobeyed standing orders when a malfunctioning weapons system said ‘nuclear attack imminent’. He smelt a rat and we had a narrow escape. We probably owe it to Petrov’s right hemisphere. There have been other such escapes.

[Pattern-chaser]

As for Prof. McIntyre, I just checked, and he refers to a "loosening of thinking", not vocabulary. I won the book, but had misremembered. I don't think it changes the sense of what I said, though.

Won! I am an idiot! I own the book.

[JackDaydream]

As for Prof. McIntyre, I just checked, and he refers to a "loosening of thinking", not vocabulary. I won the book, but had misremembered. I don't think it changes the sense of what I said, though.

Won! I am an idiot! I own the book.

I was curious as to what you did to win the book. Nevertheless, at times I have sat in places where there is Wifi and download so many books, mostly free ones, so I feel like I have won them. I feel like Moses receiving the revelation of the commandments on a tablet, as if the divine is giving me gifts of wisdom.

[JackDaydream]

I believe I have a relationship with Gaia, whom I call "God", but how personal that relationship is, or could be, I'm not sure.




As for Prof. McIntyre, I just checked, and he refers to a "loosening of thinking", not vocabulary. I won the book, but had misremembered. I don't think it changes the sense of what I said, though.

Back in the 1920s, the great physicist Max Born was immersed in the mind-blowing experience of developing quantum theory. Born later remarked that engagement with science and its healthy scepticism can give us an escape route from mindsets and unconscious assumptions. With the more dangerous kinds of zealotry or fundamentalism in mind, he said38

“I believe that ideas such as absolute certitude, absolute exactness, final truth, etc., are figments of the imagination which should not be admissible in any field of science... This loosening of thinking [Lockerung des Denkens] seems to me to be the greatest blessing which modern science has given to us. For the belief in a single truth and in being the possessor thereof is the root cause of all evil in the world.”

Further wisdom on these topics can be found in, for instance, the classic study of fundamentalist cults by Flo Conway and Jim Siegelman.39 It echoes religious wars over the centuries. Time will tell, perhaps, how the dangers from the fundamentalist religions compare with those from the fundamentalist atheisms. Among today’s fundamentalist atheisms we have not only scientific fundamentalism, saying that Science Is the Answer to Everything and Religion Must Be Destroyed — provoking a needless backlash against science, sometimes violent — but also, for instance, atheist versions of what economists now call market fundamentalism.2

Market fundamentalism is arguably the most dangerous of all because of its financial and political power, still remarkably strong in today’s world. I don’t mean Adam Smith’s reasonable idea that market forces and profits are useful, in symbiosis with the division of labour and good regulation.25 Smith was clear about the need for regulation, written or unwritten.40 I don’t mean the business entrepreneurship that can provide us with useful goods and services. By market fundamentalism I mean the hypercredulous belief, the taking-for-granted, the simplistic and indeed incoherent mindset that market forces are by themselves the Answer to Everything, when based solely on ‘deregulation’ and the maximization of individual profit — regardless of evidence like the 2008 financial crash. Some adherents consider their beliefs ‘scientifically’ justified through the idea, which they wrongly attribute to Darwin, that competition between individuals is all that matters.1 That last idea isn’t, I should add, exclusive to the so-called political right.2

Understanding market fundamentalism is important because of its tendency to promote not only financial but also social instability, not least through gross economic inequality. And the financial power of market fundamentalism makes it one of the greatest threats to good science, and indeed to rational problem-solving of any kind because, for a true believer, individual profit is paramount, taking precedence over respect for evidence — evidence about financial and social stability, or mental health, or pandemic viruses, or biodiversity, or the ozone hole or climate or anything else. The point is underlined by the investigations in refs. 24 and 41.

Common to all forms of fundamentalism, or puritanism, or extremism is that besides ignoring or cherry-picking evidence they forbid the loosening of thinking that allows freedom to view things from more than one angle. Only one viewpoint is permitted, for otherwise you are ‘impure’. You’re commanded to have tunnel vision. The 2008 financial crash seems to have made only a small dent in market fundamentalism, so far, though perhaps reducing the numbers of its adherents. Perhaps the COVID-19 pandemic will make a bigger dent. It’s too early to say. And what’s called ‘science versus religion’ is not, it seems to me, about scientific insight versus religious, or spiritual, insight. Rather, it’s about scientific fundamentalism versus religious fundamentalism, which of course are irreconcilable.

Such futile dichotomizations cry out for more loosening of thinking. How can such loosening work? As Ramachandran or McGilchrist might say, it’s almost as if the right brain hemisphere nudges the left with a wordless message to the effect that ‘You might be sure, but I smell a rat: could you, just possibly, be missing something?’

It’s well known that in 1983 a Russian officer, Stanislav Petrov, saved us from likely nuclear war. At great personal cost, he disobeyed standing orders when a malfunctioning weapons system said ‘nuclear attack imminent’. He smelt a rat and we had a narrow escape. We probably owe it to Petrov’s right hemisphere. There have been other such escapes.

The idea of having a relationship with Gaia is interesting is interesting, so I can see why you prefer the pronoun 'she' for God. It could be said that Gaia is linked to nature and many people are cut off from nature and from the feminine principle itself, which is sometimes projected onto women, whereas it probably goes way beyond that. The idea of Gaia as a living being, or expression of the force of nature indicates that the earth can get sick which may be problem revealed by climate change.

It seems likely that each human being is part of nature and needs to be understood in this way as holistic beings. It is sometimes hard to look after the body, especially with so many stresses in life. Perhaps, alcohol can become for many one of the worst weapons of self destruction. Also, it can be easy to ignore the body and it may be that projection of 'God' as beyond as opposed to imminent in creation may lead to ignoring the body, focusing on the mind, in a dualistic split.

[Raymond]

As for Prof. McIntyre, I just checked, and he refers to a "loosening of thinking", not vocabulary. I won the book, but had misremembered. I don't think it changes the sense of what I said, though.

Won! I am an idiot! I own the book.

I was wondering about exactly that!

I think it's kind of ironic though that Born speaks of the thought "löckerung" influence of science while science calls non-scientific approached normally nonsensical, which makes science (despite not willing to surrender to absolutes) dogmatic or absolute just the same.

[EricPH]

I side with the Hindus, who believe that any and all 'Gods' are aspects of the one, unfathomable, God. So all Gods are valid, in my belief system, at least.

It would make more sense if there were thousands of Christian gods, one for every denomination. Throughout history we seem to have acted towards each other as if we are worshipping different gods.

Searching for a greatest meaning of 'One Creator God'' would surely mean we have to care for each other despite all our differences.

[Pattern-chaser]

I believe I have a relationship with Gaia, whom I call "God", but how personal that relationship is, or could be, I'm not sure.

The idea of having a relationship with Gaia is interesting, so I can see why you prefer the pronoun 'she' for God. It could be said that Gaia is linked to nature and many people are cut off from nature and from the feminine principle itself, which is sometimes projected onto women, whereas it probably goes way beyond that. The idea of Gaia as a living being, or expression of the force of nature indicates that the earth can get sick which may be problem revealed by climate change.

It seems likely that each human being is part of nature and needs to be understood in this way as holistic beings.

That sums up my feelings and beliefs pretty well. As well as Lovelock, I was also initially (i.e. as a youth whose beliefs were still taking shape) informed by Lewis Thomas' book.

[JackDaydream]

I believe I have a relationship with Gaia, whom I call "God", but how personal that relationship is, or could be, I'm not sure.

The idea of having a relationship with Gaia is interesting, so I can see why you prefer the pronoun 'she' for God. It could be said that Gaia is linked to nature and many people are cut off from nature and from the feminine principle itself, which is sometimes projected onto women, whereas it probably goes way beyond that. The idea of Gaia as a living being, or expression of the force of nature indicates that the earth can get sick which may be problem revealed by climate change.

It seems likely that each human being is part of nature and needs to be understood in this way as holistic beings.

That sums up my feelings and beliefs pretty well. As well as Lovelock, I was also initially (i.e. as a youth whose beliefs were still taking shape) informed by Lewis Thomas' book.

If there is a God, or divine source, it may be that each person perceives it a little differently as every person is unique. Some may argue that this variation indicates that there is no God at all.

However, even saying that there is no God, or claiming that one is an atheist is not that precise. In particular, it is possible to be an atheist and still be an idealist or a materialist. Generally, Buddhism doesn't suggest the existence of God, but it is a radically different view of reality to scientific materialism.

Independently of atheism or theism, each person's perception may have aspects which are shared with others, but there are so many possibile variations in understanding the nature of reality. The issue of whether there is a God or not is one important aspect of this. The various paths of the different religious perspectives and denominations may be like different pictures of the God force.

I am surprised that Lovelock' s ideas have not been more influential in philosophy, but this may be due to the bias towards materialism. Also, there is the issue of the glamour of certain ideas and in this age of digital information it could be that many reject the idea of God and Gaia, because these concepts are not trendy enough.

[JackDaydream]

I believe I have a relationship with Gaia, whom I call "God", but how personal that relationship is, or could be, I'm not sure.




As for Prof. McIntyre, I just checked, and he refers to a "loosening of thinking", not vocabulary. I won the book, but had misremembered. I don't think it changes the sense of what I said, though.

Back in the 1920s, the great physicist Max Born was immersed in the mind-blowing experience of developing quantum theory. Born later remarked that engagement with science and its healthy scepticism can give us an escape route from mindsets and unconscious assumptions. With the more dangerous kinds of zealotry or fundamentalism in mind, he said38

“I believe that ideas such as absolute certitude, absolute exactness, final truth, etc., are figments of the imagination which should not be admissible in any field of science... This loosening of thinking [Lockerung des Denkens] seems to me to be the greatest blessing which modern science has given to us. For the belief in a single truth and in being the possessor thereof is the root cause of all evil in the world.”

Further wisdom on these topics can be found in, for instance, the classic study of fundamentalist cults by Flo Conway and Jim Siegelman.39 It echoes religious wars over the centuries. Time will tell, perhaps, how the dangers from the fundamentalist religions compare with those from the fundamentalist atheisms. Among today’s fundamentalist atheisms we have not only scientific fundamentalism, saying that Science Is the Answer to Everything and Religion Must Be Destroyed — provoking a needless backlash against science, sometimes violent — but also, for instance, atheist versions of what economists now call market fundamentalism.2

Market fundamentalism is arguably the most dangerous of all because of its financial and political power, still remarkably strong in today’s world. I don’t mean Adam Smith’s reasonable idea that market forces and profits are useful, in symbiosis with the division of labour and good regulation.25 Smith was clear about the need for regulation, written or unwritten.40 I don’t mean the business entrepreneurship that can provide us with useful goods and services. By market fundamentalism I mean the hypercredulous belief, the taking-for-granted, the simplistic and indeed incoherent mindset that market forces are by themselves the Answer to Everything, when based solely on ‘deregulation’ and the maximization of individual profit — regardless of evidence like the 2008 financial crash. Some adherents consider their beliefs ‘scientifically’ justified through the idea, which they wrongly attribute to Darwin, that competition between individuals is all that matters.1 That last idea isn’t, I should add, exclusive to the so-called political right.2

Understanding market fundamentalism is important because of its tendency to promote not only financial but also social instability, not least through gross economic inequality. And the financial power of market fundamentalism makes it one of the greatest threats to good science, and indeed to rational problem-solving of any kind because, for a true believer, individual profit is paramount, taking precedence over respect for evidence — evidence about financial and social stability, or mental health, or pandemic viruses, or biodiversity, or the ozone hole or climate or anything else. The point is underlined by the investigations in refs. 24 and 41.

Common to all forms of fundamentalism, or puritanism, or extremism is that besides ignoring or cherry-picking evidence they forbid the loosening of thinking that allows freedom to view things from more than one angle. Only one viewpoint is permitted, for otherwise you are ‘impure’. You’re commanded to have tunnel vision. The 2008 financial crash seems to have made only a small dent in market fundamentalism, so far, though perhaps reducing the numbers of its adherents. Perhaps the COVID-19 pandemic will make a bigger dent. It’s too early to say. And what’s called ‘science versus religion’ is not, it seems to me, about scientific insight versus religious, or spiritual, insight. Rather, it’s about scientific fundamentalism versus religious fundamentalism, which of course are irreconcilable.

Such futile dichotomizations cry out for more loosening of thinking. How can such loosening work? As Ramachandran or McGilchrist might say, it’s almost as if the right brain hemisphere nudges the left with a wordless message to the effect that ‘You might be sure, but I smell a rat: could you, just possibly, be missing something?’

It’s well known that in 1983 a Russian officer, Stanislav Petrov, saved us from likely nuclear war. At great personal cost, he disobeyed standing orders when a malfunctioning weapons system said ‘nuclear attack imminent’. He smelt a rat and we had a narrow escape. We probably owe it to Petrov’s right hemisphere. There have been other such escapes.

I have been thinking about what McIntryre described as the 'loosening of thinking' and it is likely that this varies. It may be that it requires thinking 'outside of the box' and it may be that this involves being challenged. If one goes through life without difficult experiences it is possible not to change one's point of view. The nature of experiences may cause tension between the left and right side of the brain in an excitory way.

This may be connected to personal and cultural evolution. Certainly, there has been plenty of loosening of thought in relation to religion within philosophy. It may even be asked whether the field of philosophy of religion is considered important in philosophy any longer. I am inclined to think that the issues underlying religion have not gone away. It could be the other way round and that the focus on science is seen as onesided and that the question of whether God exists lingers on in the residues of the loose thoughts.

[Pattern-chaser]

I have been thinking about what McIntryre described as the 'loosening of thinking' and it is likely that this varies. It may be that it requires thinking 'outside of the box' and it may be that this involves being challenged. If one goes through life without difficult experiences it is possible not to change one's point of view. The nature of experiences may cause tension between the left and right side of the brain in an excitory way.

This may be connected to personal and cultural evolution. Certainly, there has been plenty of loosening of thought in relation to religion within philosophy. It may even be asked whether the field of philosophy of religion is considered important in philosophy any longer. I am inclined to think that the issues underlying religion have not gone away. It could be the other way round and that the focus on science is seen as onesided and that the question of whether God exists lingers on in the residues of the loose thoughts.

I understand this loosening to centre on broadening and deepening the scope of our thinking. So rather than focussing on the exact and precise meaning of terms, we deliberately blur those boundaries and broaden the scope of what is referred to, to include and embrace more of the world in our thinking. It refers, in detail, to 'stretching' the definitions of words, with the aim of promoting a more general discussion and consideration.

IMO.

[JackDaydream]

I have been thinking about what McIntryre described as the 'loosening of thinking' and it is likely that this varies. It may be that it requires thinking 'outside of the box' and it may be that this involves being challenged. If one goes through life without difficult experiences it is possible not to change one's point of view. The nature of experiences may cause tension between the left and right side of the brain in an excitory way.

This may be connected to personal and cultural evolution. Certainly, there has been plenty of loosening of thought in relation to religion within philosophy. It may even be asked whether the field of philosophy of religion is considered important in philosophy any longer. I am inclined to think that the issues underlying religion have not gone away. It could be the other way round and that the focus on science is seen as onesided and that the question of whether God exists lingers on in the residues of the loose thoughts.

I understand this loosening to centre on broadening and deepening the scope of our thinking. So rather than focussing on the exact and precise meaning of terms, we deliberately blur those boundaries and broaden the scope of what is referred to, to include and embrace more of the world in our thinking. It refers, in detail, to 'stretching' the definitions of words, with the aim of promoting a more general discussion and consideration.

IMO.

I am in favour of broadening terms to encompass diverse thinking about ideas of God, because I look to comparative religion as a source. However, many people are concerned to pinpoint an exact meaning. This is what fundamentalists do and even in philosophy there can be strict divisions and labels, especially the neat divide between theism and atheism, with some acknowledgement of agnosticism. The labels can sometimes be taken as given, without looking into overlaps and blurry edges..

In Richard Dawkins' book, 'The God Delusion', even though he says that his focus is not on Einstein's view of God, I find his discussion of this as being the best and most expansive aspect of it. Even though Dawkins does point to Einstein' s claim of not being a theist, he points to the way in which Einstein said, ' I believe in Spinoza's God who reveals himself in the orderly harmony of what exists, not in a God who concerns himself with fates and actions of human beings.

Dawkins goes on to elaborate between the perspective of deism and pantheism. He says, ' The deist God never intervenes' but is 'one whose activities were confined to setting up the laws that govern the laws that govern the universe in the first place.' He goes onto say that,
'Pantheists don't believe in a supernatural God at all, but use the word God as a non-supernatural synonym for Nature, or for the universe, or for the lawfulness that govern its workings.

It is worth looking at these terms but my own conclusion is that the more the various labels are broken down aspects of similarity rather than mere differences emerge. In some cases, it may be that there are more similarities rather than differences between theists and atheists if they could loosen up on the yes/no division in thinking about God. Perhaps, the idea of God needs to grow in order to accommodate the changes of thinking in the twentieth first century. That is because even though science has made details of evolution apparent it has not explained the existence of life and consciousness. So, there are still unsolved mysteries behind the scenes, so the idea of God as the creative force may not have faded from the picture entirely. It all depends on interpretation and each individual may choose how to put it all together and it may be a quest which is ongoing for some within philosophy.

[Pattern-chaser]

I understand this loosening to centre on broadening and deepening the scope of our thinking. So rather than focussing on the exact and precise meaning of terms, we deliberately blur those boundaries and broaden the scope of what is referred to, to include and embrace more of the world in our thinking. It refers, in detail, to 'stretching' the definitions of words, with the aim of promoting a more general discussion and consideration.

I am in favour of broadening terms to encompass diverse thinking about ideas of God, because I look to comparative religion as a source. However, many people are concerned to pinpoint an exact meaning. This is what fundamentalists do and even in philosophy there can be strict divisions and labels, especially the neat divide between theism and atheism, with some acknowledgement of agnosticism. The labels can sometimes be taken as given, without looking into overlaps and blurry edges.

I agree with your implication, that this loosened thinking has its place, just as its near-opposite, binary thinking, does. There are some topics and discussions where precision is key. But there are others where a broader and more general outlook is helpful.

But we should bear in mind that, as we 'loosen' our terms, we render them less precise, as we seek to encompass and embrace a wider range of meaning. This blurring is the price of generalisation, and we should be aware of it, and willing to pay it.