Vendantic tenets which are exactly theist-based religious belief system assertions. One will need to demonstrate the validity of such, having firtstly fully described the details of the specific claims and assertions.
Fido, while I do, and can, appreciate the art form involved in your written form, and the ideas presented through the words, I am also fully aware that such artistic form is only useful in a rather narrow, and far less pragmatic way than you may wish to project it as being capable of.
Additionally, you are very mistaken. A mind can be disected to the extent and in the very same way a brain can be disected. Also, the mind is very much a physical thing, and yet I am in no way surprized that there are so many people in the world who crave to postpone that far more accurately and useful a description of the workable part.
It is a fact, a pure and absolute fact, Fido, that if your amygdala calciumed up (meaning the re-uptake function somehow began to fail due to protein misfolding or the like), your mind would absolutely be changed, as well as your personality, your consciousness content, and the resultant behavioural patterns which had been present before calcification. The same thing would happen if your brain failed to take care of iron too...or even if your substantia nigra failed to put out dopamine any longer... I postitively guarntee you, there would be hardly a darn thing you could do about it that would not be due to physcial alterations of that physical organ which minds--in other words, the brain inside your cranium.
So, art form is fine, and worthwhile--I would never argue against, being a painter, woodworker, and a poet myself--but to make claims and assertions towards trying to attempt to identify the realities of the pragmatic world of which and in which we living organisms are, are simply not going to hold any water at all, unless they are firmly secured in down to earth realities.
Quote:The mind is very much a physical thing
What about the argument that the brain is like a tuner for mind, which exists in attenuated form, throughout the universe.
IN the case, the fact that damage to a part of the brain affects the mind, is due to creating difficulties in 'reception' (so to speak).
What is the argument for this view? That the predictable nature of the universe suggests a greater intelligence. You might think that a religious argument, but Einstein certainly accepted it.
I should explain my position a little more clearly. I don't believe God exists, because I believe that a transcendent being must by definition be beyond existence. Therefore I am going to try and avoid arguing for or against the existence of God in ID terms.
My personal outlook is that religious traditions represent, or signify, important truths. But I am not especially aligned with Biblical or evangelical Christianity.
I think theistic evolution is a perfectly defensible position. But I don't use ID-type arguments to argue for the fact that God exists, because I don't think God does exist. All I have said is that the predictable nature of the Universe suggests a greater intelligence, which is true.
And your closing phrase is either ironic, or blasphemous. I suspect the latter.
jeeprs wrote:
I think theistic evolution is a perfectly defensible position. But I don't use ID-type arguments to argue for the fact that God exists, because I don't think God does exist. All I have said is that the predictable nature of the Universe suggests a greater intelligence, which is true.
And your closing phrase is either ironic, or blasphemous. I suspect the latter.
Both.
I love the smell of bruised, religious sensibilities in the m0rning.
Some humans have spent several centuries and an ocean of misery climbing out of the swamp of pernicious ignorance that is religious superstition. Religious "explanations", alongside all other weak-minded, ideological short-cuts to the truth, are the enemies of reason.
That makes them my enemy.
Incidentally, regarding Einstein's views of God. . . But it also makes it perfectly clear that Einstein was not atheist.
You are saying that when the brain goes so goes the mind??? Well there is a piece of news!!!
The world I live in is not the pragmatic world, but the real world, . . .
As the record stands, it cannot be said in the stricter senses that Einstein was either atheist, or theist.
bruised religious sensibilities vs angry atheism. I would say they're remarkably similar, actually.
Einstein: ''There are people who . . . "Try and penetrate with our limited means the secrets of nature and you will find that
"It was, of course, a lie what you rad about my religious convictions, a lie which is being systematically repeated. I do not believe in a personal God and I have never denied this but have expressed it clearly. If something is in me which can be called religious then it is the unbounded admiration for the structure of the world so far as our science can reveal it."
"I am a deeply religious nonbeliever . . . This is a somewhat new kind of religion."
"I do not believe in immortality of the individual, and I consider ethics to be an exclusively human concern with no superhuman authority behind it."
"I have never imputed to Nature a purpose or a goal, or anything that could be understood as anthropomorphic. What I see in Nature is a magnificent structure that we can comprehend only very imperfectly, and that must fill a thinking person with a feeling of humility. This is a genuinely religious feeling that has nothing to do with mysticism." (notice that he capitalized the word 'nature' twice !)
"The finest emotion of which we are capable is the mystic emotion. Herein lies the gym of all art and true science. Anyone to whom this feeling is alein, who is no longer capaable of wonderment and lives in a state of fear is a dead man. To know that what is impenetrable for us really exists and manifests itself as the highest wisdom and the most radiant beauty, whose gross forms alone are intelligible to our poor faculties--this knowledge, this feeling . . . that is the core of the true religious sentiment. In this sense, and in this sense alone, I rank myself among profoundly religious men."
"The further the spiritual revolution of mankind advances, the more certain it seems to me that the path to genuine religiousity does not lie through the fear of life, and the fear of death, and blind faith, but through striving after rational knowledge."
I cannot then believe in this concept of an anthropomorphic God who has the powers of interfering with those of natural laws. As I said before (my note: see two quotes above), the most beautiful and most profound religious emotion that we can experience is the sensati0n of the mystical. And this mysticality is the power of all true science." (what we do find, is that his use of 'mystical' is more obviously based on the common English noun 'mystery'--meaning what is unknown, or unsure of, and not the theist-based religious belief system rooted mysticism of ancient eastern systems.)
"The mystical trend in our time, which shows itself particularly in the rampant growth of the so-called Theosophy and Spiritualism, is for me no more than a symptom of weakness and confusion. Since our inner experiences consist of reproductions, and combinations of sensory impressions, the concept of a soul without a body seems to me to be empty and devoid of meaning." (here, nevertheless, context demonstrates that he is using 'mystical' in their (those belief system's ways of usage) sense; not his)
"For science can only ascertain what is (sic), but not what should be (sic), and outside of its domain value judgements of all kinds remain necessary. Religion, on the other hand, deals only with evaluations of human thought and action: it cannot justifiably speak of facts and relationships between facts."
The finest emotion of which we are capable is the mystic emotion.
jeeprs wrote:
Einstein: ''There are people who . . . "Try and penetrate with our limited means the secrets of nature and you will find that
jeeprs, jeeprs . . . I really, really wish you hadn't done that; it's so petty. I'm sure that Einstein did not like it when folks quoted him to try to prove a point related to any god issue--in that he likely did not like tobe seen as one really talking about anything other than nature as seen through scientific method and the awe of what that is showing us (much less one talking of theology).
As I did point out, however, he did use the 'g' word a bit loosely. The quotes you have provided, have clearly been taken out of a larger context (not surprizing at all for Walter Isaacson's work) and I can but only take it that your having posted such quotes was an attempt to suggest that Einstein had a lean towards theistic-based religious system emotions (as that author was bent on doing). That is petty (besides, this thread has a clear enough topic and bearing...and why not try to stick with it a little better than the normal, run-of-the-mill internet forum?)
BUT, I feel that I have been a bit pushed to respond in like (this time) at the sake of even being petty myself but I do hope this will finish this, and we can get back to the real discussion, please !!!
Albert Einstein; March 24, 1954 (letter) -see Albert Einstein, the Human Side, Princeton University Press, 1981; p. 43- wrote:"It was, of course, a lie what you rad about my religious convictions, a lie which is being systematically repeated. I do not believe in a personal God and I have never denied this but have expressed it clearly. If something is in me which can be called religious then it is the unbounded admiration for the structure of the world so far as our science can reveal it."
Albert Einstein; Archieve 38~434; -see The expanded Quotable Einstein; p. 218- wrote:"I am a deeply religious nonbeliever . . . This is a somewhat new kind of religion."
Albert Einstein; -see Albert Einstien, the Human Side; p 39 wrote:"I do not believe in immortality of the individual, and I consider ethics to be an exclusively human concern with no superhuman authority behind it."
Albert Einstein; 1954 or 55 (letter)-see ibid; p 39- wrote:"I have never imputed to Nature a purpose or a goal, or anything that could be understood as anthropomorphic. What I see in Nature is a magnificent structure that we can comprehend only very imperfectly, and that must fill a thinking person with a feeling of humility. This is a genuinely religious feeling that has nothing to do with mysticism." (notice that he capitalized the word 'nature' twice !)
Albert Einstein; 1946 (letter)-see ibid.; p? wrote:"The finest emotion of which we are capable is the mystic emotion. Herein lies the gym of all art and true science. Anyone to whom this feeling is alein, who is no longer capaable of wonderment and lives in a state of fear is a dead man. To know that what is impenetrable for us really exists and manifests itself as the highest wisdom and the most radiant beauty, whose gross forms alone are intelligible to our poor faculties--this knowledge, this feeling . . . that is the core of the true religious sentiment. In this sense, and in this sense alone, I rank myself among profoundly religious men."
Albert Einstein; (from 1934 symposium on Science, Philosophy, and Religion; -see Out of My Later Years (Greenwood Press, 1970; pp29~30 wrote:"The further the spiritual revolution of mankind advances, the more certain it seems to me that the path to genuine religiousity does not lie through the fear of life, and the fear of death, and blind faith, but through striving after rational knowledge."
Albert Einstein; -see The Private Albert Einstein (Kansas City, 1992; p 86)" wrote:I cannot then believe in this concept of an anthropomorphic God who has the powers of interfering with those of natural laws. As I said before (my note: see two quotes above), the most beautiful and most profound religious emotion that we can experience is the sensati0n of the mystical. And this mysticality is the power of all true science." (what we do find, is that his use of 'mystical' is more obviously based on the common English noun 'mystery'--meaning what is unknown, or unsure of, and not the theist-based religious belief system rooted mysticism of ancient eastern systems.)
Albert Einstein; Feb. 5, 1921 (letter) -see Albert Einstein, the Human Side; p 40 wrote:"The mystical trend in our time, which shows itself particularly in the rampant growth of the so-called Theosophy and Spiritualism, is for me no more than a symptom of weakness and confusion. Since our inner experiences consist of reproductions, and combinations of sensory impressions, the concept of a soul without a body seems to me to be empty and devoid of meaning." (here, nevertheless, context demonstrates that he is using 'mystical' in their (those belief system's ways of usage) sense; not his)
And, to cap off what could yet go on a little:
Albert Einstein; -see Out of My Later Years; p 25 wrote:"For science can only ascertain what is (sic), but not what should be (sic), and outside of its domain value judgements of all kinds remain necessary. Religion, on the other hand, deals only with evaluations of human thought and action: it cannot justifiably speak of facts and relationships between facts."
Now, let's put that to rest then, along with matters more realted to arguments of theist-based religious belief system doctrine, and get back to the real meat of the topic and the arguments and facts of what can be determined, tested, and verified to be worthy of being called the more factual of natural reality...gentlemen, gentleladies, PLEASE !!
