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WBraun
climber
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Dec 20, 2009 - 06:27pm PT
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There are no ultimate answers.
That is an ultimate answer and contradicts.
The conception of God and the conception of Absolute Truth are not on the same level.
The conception of God indicates the controller, whereas the conception of the Absolute Truth indicates the summum bonum or the ultimate source of all energies.
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paul roehl
Boulder climber
california
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Dec 20, 2009 - 06:49pm PT
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There is a great gap between science and theology in that science attempts to find truth whatever it may be, good bad or indifferent: science seeks to discover what and how things are.
Theology seeks only a reconciliation to our existence, as in do not be afraid god loves you.
This attempt at reconciliation often places the reality that science searches for on the Procrustean bed of theological, mythological and religious need, as in the world is only five thousand years old.
God could settle the mystery of his existence in a second if he chose to. In choosing mystery over clear and honest revelation god himself seems to relish in the anxiety of his creation. How very strange.
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Gobee
Trad climber
Los Angeles
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Dec 20, 2009 - 06:55pm PT
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Philippians 2:5-11, Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but made himself nothing, taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. Therefore God has highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name that is above every name, so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.
Birth of Jesus Foretold
Luke 1:26-38, In the sixth month the angel Gabriel was sent from God to a city of Galilee named Nazareth, to a virgin betrothed to a man whose name was Joseph, of the house of David. And the virgin's name was Mary. And he came to her and said, “Greetings, O favored one, the Lord is with you!” But she was greatly troubled at the saying, and tried to discern what sort of greeting this might be. And the angel said to her, “Do not be afraid, Mary, for you have found favor with God. And behold, you will conceive in your womb and bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus. He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High. And the Lord God will give to him the throne of his father David, and he will reign over the house of Jacob forever, and of his kingdom there will be no end.”And Mary said to the angel, “How will this be, since I am a virgin?” And the angel answered her, “The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you; therefore the child to be born will be called holy—the Son of God. And behold, your relative Elizabeth in her old age has also conceived a son, and this is the sixth month with her who was called barren. For nothing will be impossible with God.” And Mary said, “Behold, I am the servant of the Lord; let it be to me according to your word.” And the angel departed from her.
Thru the Bible - Sunday Sermon - Dr. J. Vernon McGee
http://www.oneplace.com/ministries/thru_the_bible_sunday_sermon/Archives.asp
*<((:-)
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Ed Hartouni
Trad climber
Livermore, CA
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Dec 20, 2009 - 08:54pm PT
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interesting that you would use the term summum bonum Werner, in particular, it forces a choice among many competing goods. One has to define the "highest good"... among many goods... how do you do that? how do you know which good is highest?
It is your choice in the end, but you state God has the ultimate authority. How is authority of god established and utilized?
Authority is usually referred to as the definitive reference... the opinion which is taken to be correct. Because many believe they have access to this definitive reference, but that each may have a different understanding of the reference, it is difficult to unfold, at least for me, what is actually part of the reference, and what is part of the interpretation of the reference.
Augustine had his opinions about this, but many here would probably disagree with him.
When you say "greatest" you are being relative... yet you say it as if it were absolute.
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cintune
climber
the Moon and Antarctica
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Dec 20, 2009 - 09:00pm PT
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bc
climber
Prescott, AZ
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Dec 20, 2009 - 09:06pm PT
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This is how we celebrate around my house ;-)
Paul, ...science attempts to find truth...
Liked what you had to say, but "truth" may not be the right word - possible explainations to questions regarding observed phenomena, maybe.
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WBraun
climber
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Dec 20, 2009 - 09:24pm PT
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As I have told you before, there are three kinds of modes of material nature.
One is goodness, one is passion, and one is ignorance.
So ignorance is the lowest quality.
Passion is still better than ignorance.
And goodness is the highest good quality within this material world but still not perfect.
Thus one has to transcend even goodness to come to the stage of pure goodness.
Gold (example)
Gold retains it's value in the hand of Christian, Muslim, Hindu, etc etc even atheist, equally.... (crude example)
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MH2
climber
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Dec 20, 2009 - 11:58pm PT
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So who is the authority, and who decides, and how do we know it?
Well, J. Goldberg is an authority on vestibular neurophysiology because he has studied it well, published in respected journals refereed by combative peers, and his results appear in basic texts on physiology.
Robert P. George is an authority on something completely different. We know he is because he, too, is respected by critical thinkers for his work.
There are many authorities and you might arrange them in a kind of hierarchy, but first ask yourself what you are truly interested in, what you want to know, and what potential significance it has for you.
Robert P. George says:
"I just hope I am right. If they are going to buy my arguments, I don’t want to mislead the whole church.”
J. Goldberg doesn't have that sort of worry.
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Jan
Mountain climber
Okinawa, Japan
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Dec 21, 2009 - 12:00am PT
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Thanks Ed!
I would agree with Karl that mystical understanding is different than the attempt to find the "natural reason" that some religions have pursued. Reason whether applied to science or religion is a left brain function, while mysticism is right brain.
In the West where religious authority has been centralized, religious people have always distrusted mystics for the very reason that they do rely foremost on their own experiential authority, just as artists and musicians do. That's also why mystics have worked out a system for themselves, of spiritual directors who are more experienced and know the pitfalls of experiential referencing.
The mystics would like to think that someday a new spiritual understanding can be forged between scientists and mystics - that the interior micro cosmic universe mirrors the complexities of macrocosmic multiple dimensions and black holes etc. Perhaps it is just a dream. From the Middle Ages forward however, the mystics and the scientists have stood on the same side against centralized religious authority.
Meanwhile, the mystics are developing a kind of blue print for the types of consciousness that one experiences as one progresses along the path. These experientially based guides have long existed in Asian traditions but are new to the West. The Western versions also have the advantage of being able to utilize Western psychology.
Currently mystics are attempting to come up with a unified theory of stages, in which the discoveries of both Eastern and Asian mystics and at least four different religions, East and West, can be incorporated. Neuro physiologists are also busy measuring the differences in terms of electrical activity in the brain.
Science so far has developed much better protocols for evaluating its intuitions than mystics have, but thanks to the growing popularity of meditation in the West and the scientific training of the mysticists, we are headed more in the scientist's direction.
Now as in the Middle Ages, the biggest threat to open inquiry of any kind comes from the religious people who are certain that truth exists at only one level in their approved scriptures and that it's already been discovered and merely needs to be repeated and conformed to at the dictates of some sort of authority.
The unanswered question in my mind is how many people who are still participating in some kind of traditional religion are ready to move in a more scientific, universal and mystical direction, and how many are still mired in literalist world view.
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Karl Baba
Trad climber
Yosemite, Ca
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Dec 21, 2009 - 12:14am PT
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Great post Jan
I thought this was particularly insightful
In the West where religious authority has been centralized, religious people have always distrusted mystics for the very reason that they do rely foremost on their own experiential authority, just as artists and musicians do. That's also why the mystics have worked out a system for themselves, of people who are more experienced and know the pitfalls of experiential referencing.
Peace
Karl
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WBraun
climber
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Dec 21, 2009 - 12:26am PT
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What's a mystic on experimental authority?
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Jan
Mountain climber
Okinawa, Japan
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Dec 21, 2009 - 12:37am PT
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Experiential not experimental.
One who experiences the mysteries of the human mind and universe rather than just reading or talking about them.
Of course there is an element of the experiemental about all this. The biggest challenge we have is trying to understand and control our own minds.
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MH2
climber
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Dec 21, 2009 - 12:38am PT
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The more the religion advocates post here, the more God comes across as an idealized parent who loves all his children unconditionally. What about the universe, people? If it was created by an immense subtle power beyond physics, why aren't you more interested in what it contains and how it works? Pretty cool parent, don't you think? Yes, there is love, and a whole lot of other things, too. Isn't the best way to appreciate the mind of God to study the product of it? Anyone who deeply and carefully ponders what we do know may come to the conclusion that God is so subtle He/She has created a Universe that not only has no evidence of Him/Her, but no need, either.
Religions may be like training wheels for people whose goodness is a little wobbly without help. I think that the more a person opens their mind to the physical world around them, and to the people around them, the less they need guidance from religious authority.
And please take the mysticism in graduated doses. People who look too much inside their own heads could lose perspective.
Compassion, love, and empathy can exist equally well in believer and non-believer. Using reason to explore the need for them seems unnecessary and may chase out good old common sense. Read what Robert P. George, Catholic logician, has concluded and make up your own minds.
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Jan
Mountain climber
Okinawa, Japan
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Dec 21, 2009 - 12:45am PT
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And please take the mysticism in graduated doses. People who look too much inside their own heads could lose perspective.
Good advice to all who make their living using their minds. Remember how Einstein's wife had to paint the front door orange, so he could remember which house was his?
And have some pity on those of us who have to attend faculty meetings with groups of whacked out self introspectors! Three hours of discussion to form a committee to then form another committee to talk about it all some more!
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WBraun
climber
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Dec 21, 2009 - 12:47am PT
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Jan
Oh thanks, "Experiential", sorry, my font is a bit small on this huge screen I have.
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Gobee
Trad climber
Los Angeles
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Dec 21, 2009 - 01:06am PT
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Jan, it seems as in your military base where the different religions shared the building, we all have it at the same day and time?
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MH2
climber
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Dec 21, 2009 - 01:15am PT
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Remember how Einstein's wife had to paint the front door orange, so he could remember which house was his?
No, I don't.
But there is a story that John von Nuemann moved once within Boston when he was at Harvard. His wife had prepped him about the change of address but still through force of habit he took the same old bus home, couldn't get in to the old house, started to look for help and asked a young girl on the sidewalk if she could climb in a window for him. She said, "Just follow me Papa, I'll take you home." Probably not a true story.
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healyje
Trad climber
Portland, Oregon
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Dec 21, 2009 - 04:11am PT
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Neuro physiologists are also busy measuring the differences in terms of electrical activity in the brain.
If by that you mean the good folks at the McGovern Institute at MIT who do brain research and who have done fMRI scans on Tibetan monks and other meditators, none of the researchers there would ever likely characterize or want their work construed as any form of 'mystic research'. Here is a sample of some of the kinds of research they do (from Liane Young, of Rebecca Saxe's Social Cognitive Neuroscience Lab within the MIBR):
Moral Judgment & Theory of Mind
I study the neural basis of human moral judgment. I am primarily interested in the extent to which emotional processes inform moral judgment and the precise role of Theory of Mind, the capacity for mental state representation, in moral judgment. Are brain regions that support Theory of Mind recruited for moral judgment, specifically, judgment of intentional and unintentional harmful, helpful, and neutral actions? If so, what do their functional profiles reveal about belief attribution during moral judgment? What are the component processes of belief attribution for moral judgment, and does spontaneous belief attribution occur in certain moral contexts? To address questions like these, I use methods of cognitive neuroscience: functional neuroimaging (fMRI), studying patient populations with selective cognitive deficits, and modulating activity in specific brain areas using trancranial magnetic stimulation (TMS).
P.S. As an aside, here is the last line of Robert Hooke's preface to the King of England from his classic 'Micrographia' which presented some of the first science of our heretofore 'invisible' microscopic world - from the days when humans were first extending their vision into otherwise unseen realms.
Amidst all those greater Designs, I here presume to bring in that which is more proportionable to the smalness of my Abilities, and to offer some of the least of all visible things, to that Mighty King, that has establisht an Empire over the best of all Invisible things of this World, the Minds of Men.
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Jan
Mountain climber
Okinawa, Japan
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Dec 21, 2009 - 06:50am PT
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Gobee-
There are multiple services on the same day on military installations, but not at the same time. Right now the Sunday schedule is 8 am General Protestant, 10 am Catholic Mass, and 12 noon, the Black Gospel service. Simultaneously the Orthodox Christian service runs in a different room from 9:30 to 11 am. Hindu services are in another room at the same time as the Gospel service.
Each have their own chaplains and each service requires some set up time. Different sized choirs, communion or not etc., mean that the altar area has to be rearranged. Also of course, the cross and crusifix have to be moved back and forth.
On Fridays and Saturdays, the two Jewish services occur at the same time in different rooms that a Muslim service is going on in a room upstairs at the same time on Friday nights. If you listen carefully, you can sometimes hear Arabic and Hebrew floating in the air at the same time. Of course all the chaplains are members of the Officer Corps and socialize together regularly.
PS. I wanted to mention that I've enjoyed reading about the history of the various Christmas carols that you've posted.
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Jan
Mountain climber
Okinawa, Japan
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Dec 21, 2009 - 07:02am PT
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healeyje-
Thanks for the reference. I think I will ask my librarian to send for some of those articles. I have indeed heard of the MIT lab in conjunction with research that was done on Tibetan monks in which they found very different brain waves and processing than in the ordinary person. What they found was that experienced meditators used parts of their brain that would guarantee optimum compassion and happiness for the individual monks. This means that we have the ability to remodel our brain activity which was a surprise at the time. How many people are willing to do the necessary self effort as opposed to popping pills is another question.
The researchers I was referring to were cited in the book I've just finished called the Fingerprints of God and they are scattered across the country. They would say that they specialize in researching spirituality rather than mysticism. Spirituality means many things to many people however, whereas mysticism is a more specific term denoting specific experiences and the philosophy based on them starting with William James.
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