“”"""""""""""""""""“If so, this assumes (falsely, I believe) that the reasons for our failure to fully know must always be the same.”"""""""""""""""
Not necessarily. It just so happens, that in this example, God has no further properties do distinguish God from ‘anything’.
We don’t even have an ‘aware’ being…
God is interchangable with a scoop of vanilla ice cream for all we know. To suggest that God is a sysnonym of ‘anything’ is not particularly important to people IMO, without possessing some additional qualities.
Sorry, I just don’t getit; how exactly (in simple terms please) did we get to not having an aware being and not being able to tell if God is a scoop of ice cream?
“”"""""""""""“Sorry, I just don’t getit; how exactly (in simple terms please) did we get to not having an aware being and not being able to tell if God is a scoop of ice cream?”""""""""""""""""
Apologise for apologising ! No wait, Don’t apologise. Gah! Forgot it… =)
We don’t have an aware being, because awareness was not included as a property of God, when God was being defined. That’s why properties are so important, when determining possibility or meaning or existence. Without properties, all words become sysnonyms of each other via meta terms like “everything” or “anything” or “something”.
God = Everything
(Well great, we already have a word for that. It’s called ‘everything’. Thanks for the new synonym, but I’ll pass, thank you… although, it is easier to spell … hmm…)
As for ice cream, or anything, for that matter… I assumed by analogy that we consider ice-cream to not be aware of itself in the way that we are. ‘Our’ type of awareness is referred to as: self-recursive. I don’t think it would be exceedingly difficult to argue for self-recursive awareness in ice-cream… it would not be viable IMO to argue that such a property is meaningful however.
“”"""""""""""“A wonderful demonstration of how logic can lead you to a totally false conclusion, thanks.”"""""""""""""
A few implied terms are ommitted, which creates an ‘optical’ illusion of sorts. It would not be difficult to break that line apart with a formal logical analysis. Try seeing where the term “if” makes a difference in there =)
-Justhink
Human beings cannot know (everything) about an aware being (imaginary or not), described by the word:
God
All we know is:
The visual symbol associated with this being is: GOD
This being can be imginary or not
This being is aware
Humans cannot know everything about: GOD
Does that charachterize your argument? Do you disagree so far with any of these conclusions?
“”"""""""""“Why should my argument allow the being I call God to be imaginary?”"""""""""""""
That’s what I’ve been trying to say all along!! It’s your argument, your God, your conditions…
You tell me what your God is, and I will do with those conditions what I described in the OP. Your God doesn’t have to be imaginary if you don’t want it to be! That’s up to you. Up until now, this thread has been conserned with why properties are necessary to even humor the idea of God. Until we establish that, it is unreasonable to continue, unless you can convince ‘us’ or yourself otherwise.
I’m finding it hard to nail down a pithy list of properties of God; you will no doubt see my inability to find grand enough words to express the concepts as evidence that the concepts are meaningless, or that I have spent no time at all thinking about them.
But my full comprehension of something is not required in order for that something to exist in a completely real sense; my knowledge of calculus approaches ever closer to zero (but without actually getting there); my understanding of quantum theory is so poor that I cannot tell whether it is true or false or some undetermined point in between; it may be that these concepts are forever out of the reach of my puny mind, yet I do occasionally catch meaningful glimpses of the truth that everybody else claims is there.
I’m sure that I would be in a lot of trouble if I tried to imply that these concepts are rendered generally meaningless by my own failure to grasp them; the fact that (not literally)everybody else has no trouble with them means nothing to me.
In a similar (but not exactly the same) way, I believe that the being ‘God’ is too big a banana to fully fit in the eggcup of my universe, but that doesn’t stop me catching meaningful glimpses.
I see (on preview) that you have ‘won’ - well done!, I must therefore be convinced now.
You haven’t really given me any properties to go on yet Mangetout. I am assuming that when you started filling out those questions in reply to the OP, that you were scrapping that and providing a more conclusive list.
Many of the answers there were like: Well… sorta, Hmm, not sure really, possibly, I think so, maybe, could be…
What kind of God is that ! Why on earth do you believe in it?!
You don’t even sound like you believe your own God! =)
Because as I have said all along; one can experience something without needing (or being able) to fully understand or define it; you seem to have assumed that my belief in God is rooted in some dry logical process or scrutiny of some dusty manuscripts.
This is not the case; God is a person with whom I claiim to have experienced interaction; a person that I claim to be getting to know (if you’d asked me to describe the properties of my wife (apart from the obvious visual ones) after my first enthralling encounter with her, I’d have had the same kind of problems as I’ve had here).
Do you ever contemplate the striking simiarities with what you are describing to a hallucination?
Do you believe that hallucinations are possible?
Do you believe that a human being can conjure up an image of something that hold no relevance to the outside world whatsoever? There are people who sleep and dream with their eyes open. Think about that =)
Does it seem improper to you that people articulate a difference between people and events they experience in a dream, from those not in a dream?
What about people who cannot tell the difference, and speak of the two ‘worlds’ as the same world? It would be very confusing to those in the waking world, until they finally realized; “Wow, that person doesn’t know the difference between a dream and being awake!” It would probably take a while to figure it out too!
There are forms of schizophrenia so severe, that people literally conjure images with all the senses engaged — fully immersed in a virtual world, locked in a room… occasionally interacting with people on the outside.
Do you conceed, that this occurs … and possibly that this may exist on a continuum?
Do you believe that there is a difference between simulation and reality?
Do you believe in such a thing as reality?
Do you believe in such a thing as simulation?
Do you know what a game is?
Do you know what a role-playing game is?
Do you believe a person can choose to participate in a role-playing game, while others believe they are actually in the game?
Oh absolutely, I also sometimes contemplate whether I am just a brain in a jar or whether the entire universe is a simulation or whether this is all just a dream of mine (or somebody else’s).
**
It would be hard not to.
**
**Yes, I read a lot of SF. I would find it most interesting, though, if a person’s brain spontaneously conjured up something that did hold relevance to the outside world…
**I didn’t know that, but I’m thinking about it right now, as instructed.
**Improper? no, but not all sane people do articulate a difference; my (ver young) children will often refer to something that they experienced in a dream as if it were real. I mention this only out of interest, but feel free to make inference about hereditary insanity if it suits your position.
**Crikey!
I am not a psychiatrist, but I see no reason to refute it.
In all seriousness though; can you tell me what reality is, or at least what it can be compared to?
Or is it something beyond descriptionand comparison that you can only experience? (in which case I’d venture to remind you that such a terribly subjective statement probably indicates that you are hallucinating).
“”""""""""""""In all seriousness though; can you tell me what reality is, or at least what it can be compared to?
Or is it something beyond descriptionand comparison that you can only experience? (in which case I’d venture to remind you that such a terribly subjective statement probably indicates that you are hallucinating)."""""""""""
Working on it (my general topics to address here and other threads … arghh… I even abandoned a thread a few months ago close to the same topic :: lots of work it seems =)…
On this point however, I will state that reality is that which has no logical inconsistency. That is how you weed out one from the other IMO. I can offer examples when I compile this request.
I’m starting to think that I want one of those fancy symbolic formulas for myself… maybe I’ll give a go at constructing one.