Israel,

I did read your essay and went back and reviewed it. As you say, the situation is overwhelmingly complex when we start considering all the actual details. A big part of the reason why I like discussing physics, rather than history, politics, sociology, etc. The secret seems to be to find the patterns and processes within all those details. For one thing, we really are not looking for stability as an overall state. There has to be inherent ebb and flow. It is just when it gets out of the acceptable and manageable ranges and those vary, according to perspective. Otherwise stability eventually leads to stagnation and then disruption, as that stable state decays.

As for science and religion, they actually evolved as two sides of the same coin. When you go back to the ancients, it was a matter of both describing natural order and explaining it. This description became mathematics and science. Think cosmology. Meanwhile religion grew out of the entirely natural impulse to explain this order as intentional and assign personality to these natural forces. Beauty, anger, fear, ego, attraction eroticism etc. can all find, with a little imagination, parallels in the natural order of things. The premise of monotheism is essentially knowledge and wisdom as a form of platonic ideal. Given the inherent dynamic of intellectualism is to distill signals from the noise, this reductionism is a logical progression. Christianity is actually a bit of a step back, with the concept of the trinity, to the inescapable complexities. Essentially it is a personification of past/father, present/son and future/holy ghost, since it grew out of a schism in Judaism and so the son was projected as a renewal, but after suffering centuries of persecution, hope for the future became its selling point to those who where persecuted, which is a big audience.

Islam was actually a much more politically successful movement for its first seven hundred years (and largely coasted for the next six hundred), compared to Christianity and as such, was able to project a more monolithic vision and only in the last hundred years, have the downsides of this, in its lack of conceptual diversity and thus social inertia, come home to roost.

We are taught good and bad are some cosmic conflict between the forces of righteousness and evil, but they are in fact the biological binary code of attraction to the beneficial and repulsion of the detrimental. What is good for the fox, is bad for the chicken and there is no clear line where the chicken ends and the fox begins. Between black and white are not only shades of grey, but all the other colors of the spectrum.

What might be good for the individual, expansion and reproduction, might be bad for the group, if it uses up all the resources, so like any computation, the factors are many. The fact is that reality is bottom up and we only see it top down from our particular limited point of view.

So analyzing religion really must be part of any full scale review of humanity and its options, since it functions as the core and vision of societies.

As for our immediate situation, I just wrote a comment on Don Limuti's entry, which I think lays out the immediate situation and where to go from here. I've given this topic a fair amount of thought over the years, but tend to have trouble finding forums willing to discuss it in real depth, so I don't get a lot of feedback. Since I submitted my entry with the very first batch, I have been getting enough feedback to think it through even more, so this comment reflects that slightly more complex view. I'll post it here anyway;

"Don,

A spot on and logically focused article. I've been castigating various entrants for their 'out in space' entries and so it is nice to have such a well centered and reasonable one. I think though, that the possibility exists to be far more radical than you might think possible. Significant change is only possible when the old order breaks down, but right now the current status quo is coalescing in upon itself and only re-enforcing its own increasingly disfunctional methods. So all the various sectors of society mostly seek to hold onto what they have and further antagonize other parts of society. In this situation, even your reasonable proposals would meet considerable resistance from those who are more focused on holding onto what they have, than gambling on a better outcome.

The result would normally be a state of slow stagnation and increasingly stratified and compartmentalized future society. Yet I think that the monumental nature of these issues provides a potential relief.

The enormous tumor of financial excess can only keep growing at this exponential rate and will blow up when it reaches some totally unsustainable level. The result will be the equivalent of a massive heart attack on society, as the economic circulation system siezes up. While this will be potentially catastrophic in some quarters, it is not as though monetary regimes haven't collapsed before and had forms of local exchange rise in their place.

My proposal is that we begin treating money as the contract which it is, rather than the commodity we have been led to believe it is. While this might seem a minor conceptual issue, it has the potential to change the paradigm by which society functions.

Any society above a few hundred people needs a medium of exchange. If there is not some readily available commodity with universal applications, such as gold, silver, salt, grain, etc. then a debt based monetary system is quite effective. Yet we forget it is essentially a form of public utility and social contract, not private property. We no more own those bills in our pockets, than we own the section of road we happen to be driving on, yet it is very much in the interest of those controlling this system for us to believe that it is personal property, much as it is in the fisherman's interest for the fish to think that worm belongs to it. This way, every aspect of exchange becomes denominated in this medium and everyone wants as much as possible, further empowering those controlling it.

Money functions like blood in the economy and as such it needs to keep flowing. Since everyone wishes to obtain as much as possible, this naturally creates excess. If we simply take it out of circulation and store it, it means more must be issued and then there becomes more than necessary, so that if the value started to go down, people would try dumping these stores, further decreasing the value.

Otherwise it must be invested, ie. loaned to someone else who can effectively spend it in ways to make even more and then pay off the debt and still earn enough to make the effort worthwhile. The fact is there are far fewer of these opportunities, then there is money seeking worthwhile investments.

This then leads to various unsustainable feedback loops, such as that once speculative investing, ie. greater fool systems, start, it can quickly become possible that money can be borrowed into existence cheaper than these bubbles grow and thus building on theselves, as is currently happening in much of the investment world

There is also the need to create ever more debt to feed the production of this capital and so lending standards fall. Not to mention the innumerable ways further leverage is added.

Now if people wish to gamble, this should be perfectly legal, with the understanding that it is gambling, not disguised as safe investment.

So in reality money is a form of debt. One person's asset is another person's obligation. When those with large piles of these surplus bills gain functional control over the government, then they can effectively have the government, ie. the public, buy this notational wealth as public debt and so sustain its value, since the public is required to pay it back, with interest. Then this money has to be spent and often it is in ways which further enrich those in control.

Now if we were to begin to understand that money functions as a necessary social contract and we don't actually own it, then most people will start to be far more careful how much they are willing to pull value out of personal and social relations, as well as environmental resources. This would then make the community and the environment natural stores of wealth, not just resources to be mined for value, in order to compete and gamble in the financial system.

Since stores of currency would be recognized as potentially unhealthy to the system, methods would be devised to reduce them. Most people store wealth for such needs as elder and youth care, education, housing and other large expenses. Now if we started storing value within our communities and relations, the normal, organic systems of exchange and reciprocity would emerge. We would start caring for the old folks and kids like nature intended, as part of life, not just services bought and sold. Much of primary education could also naturally fall into this system and more naturally integrated systems of secondary eduction might evolve as well. Then there could be forms of mutual building societies, much as the Amish do.

This is not to say a normal and extensive monetary, or even various overlapping monetary ststems wouldn't still function, but they would be built with full understandings of how they best function and for more liquid forms of exchange. Then local public banks would use their profits to fund services and projects within the communities that produced those profits. They would then serve as shareholders in regional systems, in a bottom up system.

Much as the body has both a heart and a head, society would naturally keep this function of circulation of wealth somewhat distinct from its public management, as a natural distribution and separation of power.

So this is how I think humanity should be steered; When this current financial system does break down, which seems imminent, but has been for a few decades, but they keep patching with ever more public debt and the resulting surplus credit, we simply have to open our eyes and understand this stuff called money is not, in and of itself, a form of commodity, but a contract which a community is making with its members and those caught abusing this system will naturally have their benefits penalized, not be allowed to profit from this abuse.

We need to educate people how it all works!!!!

Regards,

John Merryman

I

John,

Time grows short so I'm revisiting and rating. Your response to my questions before: "We really won't know what will rise from the rubble, but I'm naturally optimistic. As I point out, the larger issue is that the earth's resources can't sustain the current economy indefinitely, so having what amounts to a self induced heart attack will be a serious monkey wrench in that process and who knows how it ends up."

My essay has a solution of "looking beyond" -- to dark skies and sustainable actions and "looking within" to a mind that is a microcosm of our universe, using it for transforming actions. I still wonder if we have doomed our world's environment, something that will hamper real recovery.

Jim

    Jim,

    Nature is constantly building up and tearing down. We are seriously disrupting the biosphere, but even a cleared stage eventually is creating opportunities for whatever has the capacity to fill it. At the very least, it will be an interesting few decades.

    Regards,

    John

    Thanks again for reviewing my essay, John. I'll be rating yours (along with the others on my review list) some time between now and May 30. All the best, and bye for now, - Mike

    Hi John,

    I am suspicious that philosophy may be outlawed in the FQXi contests, we may be forced back into sinning (in the essays) so that grace may abound..... heaven forbid!

    Good to see you in another contest.

    Wishing you the best,

    Don Limuti

    Hi John,

    Appreciate your links to state public banking and to Ellen Brown.

    I was in the process of replying when you post just disappeared !?!?

    The post was reply to a Jonathan D. post I made.

    The links were very informative and appreciated.

    Could you post again?

    Don L.

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    • Post #130

    Dear John,

    My attempt to extract convincing arguments from your essay was not very successful. Why did you not give an abstract? What the heck means hack human history?

    Your musing around philosophy might be appealing to many who share your half-digested questions how to cope with their personal perspective. You are focusing on money and you predict a belonging catastrophe. I agreed with you on that money is not a commodity. I should also agree on that money is said ruling the world. Should I invest money in India after the election was won by Modi? Hm.

    My wife asked me what does oligarchy mean. My dictionary told me: a small group of people who control and run a particular country or organization. India could definitely be a huge market. However, it suffers from lack of true democracy in the sense that most people (the demos) are utterly poor while those oligarchs of India who live in London are incredibly rich. Most people I know in Europe are neither very poor nor very rich. The oligarchs will perhaps try and prevent both a new worldwide war and the worldwide collapse of the monetary system that you seem to envision. Discoveries, inventions, and other contributions to progress will perhaps prove stronger than military or monetary maneuvers. Modi was almost an underdog. He might or might not achieve a lot. However, I see India's problem rather than its strength its young and still growing poor population. They will like to live as do we and as Modi promised to them.

      Anon,

      The contest question was a bit broad and so the idea of packing everything into 9 pages isn't possible, thus the reference to the essay being the abstract. Unfortunately one of the areas left on the cutting room floor was the impact of these points on Indian politics, especially those which occurred after the essay was submitted.

      As for oligarchies, it is also difficult to explain political form in such a short piece, so I did stick to abstractions, such as energy/the dynamic and information/the form. Necessarily oligarchy is a form, so your questions might possibly pertain to the historical dynamic by which it came to be and the potential dynamics by which it might be disrupted. Now this might not necessarily be a good thing, given the tendency for established social orders to crumble when disrupted, rather than quickly assume a more ideal form.

      I prefer to stick to physical abstractions and not have to explain all their potential manifestations, as the result tends toward clutter, rather than clarity, even if not everyone is able to think abstractly and apply it to their personal situation. Have you had similar reactions to many of the other entries? This is more of a physics forum, than a strictly political one.

      Regards,

      John

      Dear John

      Thanks for your reply. You almost wrote another essay. I have some minor disagreements on some of your points. That I would like to make some comments.

      You: stability as an overall state... Otherwise stability eventually leads to stagnation and then disruption, as that stable state decays.

      In my opinion, stability does not necessarily imply lack of movement, progress or stagnation. This would depend on the collective goals a nation or group of nations have.

      You: As for science and religion, they actually evolved as two sides of the same coin. When you go back to the ancients, it was a matter of both describing natural order and explaining it.

      Strictly speaking science was born with the work of Newton in 1687. Before Newton there were philosophical doctrines, mathematics, natural philosophy, etc. but not science because there was no model of doing science. So, at that time we had philosophy and religion as two ways to approach the truth. There is a debate whether religion is some kind of philosophy or philosophy some kind of religion. Some have tried to claim that because science is a descendent of philosophy it is some sort of religion. I see religion, science or philosophy just as ways of perceiving life. Moreover, science and religion have opposite principles.

      With respect to the money issue, I don't consider myself an expert in economy. It is evident that you have given a deep thought on that topic and I'm afraid I cannot not offer much valuable feedback. However, I think that your idea is quite good and sound. So, I would like to make some comments.

      You: Significant change is only possible when the old order breaks down... and ...

      The enormous tumor of financial excess can only keep growing at this exponential rate and will blow up when it reaches some totally unsustainable level...

      This reminds me of the book written by Thomas Khun, on the structure of scientific revolutions. He argues that science is done in several stages. The stage that corresponds to normal science, which is a STABILITY stage, where most scientists work happily following certain principles, where theories are tested and confronted with experiments. Then, as time goes by anomalies start to appear that challenge the establishment. This stage marks the set for the development of new and fresh ideas. Then, more and more experimental and theoretical evidence piles up that demands radical changes and set the landscape for a new revolution. As the pressure on the orthodoxy increases, those maintaining the status quo hold and resist as much as possible until new and bold people put forward a new theory. The next stage is the revolution in which there is competition to introduce the new theories and ideas. In the final stage the new theory is accepted. Then the cycle repeats again.

      I think, the case is similar in any revolution scientific, economical, social or whatnot. And now I think we are not close to a revolution of this kind (may be close to world war). Indeed, I think elements are emerging and piling up, but I do not think the economical system will collapse in the following 50 years or so. Although I agree with you that those who have the economic control can steer the future. But I don't think they will be happy with the restrictions you are suggesting. I agree however that we should be informed of how money is handled.

      Good luck in the contest!

      Best Regards

      Israel

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      • Post #133

      Israel,

      Thanks for the reply.

      I'm not saying stability doesn't exist in the first place, but that it functions in an inherently dynamic context. You might say life is a bit like riding a bicycle. Either you keep moving forward, or you fall over.

      Yes, I certainly agree with your points about the relation between science and religion, but they more clarify my basic argument, than refute it. Yes, they do serve different functions, which is what I said. One seeks to describe the order of reality and the other seeks to explain it. And so as science gets ever more effective at both describing and explaining reality, it seemingly pushes against the realm of religion, but as the old saying goes, the more you know, the more you know you don't know. So now science, specifically physics, is starting to make up lots of explanations, from string theory, to multiverses, to explain all it finds it doesn't know and thus commits the errors of presumption for which religion found itself accused of.

      As for that cycle of speculation and consolidation, it pretty much describes many of the processes in life. As I keep arguing, time and temperature are essentially frequency and amplitude and the two hemispheres of our brains are effectively a thermostat and a clock. The left linear side seems rational, because we can follow that causal chain of sequential events, but the non-linear, emotional, intuitive, right side functions as just such a scalar mechanism, of expansion and then consolidation around the perceived results that are distilled from this larger grouping, be it anything from the insight of a connection not otherwise perceived, or anger and stress from too much information and pressure, causing the 'pot to boil.'

      Scientific American recently ran an article on how speculative bubbles are fundamental to the economic process. Though they were far more circumspect about how they described it, rather that Ponzi schemes emerge naturally and not just as confidence games.

      I also posted a continuing rant on the subject of the financial situation, over on the contest thread.

      Thanks!

      Regards,

      John

      John,

      Perhaps a financial collapse is natural with little or no regulation when the Clinton administration lead efforts to rid us of the Glass-Steagall Act. It assured stability for some 65 years.

      Time grows short, so I am revisited those I've read to assure I've rated them. I find that I rated yours on 5/20. Hope you enjoyed mine.

      Jim

      Dear John

      You: I'm not saying stability doesn't exist in the first place, but that it functions in an inherently dynamic context.

      I agree.

      You: One seeks to describe the order of reality and the other seeks to explain it.

      About more than 20 centuries ago religion and philosophy used to seek the truth. Although science continues with this line, I would not say that religion is about truth. Religion has been relegated to cover spiritual aspects of life but no longer truth. As I said, these two are incompatible.

      You: ...to explain all it finds it doesn't know and thus commits the errors of presumption for which religion found itself accused of.

      You're probably right. In some sense science is behaving as religion.

      The article you cite seems to be interesting. As far as know the Ponzi scheme is fraudulent.

      Israel

      Thanks, Jim.

      That was a major fracture in the banking framework, but it was one in a series. Given the purpose of capitalism has degenerated to the point of merely producing capital, at the expense of virtually every other facet of society, the force of this notational value has burst all bonds.

      Regards,

      John

      PS, Either it doesn't look like I developed my argument very clearly, or a fair number of other entrants don't agree.

      Israel,

      In the grand scheme of things, a few millennia is not such a long time. Monotheism is an extremely powerful concept and fulfills a lot of emotional, social and civil needs. As we have all come to realize, logic comes in a distant second to emotion. It's an ideal and who really wants that bubble popped.

      Truth is the way it is. Answers are what people will pay to hear. Philosophers seek truths, while priests and politicians provide answers. That is why far more people can make a living as priests and politicians, than can as philosophers.

      Regards,

      John

      Hi John,

      Your essay points out that "money is representative of a social contract and as such is a form of public utility" and it shouldn't be treated as a commodity. And I agree that money is not just a token that represents potential exchange for potential goods and services and commodities: money is like a social contract where society agrees that this is so. But as you say: "those running the financial system have lost sight of their larger role". They have a public trust and they need to see beyond their self-interest because "contracts and promises are only as valuable as the integrity of the system on which they are based."

      As you imply, the community and the environment etc. ARE the true wealth, they are where actual value resides. I think that you are right that the disengagement of money-tokens from what they actually represent must lead to the destruction of actual value in the community and the environment.

      Re community banks: the issue of community oversight of what is happening (e.g. in government and banks) will never go away. We can never write a computer program to plug all the potential loopholes and solve all our oversight problems. Because our lives are so complex and busy, we have to sometimes trust that the other person is doing "the right thing", and our trust is often abused.

      I think you are right to remind us that we must deal with these money issues as we attempt to "steer the future".

      Cheers,

      Lorraine

        Lorraine,

        Thanks!

        This contest has been a bit of an eye opener. Usually I discuss these sorts of ideas on economic and social forums, where there is a much higher level of interest. I guess FQXI appeals to a section of the population not engrossed in community issues.

        I thought though that trying to relate a physical description of reality to the way abstract wealth extraction compounds environmentally and socially destructive tendencies would get more interest and there would be more entries focused on what seems to me a very significant aspect of modern life.

        I suppose I should have developed it more, but I know how hard it is for most people to digest many of these entries, so I edited it as much as possible.

        That said, there have been some interesting exchanges and feedback. I did have my hopes up to reach the finalists there for a while, but the reality is another year in the also rans.

        I suspect though that we are going to have another significant financial earthquake soon, possibly by this fall, so I'm sure I'll be discussing these issues on other venues.

        I can't boost your score more, since we can only vote for each once and I enjoyed giving you that ten to put you up on top for a few days, early in the contest.

        Regards,

        John

        Dear John,

        I am sorry that it has taken me so long to get back to you. Several things came up that required my attention, but at the moment I am back.

        I am trying to understand your point of view, but you are right that I have apparently jumped to some conclusions that appear to not be accurate based on some of the things that you said. Let me start from the beginning with those things that seem the most clear to me about your point of view and you can correct me if I am wrong in any of them.

        1. It appears that you believe that God exists.

        2. It seems that you believe that he is so great in comparison to us that we have no hope of ever comprehending and understanding him.

        3. You come from a Christian background and you seem to like and possibly accept some parts of the scriptures because you say that you like the trinity concept that is presented there.

        4. One place that I apparently made an error is that I assumed (based on item 3 above) that you believe the scriptures to be God's communication to man telling us about him, his creation, and how we fit into it all. It now appears to me that you don't believe the scriptures to be God's word because you say that you do not accept the concept of a top down paternal deity when it is clear in the scriptures that God desires us to consider him to be our Father. As an example, when the disciples asked Jesus how they should pray he told them to start their prayer with "Our Father which art in heaven". You appear to believe that the scriptures were just made by men with the purpose of controlling other men to get them to do what they want them to do. If that is your belief, I can understand it because when I was an agnostic I came to the conclusion that I would not be able to determine whether or not the scriptures are actually God's communication to man. That is probably the main reason that I did not read them during that 22 year period when I was trying to determine if God existed or not. Instead I looked for indications of his existence in the structure of the world through science. In the beginning the prevalent established scientific concepts seemed to support the belief that God did not exist, but over time they gave way to other prevailing scientific concepts that made the alternative possibilities less and less likely and the existence of God more and more likely. When I received scientific information that no man on this planet knows about, much about the structure of the universe became apparent to me. Like most in such circumstances I began to think that I was really great to have come to understand so much that others had not been able to accomplish. I did not consider that I was just being prepared by God to be able to see that the scriptures could not have been made by men, because it contained this information that man still did not know and certainly could not have known 2000 years ago when they were written. Because the evidence that has been provided to me that the scriptures are God's purposeful communication to us about him, his creation, and our place in all of it is so great, I can no longer reasonably deny or even doubt it. I, therefore, must accept all of it to be God's message to me, so if he says in it that he desires me to call him my Father because he has adopted me to be one of his sons, I rejoice in that he loves me enough to be that way with me and not me only, but all that are his. I do not worry about him being over me in a top down relationship because as my creator and because he is so much greater than me, he deserves that position and I trust him to not mistreat me, but to use that position to work all things for my good as he promises to do.

        5. It appears to me that you have not found such things in the scriptures that would convince you that they are truly God's word. If you believe that God does exist and is great beyond our comprehension, do you believe that we are just something that he happened to make for no real purpose or that he just doesn't desire for us to know our purpose in his creation? Of course, you could believe that he has shown to us his purpose for making us in some other way in the creation. If that is the case, how do you believe he has done that and what do you believe our purpose is? That is about as far as I can go without more information from you so I will close for now.

        Sincerely,

        Paul B.

          Paul,

          You really are making a genuine and sincere effort to understand my point of view and for that I commend you. Yet the reason you don't fully understand or accept it is part of what I'm trying to explain. Since it doesn't relate to the frame you are working from, it is as though I'm simply speaking another language, or a branch of math you haven't studied.

          Consider the concepts of objective versus subjective. Now me sitting here typing, while the coffee is brewing, is my personal subjective experience. While the equation E=mc2 is a largely objective observation. Yet while my situation is specific to my reality, it is very detailed, but the formulation of relativity is very general. It is like a very focused picture of a particular scene, versus a white sheet of paper. Consider this in terms of a camera taking a picture. If you want that detailed picture, you have to specify shutter speed, aperture, focus, lighting, distance, direction, angle, lenses, etc. Otherwise it isn't what you want. For instance, simply leaving the shutter open too long and too much light gets in and you have a white sheet of paper!!! That is because you have too much energy and to much information being carried by that energy onto the surface of your film. So that is the reality of the objective perspective. All that information balances out and so cancels all the detail, while the subjective perspective is fundamentally dependent on the particular frame required.

          So now consider this in terms of how a movie is shown, with the projector light shining through the film. You might say my conception of that essential sense of awareness is like the light shining through the film, while you and I and all living creatures are basically images on that film. Now obviously this would be a far more involved and interactive process, with that light/consciousness pushing and motivating all the different life forms according to all the subjective particulars of their different existences. Sometimes these life forms are bumping into each other like they are just material objects in the world and sometimes that life force is flowing through them together, like they are all one being.

          A large part of the reason we have trouble sensing this level of reality is that as complex thinking, essentially predatory creatures, is that we associate thought and awareness with concentration and focus. While this process is very effective at distilling preferred signals from the noise and such useful points of observation and value out of all that goes on around us, it also destroys much of the subtle connectivity which is the life force tying everything together. You might say that while the spotlight of our concentration is very good for illuminating what we are looking at, it consequently obscures all the contextual connections which really make sense of it.

          Now consider the idea of oneness, versus one, or unity versus unit. When things are connected, they are unified, but when one object is distinct from all its surroundings then it is a unit. The first is a network, while the second is a node. The problem is that we often mistake the two. For instance, the idea of God handed down to us, is that it is a unit. One entity distinct from everything else. So we put it up in heaven, or on a pedestal. Yet when those ancients were first considering the idea, given they were far more organically imbedded in nature, it seems likely the original concept was that everything is connected. That all those various deities and spirits and natural forces and the order seemingly running through it all, were connected in one bigger reality. A network.

          Now what happens when you take that sense of connectivity and filter it through several thousand years of human experience, needs, desires, interpretations, etc. Than that it becomes this singular father figure watching over us would be a logical result.

          The problem is that different people go through different situations and so emphasize different aspects and interpretations of what they perceive. For instance, the early Jews needed a sense of collective unity to survive and keep together through all the hardships they were enduring, so what had been in the earlier Egyptian conception of wholeness and unity, of the sun shining down, not just as a object in the sky, but a source of light and heat, raising up life, became focused as much more of a tribal deity, watching over this particular band of people and guiding them. By the time Jesus came along, this had hardened into a bureaucratic structure, with little concern for the basic cares and feelings for individuals. So by proposing a rebirth, he was making a very naturalistic argument, since the old pantheistic religions had traditions of year Gods, that died and were reborn. The problem was this didn't exactly fit with the idea of one God and yet some form of cycling had to be included in an understanding of nature. Since Jesus was no more and his movement was persecuted, the promise then became to look tot he future, which for many downtrodden people, is a powerful message and so the image of the Holy Ghost arose as that light shining through and giving hope for a better, stronger, healthier future. So you have the cyclical God encased in a singular entity.

          Islam actually proposes a far more defined and universal monotheism and since it was phenomenally politically and socially successful for seven hundred years and largely coasted on that success for the next six hundred years, it is only in the last hundred years in which the down side of such a monolithic belief system came home to roost, as it tries to compete with the technologically advanced and socially flexible west.

          So it is not as though those people three thousand years ago were not having brilliant insights, motivated by their self awareness and wonder of the universe opening before them, but what today you have of that perception is a very edited account that bears faint resemblance to the reality in which they lived and much to do with the needs of the many generations which managed to add additional insights, political desires, social needs, etc. to that collection of writings. Now I can understand why you view this source as a guidepost in life, as certainly many people do, but do you think that had you been raised in an Islamic culture, Jewish, or Hindu, or Buddhist, that you would have still gravitated to the Christian explanation of the universe? Now I expect you to consciously believe that you would, but that would mean you would have to ignore all those profound social and cultural ties to whatever society you were a member of and it is those which give a religion its real strength, not just the particular stories it tells and morals it tries to convey. That light shining through the people and life around you, is more important to your health and wellbeing than any words in any book.

          So it is not that this spiritual essence is incomprehensible, but that it is profoundly elemental and not that it does not care for us, as we are its expression. It is just not an ideal, which are simply preferential qualities from our point of view. It is like light without any filters, yet we are a filter.

          Regards,

          John

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          • Post #142

          Dear John,

          Thank you for your more detailed description of your beliefs concerning God. I think that you somewhat underestimate me. I just needed adequate information to understand your point of view. This is because I have found that there are many different definitions that are applied to the same words and phrases by different men. If someone says that he believes in God the most prevalent definitions would mean belief in a being that would be worthy to be worshiped or served, generally with the belief that God would at least in some way relate positively in some way back to the person that worships him or at least would be less likely to treat him negatively. Generally a belief that God is only the sum of all the myths that men have made up about God to comfort themselves or to have less fear in times of trouble, etc. would not be considered a belief in God by most people. This belief would generally be considered more a part of atheist religion (belief that there is no true God) as part of its doctrine to explain away why so many people all around the world believe in the existence of God as some form of being.

          I can understand that concept because as I mentioned we both have similar backgrounds in some ways. We were both brought up in more or less Christian homes to some degree. I believe yours may have actually been more so than mine because I was brought up in that environment until my parents were divorced when I was about 10 years old. That environment pretty much ended at about that time and was after that mostly a neutral environment without much family influence in either direction. Of course, over time I did discuss the subject with some who believed in God and some who did not believe in him, but I found their arguments lacking on both sides both in detail and in logical reasoning. During those 22 years that I was searching to see if there was adequate evidence to come to a conclusion as to whether God existed or not I was mostly informed by scientific observation, both of my own and that of others. I also saw that there were many different religions both in the past and also in the present that portrayed God in vastly different ways. It became apparent to me that at most only one of these religions could be true and it was possible, of course that none of them were true. At the same time the fact that so many different people believed in God in one way or another as a living being suggested that either man had needs that he could not meet and was falling back on that belief for comfort, etc. or that God really does exist and made man to have a relationship with him, which caused man to try to fill that relationship need that had been built into man's structure with a belief in him even when they could not have the true relationship with him. The fact that a large number of men would have to be in the group that did not have a true relationship with him in order to allow for the creation of all of the false religions and all of their followers meant that the way of obtaining the true relationship with God would have to be restricted by conditions that would exclude most people from obtaining that relationship. The other possibility was that they all were wrong and God did not exist at all. I found that both of these possibilities existed, but I did not have adequate evidence to determine which was true, so I withheld judgment and continued to look for more evidence as to whether God did exist or not. It appears to me that you came to the conclusion that God does not actually exist as an intelligent being who created the world or even as a living being at all. If I am right about that, how did you come to this conclusion? What evidence did you see that convinced you that God does not exist as a real living being? Whether God really does exist as the creator of the world who has chosen to communicate with us to tell us about him, his creation, and our purpose in it in the scriptures or not is the important understanding to gain because if he does, although all of the things that you mention in your reasoning about why each of the gods were believed to be as they were might apply to all of the others, the things recorded in the scriptures are as they are because they actually tell us about how God actually is, how his creation actually works, and what his purpose for us actually is, etc. We should, therefore, first look at the evidence for and against God's existence as a living being who created the world, etc. I have already provided to you some of the evidence that has convinced me that God does exist as a living being as mentioned above, so I will wait for your evidence to the contrary before I go any farther.

          I see that you have a real and strong aversion to the concept of top down authority. Did something happen in your life associated with this type of authority to make you believe this way? You did mention that you rebelled in your earlier years. Did that and the results of it have anything to do with the establishment of that belief or was it based more on external observations, etc.? I have found that top down authority is built into the structure of the world and can be a great positive influence when used properly, of course, like most other things it can be used wrongly to create negative results. As an example, when we are born into this world we all experience the top down authority relationship with our parents. Because at birth we are all completely helpless none of us would survive for very long without this relationship. As we grow and begin to be able to interact with the external world, we would not likely survive long without obeying the top down authority commands of our parents to not play in the street and not get into a car with a stranger, etc. Even though we do not yet have an adequate understanding of how the world works to justify it, it is common around the age of 12 to 14 years old to begin to have a strong desire to be free to do what we want to do in the world. At the same time we are driven by hormones as a result of puberty to fulfill desires that can easily result in very detrimental outcomes that can negatively affect our lives for many years to come if allowed to be fulfilled. Although it is not usually appreciated at the time, strong top down authority during this time can be of great value to children in this time of life. Of course, it is best if a positive relationship between the parents and their children has been cultivated during previous years, so that the children have come to respect their parent's guidance and can, therefore, accept it during this time without rebelling against it, thus preventing the negative outcomes that would result from that rebellion. I have found that children in this age group talk about having freedom, but this freedom does not extend to actually having to take care of their own needs, etc. It is usually around the age of 19 to 21 when the children are truly set free to make their way in the world and they find out how much work is involved in it, and they tend to see how much work their parents had to do to take care of them while at the same time trying to keep them from rebellion to prevent them from having to suffer its negative consequences, that they begin to come out of rebelling. This time can sometimes be delayed somewhat by college attendance, etc., however. Top down authority can be very useful in situations that involve very complex structuring because the greater the number and complexity of decisions that need to be made the more difficult it becomes to get bottom up agreement of all involved as to the best decision to make in each circumstance. I do agree with you that top down authority can result in very negative results when used improperly, however. Similar results can also occur when bottom up authority is used improperly (mob rule). These things are tools and all tools can be used for good or evil resulting in the corresponding output results.

          I find the use of the concepts of objective verses subjective to be greatly misunderstood by most people. The term objective normally refers to an object or thing as it actually exists in reality while the term subjective means the subject that is generated by the mind such as thoughts and concepts, etc. This would mean that E=mc2 would be subjective in nature because it does not exist as an object in the real world, but is instead an abstract concept made by the mind of man to express a relationship between real objects. Your coffee, keyboard, and fingers would be real world objects and, therefore, would be objective. You could, of course say that you don't actually experience these objects, but only the images of them that are received by your mind from interactions of photons with those objects and then further interaction of the same photons with sensors that are parts of your eyes. You could then say that your mind interprets these interactions and, therefore, you are only seeing subjective information produced by your mind. Looking at it in this way everything would have to be considered subjective to us because we would have no way to directly observe the real world objects. The other way that people sometimes think of objective and subjective is: that which can be obtained by deduction is objective and that which can be obtained by induction is subjective. Induction is usually considered to be less surely known because it is obtained from information obtained from a finite number of observations, so it is always possible that the next observation would prove it to be wrong, while deduction is achieved by a closed loop of logical reasoning from that which is positively known to that which is not presently known to gain an understanding of the unknown. Induction does have the problem mentioned above of lack of certainty. Deduction is harder to understand. You could consider E=mc2 as deductive because all of the elements are defined and their possible interactions are defined according to logical rules that have been made by the person who made the formula. Since a man has created the formula and made all of the rules concerning it, all of the possible outcomes can be known with surety because they are all defined in its structure and the associated rules that describe it. Of course this does not mean that it in any way conforms to reality. The only way that this can be confirmed is by making many observations and subjectively reason that if they all agree with the formula, the formula must be true to reality. The use of subjective reasoning in this proof makes the result uncertain, however, because if another observation had been made it may have not agreed with the previous observations because of some unknown variable that might only come into play under very uncommon circumstances that no one was aware of up to that point. The end result of all of this is that there is always a degree of uncertainty concerning our knowledge of objects that exist in reality except those things that we completely create ourselves in our minds and these things are of very limited use to us if we don't connect them to reality. In the above example, you can positively know all things about the formula E=mc2 as long as you do not try to connect the E with real world energy or the m with real world mass or the c with the real world speed of light, but if you do so, you can never know for sure that the formula is then completely accurate because you can only access this information by subjective observation. Scientists often think that because the formula that they made is objective in nature it is more certain than that which is obtained by observation, but they often don't see that when they connect it to reality it loses that certainty and if it is not connected to reality it is practically useless. As long as you restrict your statements to the outcomes of current observations and all of those observations agree with the statements, both subjective and objective arguments that completely agree with the observations can be considered completely accurate within the scope of the available observational data. Subjective experiences are not always more detailed than objective observations. You could set up a simple subjective observation of a voltage meter's output while you turned a variable resister in a circuit while you were in a dark room to limit the detail of your experience and at the same time you could observe a very complex objective math formula that would contain more detail than the subjective observation.

          To me it is not really important by what process man might have come to the conclusion that God was a father figure if god did not really exist because it would not really be true and, therefore, would be irrelevant. On the other hand if God does exist, then he is the way that he is, so man's belief of him as a father figure is only applicable if he really is a father figure in his relationship with us. Even then it is not important because man came to that conclusion, but because he is really a father figure to us by his nature. The real important determination to be made is, therefore, whether God actually exists and if so what is his nature and how does he choose to relate to us.

          The argument that Jesus's death and resurrection was derived from year gods makes very little sense because these year gods died each year and were reborn the next year to create a continuous repetitive cycle, but Jesus died only once like the rest of us. He was then resurrected the same year and will never die again. At most this would only be one half of an additional cycle, but he was not reborn to start life all over again, but was raised from the dead fully grown as he was when he died on the cross. He then ascended up to the Father high above the highest heaven with eternal life.

          That God has 3 parts (The father, The Son, and the Holy Ghost and these three are one is no great mystery. He made man in his image and man is, therefore, also made of 3 parts (a spirit, a soul, and a body). The spirit generates our intents or purposes for us to accomplish. The soul translates those intents into thoughts that our body can understand and our body carries out the actions in accordance with those thoughts to perform the intents of the spirit.

          Some men three thousand years ago may have had some brilliant insights compared to the level of knowledge of most during that time, but many of today's scientific concepts could not have been envisioned by any of them because they had not yet developed the ability to make the equipment that would allow them to make the observations that would allow them to conceive the possible existence of such things as the structure of sub-energy particles, energy photons or matter particles or that they are all composed of basic motions. The observational information that would allow man to understand that all things that we can observe are composed of basic motions has only been available to man for less than 100 years and man has so far mainly ignored that data. The scriptures also contain much more advanced information than these things some of which cannot currently be disclosed to man in this world because it is not yet time for it to be known. Other things such as the existence of multiple fifth vector structural levels can be mentioned, but cannot be given in much detail at this time. I would not be in the position to have obtained all of the information that I currently have if I was not able to look beyond all of man's and other's political and ideological viewpoints and prejudices, etc. both past and present. The social and cultural ties may be what give the false religions their strength to affect the people to get them to believe in those religions, but it is God himself who gives the strength to those who seek him to find and believe in him and his Word. You are right that in the long run it is not the printed book that is most important. It is the light of God in us that gives us to be able to work with him to do his will and to also work with him to bring his light to others. The book gives us the information that allows us to get that relationship with God.

          If it is just the result of men and men's works then it is of little value if any value at all. Why would I consider a god composed of men's works of any value to be worshiped when I am also a man and also not worthy to be worshiped. A spiritual essence that is profoundly elemental and not an ideal, but like light without a filter sounds a lot like religions that consider god to just be some unintelligent force that we could learn to control to get it to do what we want it to do like in Star Wars. Such a god would just be a tool that could be used either for good or for evil (the light side or the dark side) and could, therefore, not make man any better or help him to overcome his inherent weaknesses that cause him to do things in such a way as to ultimately destroy himself and possibly the whole planet in the process. It would only be able to magnify man's current condition to accomplish larger scale results that were in line with man's current condition. Those who were evil would still do evil things and ultimately advanced scientific knowledge could allow one such person to do a terrorist act that would destroy everything for man.

          This does not even consider any who are more powerful than man (let's say a fourth vector civilization) who would desire to displace man from this planet, etc. Even if some fifth vector civilization that is more powerful than them will protect man from them because they have an interest of gain from relations with man, such a relationship could not be counted on in the long term. The word has it that before they consider man to be ready to be joined to them a seventh vector source will open up the fifth vector to man. The response of those from the fifth vector will be to force advancement control over the minds of those who are not yet ready. They will suffer greatly and even desire to die, but will not be allowed to do so. This will take about 5 months. Only those who are already prepared will escape this suffering (those I call true Christians). In the long run man will only be safe if the one at the top desires to protect him because he can control all of the others. This last part is well beyond man's believability quotient, but others might take note and act in a way so as to be productive and thus be judged favorably and receive positive rather than negative results. If you desire, you can consider this last part as a SYFI moment or maybe future history.

          Sincerely,

          Paul B.

            Paul,

            You do put an awesome amount of effort into these replies and I certainly wish I had enough time to reply in kind. I do edit much of what I would say, for time considerations.

            Yes, by about a thousand years ago, the cloistered priesthood had determined the trinity stood for the spirit, the soul and the body, but the fact remains that Jesus was attempting to push the reset button on the Jewish God and this was fairly firmly acknowledged at the time. That is why it is called "God the Father and God the Son," not God the Spirit and God the Soul.

            Meanwhile God the Holy Ghost did grew out of a neutering of the female deity and came to stand for hope in the future and the Second Coming/rebirth. As I said, this has all been put through two thousand years of interpretation. As we all well know, when the academics get hold of any idea, it little resembles what was originally meant.

            Personally I have no problem with top down authority. In fact, I worked for my parents, on their farm, until my mid twenties and have mostly worked for various family members since. This is because that makes them point person in an economic world I find very disturbing and am quite willing to accept my role as more of a manager and tactical point person. In fact, I feel it gives me far more emotional freedom then the stresses of being the boss would allow.

            This is because that top down role is still relative to a larger context. As the process of distinction and judgement, intelligence is an essentially navigation function. So, from my perspective, making it some form of theological absolute is contradictory and simply an example of anthropomorphizing God. Good and bad are the biological binary code of attraction to the beneficial and repulsion of the detrimental. What might well be beneficial on the individual level, such as going forth and multiplying, might well be detrimental on the mass scale, as overpopulation destroying the environment.

            Now I do realize making good and bad a cosmic duel between the forces of righteousness and evil provides a wonderful narrative contrast, but personally I don't need stories to appreciate morality.

            As you frame it, it seems your highest ideal imposed on this preferred deity is intelligence, yet intelligence is in fact the tool. Even in the story of Adam, Eve, the snake and the apple, it was understand that knowledge can be a double edged sword.

            Light can be a destructive force, but than so can life itself, as we have all been discussing in this contest. I appreciate the light, but I do know it can burn. My judgement is stay in the middle ground between too much and too little and not chase it like some moth.

            Men can be led with hope, or herded with fear. We need to be able to put both in the larger context and not have the priests herd us around like children.

            Regards,

            John