What if God was an event?

[lowbrass]

@mswas

lowbrass I think that when people describe it they often neglect to be clear that they are describing an experience. If you do not share that common experience, then people describing it will sound like babbling idiots. However, have you ever heard people who knew something about a topic you knew nothing about and listened to them sound like babbling idiots, yet they seem to know what the other is saying? In a way the god-talk is Jargon. That is why Christianity for instance, puts such a high premium on ‘revelation’. In a Christian church you get together to share your experience of revelation. If it was not revealed to you, how could you know it?

When experts use technical language that I don’t understand, I find that I can understand it if I want to take the time to educate myself. However, theists seem to use common, everyday words that already have specific meanings, but assume them to have some other obscure meaning in the context that they are using them, and it seems to be a requirement that one acheive the same state of mind to understand the words. For example, I don’t doubt that I could understand what a muon is, if I cared to do enough reading on the subject. Quantum physicists don’t call a muon a “screwdriver”* and expect you to understand that “screwdriver” means something different in their context, nor do they require one to “accept Quantum into their hearts” in order to comprehend the concepts. Such things are unknown but knowable to me, whereas religious jargon is simply nonsensical to me.

*O.K., they do use the word “spin” in a goofy way, but I think that’s an exception.

[henrijohns]

God is more of an emotion than an event. And people get confused about their emotions.

[fessie]

I didn’t really have any expectations, though – I was involved in some of the prep work and had spent the day hanging signs, moving music stands and gathering water bottles for the soloists. Oh, and there was the elderly first violinist who passed out as we began our dress rehearsal, dropping her violin to the floor. She was a diabetic and hadn’t eaten. We had to call 911. The paramedics came. Two hours before concert time.

I’m not saying I hallucinated and saw visions. I know better than that.

It just was not an everyday experience. Maybe it sounds grandiose to put it in religious terms, but it exceeded the ordinary, by a far piece.

The other time I really cried during a concert was while playing my first one with this group. It was so meaningful to me, to have started playing again. But that was utterly personal, tied to ME. It was powerful and emotional, but that’s not transcendence.

[hotflungwok]

@fessie

I didn’t really have any expectations, though – I was involved in some of the prep work and had spent the day hanging signs, moving music stands and gathering water bottles for the soloists. Oh, and there was the elderly first violinist who passed out as we began our dress rehearsal, dropping her violin to the floor. She was a diabetic and hadn’t eaten. We had to call 911. The paramedics came. Two hours before concert time.

But you were religious before the event. You had all the preconceptions already in your head. Did you think ‘angels are here’ because you had any evidence of angels, or because your preconceptions told that something wonderful like this could or must come from angels?

It just was not an everyday experience. Maybe it sounds grandiose to put it in religious terms, but it exceeded the ordinary, by a far piece.

I understand that it was not an everday experience. What I’m interested in why you chose a supernatural explanation instead of a natural one.

[fessie]

@lowbrass

When experts use technical language that I don’t understand, I find that I can understand it if I want to take the time to educate myself… For example, I don’t doubt that I could understand what a muon is, if I cared to do enough reading on the subject.

You’re not giving yourself enough credit though – the ability you’re describing is nowhere near universal.

I’ve read plenty of posts at the Dope on technical subjects where I could not follow what they were talking about. The words strung together held absolutely no meaning for me.

I think it’s just human nature to assume that our frame of reference is “normal”.

[fessie]

@hotflungwok

What I’m interested in why you chose a supernatural explanation instead of a natural one.

Is “supernatural” synonymous with “artificial”? I think of distinct God-events as being a part of the “natural” spectrum, just a few standard deviations to the right.

I like that story because of the conductor’s discernible reaction to what I perceived as a “supernatural” moment. It seems more “empirical” than most of my religious experiences, and makes a better story.

But I didn’t go into that concert expecting to find that. It was mostly a sad day, remembering 9/11. The lights were hot, my pantyhose were pinching, and I was mostly concentrating on not embarrassing myself with my piss-poor playing ability.

There’s no reason a person would have to believe in a Deity to experience that kind of thing. I just think the guy on the throne is the Church’s attempt to personify a real, human experience (which you said you have, although you attribute it in other ways). If God can only mean “guy on throne” to you, then by all means I’m not describing that. But as posted previously, I don’t think the Church (any church) owns God. They’re human institutions. Holy moments belong to everyone.

Perhaps I should try an experiment – I’m pretty sure I have a CD of that concert around here somewhere. As well as another version of the same piece. Maybe I should put them online somehow, and see what other people detect. I know my experience was also a visual one, and a sense of the space around me. I’d be curious to know if just the audio carried the same power (or any power) for others.

[mswas]

hotflungwok I think fessie was being what is known as ‘poetic’ in the technical jargon.

lowbrass The technical jargon of the theologians was created a long time before alchemy metamorphosized into science. The reason people use words that seem out of context to you is because they are using the terms available to them at the time. Theologians have their own technical terms too. Like any discipline, you could study it if you so chose. You lack the experience that initiates interest in the subject. There was a great discussion here not too long about about the Ten Commandments acknowledging other gods. Someone explained that Moses recognized other gods, but that they were of human origin, ie, the creation of human beings as opposed to ‘real’ in the sense that YHWH is real. What you are talking about is actually grown out of this same impulse to make God into man’s image. One of the main factors of Abrahamic religions, is that you are supposed to be peeling back those layers of images of your own creation. People describe God using the words available to them. In every mystic tradition there is some sort of metaphor that refers to a layer of illusion that covers up the real and transcendent whole. A great secular treatise on this that doesn’t rely on the God talk is “Society of the Spectacle” by Guy DeBord. There is a lot of agreement amongst many different traditions that we live in a sort of world of illusion, or of images. For one who is relegated to this world, the only way they have of using this world as a communications transmission medium is to use its imagery. Think of it as lossy compression.

[cosmosdan]

@fessie

Thank you, Zoe and Johanna. I’ve really enjoyed your posts as well, cosmosdan.

I wish there was a way to share one particular concert moment with you. We were playing Mozart’s Requiem, which is just absolutely profound anyway. The concert was a memorial for 9/11, played on the first year anniversary. Groups around the world performed it that day.

We had the incredible luck to be performing in a huge chapel, it seated 1200. About a hundred of us in the orchestra, plus another hundred choir members from groups around the city who wanted to be there that day. Everybody was ON.

The first movement was so stunning, so full, powerful; as it ended, the echoes coming back to us from the cavernous chapel affirmed life and death and God and beauty. I was crying, I thought, holy cow - the angels are here - we’ve risen the dead.

The conductor (who’s an old pro, been around for years) was so thrown by the otherworldly effect that he totally f’d up the beginning of the second movement.

The scrambling that ensued kind of brought everyone back to reality.

I’ve been a musician all of my adult life and am still held in awe about musics ability to move us, brake down barriers and unify us, and express our inner most hopes and unspoken feelings.

The concert sounds incredible. I love those moments.

[cosmosdan]

@hotflungwok

I’ve had experiences like this. My question is, why couldn’t it have just been a lot of effort producing well played music in a large acoustic place during an emotional time? Why did you think angels were there, or you raised the dead?

I’m willing to bet that if you didn’t have religious expectations, you wouldn’t have attributed the experience to religion.

Is that like saying if you didn’t believe in god in any concept then you probably wouldn’t have made religious associations? Well duh!!

Non Theists can have awe inspiring moments with making any spiritual association. Great! Wonderful! Perhaps there was an atheist in the orchestra that felt that way.

I think it would be great if the theist and the non theist can appreciate the same event with a sense of awe without questioning each others appreciation. How about you?

[DSeid]

Here is God’s purpose - for God, to me, it seems, is a verb not a noun, proper or improper.

-R Buckminster Fuller in No More Second Hand Gods

Another attempt to get at the same concept that you seem to be getting at was Martin Buber’s I and Thou. The process by which we as individuals relate to each other and to the world in a deep manner is the I-thou relationship and is in distinction to the I-it relationships we have otherwise. In that way God and our relationships to God are manifold.

[Indistinguishable]

@cosmosdan

Is that like saying if you didn’t believe in god in any concept then you probably wouldn’t have made religious associations? Well duh!!

Non Theists can have awe inspiring moments with making any spiritual association. Great! Wonderful! Perhaps there was an atheist in the orchestra that felt that way.

I think it would be great if the theist and the non theist can appreciate the same event with a sense of awe without questioning each others appreciation. How about you?

I don’t think anyone’s questioning anyone’s appreciation or sense of awe. It just seems a bit odd to consider that sense of awe to be the same thing as God (as the OP seems to propose); it just doesn’t seem at all to mesh with how the word “God” is normally employed, and doesn’t seem to have any use (except, perhaps, to allow us to “prove the existence of God” [for suitably values of God] by pointing to these events and then invoking this silly proposed identity). It seems to many of us more confusing than enlightening to conflate sensations of awe, and/or events of that sort, with all the various ideas already floating around about God which are far from necessarily related to such events. It would seem best to speak plainly; a sensation of awe is “a sensation of awe”, and “God” refers to something a lot more, well, like an intelligent being with superhuman abilities, etc.

I mean, if you want to use the word “God” in a different way than normal, go ahead, but you should at least demonstrate some sort of family resemblance to the various normal usages.

[fessie]

Waitaminute ---- this is the board where people pitch fits for days over ontological this and peer-reviewed study that, insisting “God’s existence can’t be proven logically.”

I come here and say “Yep, I agree, it can’t be proven logically. But people are still having these experiences. Maybe our definition is wrong. Maybe the experiences are what’s real, and the rest is an attempt to explain (or manipulate, depending on which religion and what era).”

And that’s silly? Why? Because it’s a departure from the Bible? I thought Dopers had dispatched with that document long ago - it’s got more holes than my husband’s underwear.

So it’s, what, if that particular God doesn’t exist, then no God can exist? Is that it?

Cracks me up how some people insist on a literal explanation, which can’t be given logically, and then complain about the illogical literal explanation.

[fessie]

My sense of God is definitely not “an intelligent being with superhuman abilities”. Sorry. Every tale about God that I’ve heard which relies on that definition falls apart on page 5, when they try to explain why babies get cancer. Gary Zukov’s books come to mind – he has to evoke “past lives” to explain suffering in the very young. It just doesn’t wash.

[Indistinguishable]

I don’t see anything in the notion of an intelligent being with superhuman abilities which precludes babies from getting cancer (you see, you’re already dragging in unstated assumptions based on how the word God is normally used; how could you possibly plan to divorce the word so completely from its normal use?), but alright.

Perhaps we’re just caught up in semantics. If your thesis is that these events people experience can explain why they posit the various things they do about God, that’s great, that would be a great talking point. We could say that the reason people believe in an intelligent being with superhuman abilities is because they undergo these profound experiences and feel there to be a connection.

But to go one step further and say that the normal definitions of “God” are wrong is a bit odd; I don’t know of any better criteria for the correctness of a definition than its conformity with how people actually use the word. It would be as if I said people were wrong to refer to those little four-legged things that bark as “dogs”; the right definition of “dog” is as a sort of flowering plant. You’d say I was silly.

Granted, your proposal is better than that, because it is somewhat motivated by things people link to God. And you can always propose a shift in the people use a word if you feel there’s a close enough resemblance to existing usage that the confusion would be outweighed by some advantage of the new use. But I just see too far a gap, I suppose, in this particular situation; there’d need to be some huge advantages to the shift in usage to outweigh the confusion.

[Indistinguishable]

But I don’t want to derail your thread, if you feel that’s what I’m doing, which I fear I may be. If you want to swap uplifting stories of your profoundly touching experiences of God, well, this is the forum for that, and I’ll not cast any aspersions on it. My first post was snarky, but I bowed out after that. When I returned, I only meant to explain what I felt to be hotflungwok’s point to cosmosdan.

[lowbrass]

@mswas

lowbrass The technical jargon of the theologians was created a long time before alchemy metamorphosized into science. The reason people use words that seem out of context to you is because they are using the terms available to them at the time. Theologians have their own technical terms too. Like any discipline, you could study it if you so chose. You lack the experience that initiates interest in the subject. There was a great discussion here not too long about about the Ten Commandments acknowledging other gods. Someone explained that Moses recognized other gods, but that they were of human origin, ie, the creation of human beings as opposed to ‘real’ in the sense that YHWH is real. What you are talking about is actually grown out of this same impulse to make God into man’s image. One of the main factors of Abrahamic religions, is that you are supposed to be peeling back those layers of images of your own creation. People describe God using the words available to them. In every mystic tradition there is some sort of metaphor that refers to a layer of illusion that covers up the real and transcendent whole. A great secular treatise on this that doesn’t rely on the God talk is “Society of the Spectacle” by Guy DeBord. There is a lot of agreement amongst many different traditions that we live in a sort of world of illusion, or of images. For one who is relegated to this world, the only way they have of using this world as a communications transmission medium is to use its imagery. Think of it as lossy compression.

I honestly mean no offense, but much of that paragraph reads to me as a random collection of words, only superficially arranged in grammatical structures. I imagine I could learn to use these words in the same way by rote, much as one learns the alphabet or how to count to ten, but I don’t see the point of my doing so. And I think you reinforce my point: The experience appears to be a prerequisite to communication in this “spiritual” language. In my experience, emotions can be very strong, but Occam’s Razor dictates that the best way to explain them is as just that - emotions. I find no need to explain any feelings I have as anything other than my feelings. I do not see any reason to believe that when feelings are particularly strong, that any additional explanation for them is warranted. In the absence of evidence that feelings cannot be strong, sublime, or even unprecedented up to the point that they are experienced, I find it unnecessary to posit any other reason for them being so.

[fessie]

lowbrass I can see what you’re saying and it makes sense. Particularly in the context of organized religions that have exploited what I think is a real phenomenon in order to further their political goals and bigotry (not that ALL practitioners do this, they don’t).

You say that eliminating a God-driven phenomenon in favor of simple emotion is true to Occam’s Razor; but how, then, do you explain roughly 80% of humanity that identify themselves as “believers”? God and Gods are all over the place, all throughout time. The stuff keeps cropping up. Why?

I think one advantage of linking those experiences to God is as a pathway for more experiences of God. Sure, not everyone wants to follow that trail, or finds it useful; but a lot of people do. It’s possible that those adventures have value that you never know about if you stay on the sidelines.

Thank you for your clarification, Indistinguishable. I always learn something here. I think you’re making the same objection that Kalhoun touched upon. I forgot how varied our frames of reference are. The “normal” definition of God, by which I think you mean the Catholic or Protestant, it seems really dated to me. The people I read, the religious people I know, none of us are using that view. Here are three such organizations:
Unity Church (about 100 years old):

1. There is only one Presence and one Power active as the universe and as my life, God the Good.

2. Our essence is of God; therefore, we are inherently good. This God essence was fully expressed in Jesus, the Christ.

3. We are co-creators with God, creating reality through thoughts held in mind.

4. Through prayer and meditation, we align our heart-mind with God. Denials and affirmations are tools we use.

5. Through thoughts, words and actions, we live the Truth we know.

Unitarian Universalists (the Unitarian part started in 1825, Universalist in 1793, and they consolidated in 1961) are guided by seven principles:

* The inherent worth and dignity of every person;
* Justice, equity and compassion in human relations;
* Acceptance of one another and encouragement to spiritual growth in our congregations;
* A free and responsible search for truth and meaning;
* The right of conscience and the use of the democratic process within our congregations and in society at large;
* The goal of world community with peace, liberty, and justice for all;
* Respect for the interdependent web of all existence of which we are a part. 

And draw from many sources of faith:

* Direct experience of that transcending mystery and wonder, affirmed in all cultures, which moves us to a renewal of the spirit and an openness to the forces which create and uphold life;
* Words and deeds of prophetic women and men which challenge us to confront powers and structures of evil with justice, compassion, and the transforming power of love;
* Wisdom from the world's religions which inspires us in our ethical and spiritual life;
* Jewish and Christian teachings which call us to respond to God's love by loving our neighbors as ourselves;
* Humanist teachings which counsel us to heed the guidance of reason and the results of science, and warn us against idolatries of the mind and spirit.
* Spiritual teachings of earth-entered traditions which celebrate the sacred circle of life and instruct us to live in harmony with the rhythms of nature.

Quakers (aka “Friends”)(they’ve been around since 1660):

Friends have no creeds—no official words can substitute for a personal relationship with God through Jesus Christ. These unofficial statements give a general sense of Friends’ faith.

*  God is love and wants to communicate inwardly with everyone who is willing.
* Worship is spiritual and must be Spirit-led.
* All people are equal before God and may minister as they are led by God.
* Jesus Christ is our present Teacher and Lord, and we seek to conduct church affairs in unity under his guidance
* The Spirit of God gives guidance that is consistent with the Bible.
* As people respond to the Light of Christ within, their lives begin to reflect Jesus' peace, integrity, simplicity and moral purity.

[lowbrass]

@fessie

lowbrass I can see what you’re saying and it makes sense. Particularly in the context of organized religions that have exploited what I think is a real phenomenon in order to further their political goals and bigotry (not that ALL practitioners do this, they don’t).

You say that eliminating a God-driven phenomenon in favor of simple emotion is true to Occam’s Razor; but how, then, do you explain roughly 80% of humanity that identify themselves as “believers”? God and Gods are all over the place, all throughout time. The stuff keeps cropping up. Why?

If I were to hazard a guess, I’d say it’s like any superstition. Superstition also keeps cropping up all the time throughout history; I would assume there are some superstitions that you do not believe in. I think we have an innate drive to control our environment, and in cases where we cannot control events, we sometimes invent ways to fool ourselves into believing that we are in control. And gods are a particularly apt invention for that purpose, because we can petition gods to change that which is out of our control. If the change occurs, we can attribute it to our petition. If the change does not occur, we can blame the “will” of the gods. In that way, even though no event has actually been influenced, people can feel as though they have some control over events. I suspect that’s why it has been such a popular idea throughout history.

The earliest religious rituals involved asking the gods for the necessities of life, like rain, a bountiful harvest, a successful hunt, etc. People didn’t want to feel as though they were helpless in the face of drought or natural disasters. It’s more comforting to think that it is possible to change these things just by trying harder. I think that’s why gods were invented.

I think one advantage of linking those experiences to God is as a pathway for more experiences of God. Sure, not everyone wants to follow that trail, or finds it useful; but a lot of people do. It’s possible that those adventures have value that you never know about if you stay on the sidelines.

Sure, I think that something that makes you feel good has value. On the other hand, it’s possible that one could be missing valuable experiences by obsessing about God. I’ve observed many believers who spend almost every waking moment thinking and talking about God. They might be so busy trying to tie every experience into their theological beliefs that they miss simply enjoying the experience in its own right. And when something bad happens, many believers experience severe cognitive dissonance, and may even have a crisis of faith, whereas non-believers can simply recognize that bad things do happen, but that there is still a lot of good in the world, and have no emotional conflict about it. I don’t feel that I’m missing any experiences, I just don’t feel compelled to label them as “God” when they occur.

[mswas]

@lowbrass

I honestly mean no offense, but much of that paragraph reads to me as a random collection of words, only superficially arranged in grammatical structures. I imagine I could learn to use these words in the same way by rote, much as one learns the alphabet or how to count to ten, but I don’t see the point of my doing so. And I think you reinforce my point: The experience appears to be a prerequisite to communication in this “spiritual” language. In my experience, emotions can be very strong, but Occam’s Razor dictates that the best way to explain them is as just that - emotions. I find no need to explain any feelings I have as anything other than my feelings. I do not see any reason to believe that when feelings are particularly strong, that any additional explanation for them is warranted. In the absence of evidence that feelings cannot be strong, sublime, or even unprecedented up to the point that they are experienced, I find it unnecessary to posit any other reason for them being so.

I am not offended.

Do you believe that there are phenomena that are capable of being experienced for which the common parlance is wholly inadequate? Should our spectrum of experience be limited to our facility with language?

[Lush_Puppy]

@fessie

I think God is the experience of the knowledge.

You may enjoy reading “The God Theory: Universes, Zero-point Fields, And What’s Behind It All”

The author aims to redefine God as a being who created the universe in order to experience himself.