God. Personal or impersonal ?

@Deckard,

Deckard;149490 wrote:

God like Spinoza's be idiosyncratic? Consider the number Pi. Isn't there something idiosyncratic about Pi? Or e? Or the Plank constant? Or the six numbers that shape the universe (see link)? Such things give even a pantheistic God "personality".

Six Numbers in Search of a Theory - September 27, 2006 - The New York Sun

These are excellent questions. Would Spinoza's God include each individual human, and therefore be a sort of blurred average of idiosyncrasies? Are idiosyncrasies describable by equations? Kojeve presents animals as falsely dynamic. Yes, they move, but their behavior is predictable, because it's structure doesn't change. Of course this is an overstatement, as evolution is still at work here and there, and environments change. Still, compared to humans, the animals are constants, whereas humans culturally evolve, and at an exponential pace(?).

Of course I also like the number question. At the moment it seems to me that the digits/magnitude of e (for instance) don't matter as much as the fact/definition that exponential function is its own derivative. (If I phrased that wrong, forgive me. I'm trying to re-educate my math-mind after 15 years of not using it, including learning calculus on my own...). And what about pi? Circumference / Diameter seems more important than the value involved. And yet I suppose in this spatial realm the two are inseparable. I'm still trying to figure out how they discovered the value of pi when a perfect/ideal/transcendental circle is involved. Obviously, they have, but it's amazing really. And then pi in radians is a straight line(180 degrees), That's quite poetic.

Does personality/idiosyncrasy require contrast? I think we are touching here upon accident and essence, which seems to me like the essence of thought in general. (Is man qua man essentially essence?) (Self-conscious logos?)

1 Reply

@jack phil,

jack;149997 wrote:

You cannot think a thought for me any more than you can wear a hat for me. We must avoid everything that smacks of high priests.

Why even high priests can be right at times??

1 Reply

@Elmud,

Elmud;49642 wrote:

Personally,I cannot conceive of an impersonal God or creator such as the God of Spinoza or perhaps Buddhism.That is my "personal" feeling on the matter. To disqualify any first impressions, I am not a believer in fundamentalism of any kind. Therefore, I am not trying to prove any point at all. I am just sort of curious about things.
Of course, to anyone out there who believes in the fortuitous nature of things, this topic would not apply.
Now that I have qualified the subject a little, here are my questions. To those who believe in a personal God, why would God care about you? To those who believe in an impersonal God, Why would God not care about you?

I believe that God offers each of us a very personal relationship with Him. It is up to each of us to choose how far we will let Him into our hearts and our lives. From the Hidden Words of Baha'u'llah:

"O SON OF MAN! I loved thy creation, hence I created thee. Wherefore, do thou love Me, that I may name thy name and fill thy soul with the spirit of life."

"O SON OF BEING! Love Me, that I may love thee. If thou lovest Me not, My love can in no wise reach thee. Know this, O servant."

"O SON OF MAN! Thou art My dominion and My dominion perisheth not; wherefore fearest thou thy perishing? Thou art My light and My light shall never be extinguished; why dost thou dread extinction? Thou art My glory and My glory fadeth not; thou art My robe and My robe shall never be outworn. Abide then in thy love for Me, that thou mayest find Me in the realm of glory."

"O SON OF SPIRIT! I created thee rich, why dost thou bring thyself down to poverty? Noble I made thee, wherewith dost thou abase thyself? Out of the essence of knowledge I gave thee being, why seekest thou enlightenment from anyone beside Me? Out of the clay of love I molded thee, how dost thou busy thyself with another? Turn thy sight unto thyself, that thou mayest find Me standing within thee, mighty, powerful and self-subsisting."

"O SON OF LIGHT! Forget all save Me and commune with My spirit. This is of the essence of My command, therefore turn unto it."

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@Reconstructo,

Reconstructo;150039 wrote:

Of course I also like the number question. At the moment it seems to me that the digits/magnitude of e (for instance) don't matter as much as the fact/definition that exponential function is its own derivative. (If I phrased that wrong, forgive me. I'm trying to re-educate my math-mind after 15 years of not using it, including learning calculus on my own...). And what about pi? Circumference / Diameter seems more important than the value involved. And yet I suppose in this spatial realm the two are inseparable. I'm still trying to figure out how they discovered the value of pi when a perfect/ideal/transcendental circle is involved. Obviously, they have, but it's amazing really. And then pi in radians is a straight line(180 degrees), That's quite poetic.

The five (and only five) Platonic regular solids will always amaze me. It is amazing that there is only five such solids possible in 3 dimensions. As compared to the infinite number of regular polygons in two dimensions which I take to be the analog. In 4 dimensions? In 5?...

The fact that there are only 4 is provable, not an accident, not idiosincratic. It is the result of characteristics of 3 dimensional space. But are those characteristics accidental? Perhaps even A=A is accidental, idiosyncratic...a facet of the universes personality...or perhaps following Kant...a idiosyncratic facet of how humanity conditions the universe...can a collective (e.g. the human race) have a personality?

1 Reply

@Alan McDougall,

Alan McDougall;150122 wrote:

Why even high priests can be right at times??

Even a broken clock is right twice a day.

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@Deckard,

Deckard;150149 wrote:

The five (and only five) Platonic regular solids will always amaze me. It is amazing that there is only five such solids possible in 3 dimensions. As compared to the infinite number of regular polygons in two dimensions which I take to be the analog. In 4 dimensions? In 5?...

The fact that there are only 4 is provable, not an accident, not idiosincratic. It is the result of characteristics of 3 dimensional space. But are those characteristics accidental? Perhaps even A=A is accidental, idiosyncratic...a facet of the universes personality...or perhaps following Kant...a idiosyncratic facet of how humanity conditions the universe...can a collective (e.g. the human race) have a personality?

TO answer your last question, yes. And I think the solids you mention are one proof of this, and Jungian archetypes are at least evidence in this direction. I also find it amazing. Absolutely. Exactly what you mentioned. I just read G.H. Hardy's famous book, and he persuaded me more toward numbers-are-real. Because 317 is a prime. It just is. No matter if we want it to be or not. So this is something like Spinoza? Pythagoras? Plato?

The deeper I read into math, the more I care about this higher idiosyncrasy, and the less I care about my contingent vessel (except the vessel is the stem that makes the flower possible, to use an awkward but accurate(?) metaphor.)

Yes the A=A is crucial. I agree. That even this essentially identity is conceivable accidental. Which ties on to Rorty liking Heidegger for his making the contingent visible as contingent. Why this world, with its spatial laws and its particular primes, and not another? Why this color spectrum? We can conceive but not imagine colors that do not exist for humans. We see only a tiny part of the electromagnetic spectrum. I like the sci-fi fantasy (at least as old as Voltaire) of beings with 9 or 11 senses. It pushes the mind, doesn't it? It's both beautiful and reasonable. (science and religion sublated...) or we can just say that Science/gnosis is its own reward. or to be both cliche and true (?) virtue is knowledge, as knowledge makes one friendly, social, and efficient? but i digress

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@Elmud,

I keep thinking about that point, Deckard. It is passing strange. And to take the basic structure as contingent is quite a poetic leap.

1 Reply

@Elmud,

Think of God as more of a sustainer or source of your existence instead of something that wants to interfere or intervene.

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@Elmud,

My theory.

The person is created just like God. If wish to learn that there is God - learn psychology. The person is similar to the person of God. The person is steady and continuous communication of electric, chemical and information interactions between clusters of neurons. It is the physiological nature of consciousness. The civilisation is steady free interaction of the most active and creative people. The civilisation is Consciousness of mankind. God is constant creative interaction of the most advanced civilisations of the Universe. They as Bees, but possess super reason and the Person.
Not developed worlds (Earth) it is subconsciousness.
The basic worlds are Reason and the Person.

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@Elmud,

Elmud;49642 wrote:

To those who believe in a personal God, why would God care about you?

if god is omnipotent, he will not have a followers, everything will follow him,but because he have a followers, then he is not omnipotent, he just take advantage on it.

because god take advantage on its followers
his followers also take advantage on him

they do what the god favors to them
god do what his followers favors to him

Elmud;49642 wrote:

To those who believe in an impersonal God, Why would God not care about you?

all is god
all is nature
humans are nature
then humans are part of god
all is one body
and that is god

every body parts has his own job
just like the heart cannot do the liver's job
the liver cannot do the stomach's job
so every part cannot do others job
but they can help others

but doing their own job helps the other
so every part has his own job

if one benefits, the others also benefits
if one does not benefit, the others also does not benefit

human have their own job
nature have their own job
fires have their own job
waters have their own job
but all of this is are jobs of god
because all is god

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@Reconstructo,

Reconstructo;151098 wrote:

I keep thinking about that point, Deckard. It is passing strange. And to take the basic structure as contingent is quite a poetic leap.

Did Kant make this leap? Seems the basic structure is phenomenal and the phenomenal contingent. You were saying it was Heidegger's return to "Why is there something rather than nothing?"? It is, but did it have to be?

Perhaps Hegel (I won't lump all the German idealists together) just didn't have the stomach for this contingency and that is what drove him towards necessity even if it wasn't completely justified. Not so much that that the real was rationality but that the real was necessary down to the very fact that it is. It had to be this way! But more than anything it had to BE! Or else all is contingent even the fact that there is anything at all. Can we maybe convince ourselves that we know this through intuition, that it is self-evident etc.

I remember someone defining the poetic as that which finds the universal in the particular.

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@Eljah,

Eljah;149486 wrote:

there is nothing so funny about what i said. My point is rocksolid, and based on common scientific knowledge.

You have to deal with the Big Bang theory, since it is one of the most solid theories, and around over 80 years. According to it, everything was created through the Big Bang, energy as well.

According to the standard theory, our universe sprang into existence as "singularity" around 13.7 billion years ago. What is a "singularity" and where does it come from? Well, to be honest, we don't know for sure.
According to their calculations, time and space had a finite beginning that corresponded to the origin of matter and energy."3 The singularity didn't appear in space; rather, space began inside of the singularity. Prior to the singularity, nothing existed, not space, time, matter, or energy - nothing. So where and in what did the singularity appear if not in space? We don't know. We don't know where it came from, why it's here, or even where it is. All we really know is that we are inside of it and at one time it didn't exist and neither did we.

Well that's just the thing. There is no consensus that the singularity came into existence. There is absolutely nothing that states the singularity couldn't have always existed. I say that matter and energy was not created, not in a singularity, not from nothing. I say that the universe has undergone a formation and reformation endlessly. It upholds to the laws of physics and thermodynamics. Your notion actually defies the first law.

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God. Personal or impersonal ?

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