I'll take the first bite.

So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them. — Genesis 1:27

Theomorphism: We're the likeness of god, physically and mentally. Not much has been said of god's appearance but the Greeks believed that rationality is the most divine quality we possess. To Leibniz, minds are little gods.

---

Anthropomorphism: The gods seem to possess human qualities, the only difference was that the devas were more powerful than humankind.

Later, it must've dawned on theists that god had to be (re theomorphism) the perfect human being and thus to power were added goodness and a knowledge. Out pops at the other end our ol' friend, the familiar OOO God (omnipotent, omnsicient, omnibenevolent).

If you notice, the OOO god is our conception of the ideal man, the eligible bachelor - physically strong, is smart and has a good heart. This makes me think it was a bunch of women who defined God this way. They were projecting their thoughts of the perfect mate onto God. God is a woman's (sexual) fantasy! Go figure!

God's a role model for men and Mr. Right for women. In other words, 3 things we gotta take care of:

1. Physical fitness (violence is always a possibility)
2. Moral compass (you gotta be a good person, have a heart)
3. Knowledge (you need brains too)

Could you make your point/question a little clearer please?

they very often give them human characteristics — TiredThinker

For me, human portrayals of ancient gods are strong evidence that humans created gods and gods never existed. Whether gods are portrayed as humanoids, human/animal merges, animal, or human/object merges. Here is an image of an ancient sun god with a human face!

https://static1.bigstockphoto.com/0/3/2/large2/230140.jpg

My question is basically regarding our limitations for imagining our origins as well as the nature of our world in general. What we may tend to project onto these ideas.

Sorry, I still don’t see a clear question here.

People try to make sense of chaos by telling stories.
Whether scientist, philosopher, or priest.
Whichever narrative you adhere to, isn't there bound to be some human-centric bias?

yes. Do you a have a point? Spit it out

For me, human portrayals of ancient gods are strong evidence that humans created gods and gods never existed. — universeness

If there is no God, it would be necessary to invent Him. — Voltaire

If God really existed, it would be necessary to abolish Him. — Mikhail Bakunin

The jury's still out.

We could invent God (I mean for real) but that seems to be irreversible (omnipotence & omniscience). We can't put the genie back in the bottle. We have to therefore...

Just sharing what I got from the OP, as your posts suggested you couldn't find a point or question from the OP.

Maybe state what specifically kind of point you see as missing or explain what the standards are that would qualify something as a meaningful point.

There is something about virtue, but no clear cut question or point.

Just looks like a half-formed thought with a heading that suggests there is an interesting discussion to be had.

We could invent God (I mean for real) but that seems to be irreversible (omnipotence & omniscience) — Agent Smith

What do you mean by 'for real?' If you really do mean 'for real,' then the obvious question is how do we do that?

What do you mean by 'for real?' If you really do mean 'for real,' then the obvious question is how do we do that? — universeness

The future is a world of $\infty$ possibilities. God maybe one of 'em. You never know what tomorrow will bring. Isn't that what's so exciting about times yet to come?

From an article I'm writing.

Today, we know the universe is billions of years old, not thousands. We know bacteria and viruses cause disease, not sin and demons. We know there are (literally!) more stars in the universe than grains of sand on all Earth’s beaches. Scientists believe there are roughly as many planets as stars.

Imagine on some distant planet, beings who look like rabbits worship the Great Rabbit who created everything. Or imagine spider-like beings who worship the Great Mother Spider who spun out the web of the universe. Old Theology would call such “Gods” false Gods. Or, more charitably, it might call them personifications of the one, true God.

New Theology regards the Gods of planet Earth as personifications of the one true God: the ultimate ground of existence, the foundation of reality.

The future is a world of ∞∞ possibilities. God maybe one of 'em. You never know what tomorrow will bring. Isn't that what's so exciting about times yet to come? — Agent Smith

Sounds to me that you are suggesting that some merging of individual consciousnesses in the very distant future is not something you completely reject, An emerging panpsychism?

New Theology regards the Gods of planet Earth as personifications of the one true God: the ultimate ground of existence, the foundation of reality — Art48

This reminds me of a comment made about polytheism and theism in general.
'Theists have reduced their many gods to 1 god. Only one more step to go to reach improved enlightenment! Number of gods= 0.'

Sounds to me that you are suggesting that some merging of individual consciousnesses in the very distant future is not something you completely reject, An emerging panpsychism? — universeness

Both to think up possibilities and eliminating them requires talent and expertise. I'm but a beginner in these methods and so cum grano salis with regard to what I have to say. Panpsychism is possible if only there's an image of the exterior (the world at large) and the interior (the self). I recall looking at a rock and contemplating consciousness. A rock doesn't possess eyes nor is it smooth enough to act as a mirror. In what sense, how, can it be conscious (of anything) then? Perhaps there are other ways via which it can construct an image of the world and itself. Limited as we are to our 5 senses, we can't conceive of other means of creating an image of the world or the self, but it isn't beyond the realm of possibility that a rock could, in principle. hold and image of the world and of itself, we just don't know how that's done.

The next step/stage to consciousness is being able to cogitate on the image - the only organ we know that's capable of such a feat is a neural network (a brain). Rocks are missing brains and that's an obstacle to human-level awareness/consciousness.

At this point it seems apposite to bring up the concept of mushin no shin (mind without mind) OR, to some, pure awareness - the image minus the processing!

I think I am beginning to hate Latin! Why do people think it adds something if you 'type some Latin,' to augment? :death: Sorry for this little rant, nothing personal intended, just one of my current 'pet annoyances.'

I am not so intrigued by the proposal that consciousness is a composite of smaller quanta but I accept that it probably is because I believe that everything is based on smaller and smaller quanta.
Do you think distant future advances in transhumanism will make the merging of individual consciousness more likely?

When theist people believe in a God or Gods responsible for everything in existence they very often give them human characteristics for the obvious reason that what else could one imagine beings of consciousness to be like.

But for those that either believe strictly in science or a more cosmic force like karma or some type of balance don't they also add human virtue when thinking of that scenario? At least I assume most aren't content with chaos. — TiredThinker

When theists describe a God or Gods they give them human characteristics as a matter of relatability.

Those who believe in science/karma/balance prefer to keep some emotional distance, in an attempt to ‘control’ the relationship, as it were.

The problem for both is in attributing intentionality - and with that, moral judgement. Because we tend to relate to both as one structure of moral potential to another. It’s easier to take the moral high ground against science or Karma. More difficult against a sense of higher consciousness or balance.

Both to think up possibilities and eliminating them requires talent and expertise. I'm but a beginner in these methods and so cum grano salis with regard to what I have to say. Panpsychism is possible if only there's an image of the exterior (the world at large) and the interior (the self). I recall looking at a rock and contemplating consciousness. A rock doesn't possess eyes nor is it smooth enough to act as a mirror. In what sense, how, can it be conscious (of anything) then? Perhaps there are other ways via which it can construct an image of the world and itself. Limited as we are to our 5 senses, we can't conceive of other means of creating an image of the world or the self, but it isn't beyond the realm of possibility that a rock could, in principle. hold and image of the world and of itself, we just don't know how that's done. — Agent Smith

What we consolidate as a ‘rock’ consists of individual molecular structures in an arrangement of which they are obviously unaware. If you broke a rock in half, it is not integrated at this level to respond as a rock. But some molecular structures on the newly exposed surface will begin to oxidise - to create a variation in their structural arrangements in relation to the world.

I don’t think basic awareness is about creating an ‘image’. Consciousness is a complex awareness in which an integrated life event creates a variation in its structural arrangement (of interacting molecular change) in relation to an ‘other’ event with which it interacts - ie. the world. Each variation relates to the next to gradually build and rebuild a conceptual structure of the world as a predictive reference for the brain, in much the same way as DNA builds an updated blueprint for the organism. This integrated structure of predictions about the world is then able to create an ‘image’ of the world or the self as it develops self-consciousness - creating potential or simulated variations to test how such an arrangement might affect the organism’s ongoing structural arrangements of molecular change.

So it is, the world or the self (two things we can become conscious of) can induce, chemistry-wise, a one-to-one corresponding chemical reaction that is then understood as awareness/consciousness. I call this an image. Perhaps you have in your possession a better concept and the right word to go with it. This is best exemplified by the eyes - the rods and cones undergo what's known as photochemical reactions, very much like in old camera films, and the end result of that is an image that forms on our retinas, the totality of which is then relayed to our visual cortex and that's vision in a nutshell.

No such system ("variation in its structural arrangement") is apparent in a stone, but we have to be careful here: maybe this is a lacuna in our knowledge rather than a fact about stones.

Furthermore, there's this idea of pure awareness, the raw sense data itself sans the processing (thinking). This is old news in the philosophy of mind, perhaps more well-known and included in meditative practices in the orient. An ordinary camera is the best inanimate object that typifies this concept. An image forms inside the camera after light traverses ite lenses. That's pure awareness and does involve "variation in its strutctural arrangement", there's nothing in a camera that examines the image formed inside it. In my book, that's proto-consciousness, one step away from true human-level consciousness and we've already made progress in that department with robots and AI (image processing). Is that rudimentary, simple consciousness? I dunno.

So it is, the world or the self (two things we can become conscious of) can induce, chemistry-wise, a one-to-one corresponding chemical reaction that is then understood as awareness/consciousness. I call this an image. Perhaps you have in your possession a better concept and the right word to go with it. This is best exemplified by the eyes - the rods and cones undergo what's known as photochemical reactions, very much like in old camera films, and the end result of that is an image that forms on our retinas, the totality of which is then relayed to our visual cortex and that's vision in a nutshell.

No such system ("variation in its structural arrangement") is apparent in a stone, but we have to be careful here: maybe this is a lacuna in our knowledge rather than a fact about stones.

Furthermore, there's this idea of pure awareness, the raw sense data itself sans the processing (thinking). This is old news in the philosophy of mind, perhaps more well-known and included in meditative practices in the orient. An ordinary camera is the best inanimate object that typifies this concept. An image forms inside the camera after light traverses ite lenses. That's pure awareness and does involve "variation in its strutctural arrangement", there's nothing in a camera that examines the image formed inside it. In my book, that's proto-consciousness, one step away from true human-level consciousness and we've already made progress in that department with robots and AI (image processing). Is that rudimentary, simple consciousness? I dunno. — Agent Smith

This is what we’ve been taught to assume: that consciousness is image-based, rather than chemical-based. What forms inside an ordinary camera is a photochemical arrangement of shapes and colours. It is our mind that associates this with an ‘image’ of the world. In that sense, the camera is a few steps short of human-level self-consciousness, as are robots and AI. They still rely on the human mind to determine any relation between the data and experience, no matter how detailed.

Most of what forms on our retinas or gets relayed to our visual cortex from one moment to the next is fuzzy and incomplete. Any notion that a total, detailed ‘image’ is continually formed and transmitted like a video camera to consciousness is overestimating our ongoing visual attention, and underestimating the amount of energy such a process would require.

The vast majority of our ongoing conscious experience consists of conceptualised predictions based on past experiences. This is why when most of us try to draw what’s directly in front of us, it looks stylised and cartoonish. It takes practice and deliberate attention to create a detailed ‘image’ even in our minds close to what a camera can produce, let alone re-create it on paper. Most of the time we’re only paying attention to what’s changing unpredictably from one moment to the next, and what information we feel to be in our best interests with regard to our intentions. The rest is filled in conceptually as determined from predictions as well as all our other senses.

As for the idea of ‘pure awareness’, this starts by paying attention and being ‘in the moment’ rather than experiencing the world conceptually. But it’s more than raw sense data - it’s also about developing non-conceptual awareness of qualitative potential, value and significance, as further variability in consciousness.

non-conceptual awareness — Possibility

Would you say that's phenomenology in a loose sense? I heard phenomenology is about dumping all conceptual schema that exist and we employ to make sense of the world and focusing our attention on phenomena (appearances). Kinda sorta makes sense; after all noumena will forever remain beyond, on the other side of, our event horizon.

Are our personification roughly identical whether we imagine god(s) or a non conscious force?

Whichever narrative you adhere to, isn't there bound to be some human-centric bias? — Yohan

That sounds right, given that it's a human making the claim. I suppose we can talk about layers. Perhaps there's the bias we can peel off (culture-deep) and then the kind we can't (biology-deep.)

But for those that either believe strictly in science or a more cosmic force like karma or some type of balance don't they also add human virtue when thinking of that scenario? — TiredThinker

I don't think so, if we exclude versions of the karma idea. One can envision nature as amoral and nevertheless trust in the actual relative social harmony in which this envisioning takes place.

non-conceptual awareness
— Possibility

Would you say that's phenomenology in a loose sense? I heard phenomenology is about dumping all conceptual schema that exist and we employ to make sense of the world and focusing our attention on phenomena (appearances). — Agent Smith

Phenomenology is one way to approach it, sure. But this non-conceptual awareness is arguably indicative of qualitative variability at every dimensional level of awareness, not just at this human level of consciousness. I don’t think Phenomenology goes as far as dumping ALL conceptual schema - not to the extent that Structural Realism does, for instance.

Kinda sorta makes sense; after all noumena will forever remain beyond, on the other side of, our event horizon. — Agent Smith

Our event horizon is just a barrier to certainty, which has never constrained our capacity to relate, let alone to act.

Consciousness is a complex awareness in which an integrated life event creates a variation in its structural arrangement (of interacting molecular change) in relation to an ‘other’ event with which it interacts - ie. the world. Each variation relates to the next to gradually build and rebuild a conceptual structure of the world as a predictive reference for the brain, in much the same way as DNA builds an updated blueprint for the organism. This integrated structure of predictions about the world is then able to create an ‘image’ of the world or the self as it develops self-consciousness - creating potential or simulated variations to test how such an arrangement might affect the organism’s ongoing structural arrangements of molecular change. — Possibility

Nice !

The future is a world of ∞∞ possibilities. God maybe one of 'em. You never know what tomorrow will bring. Isn't that what's so exciting about times yet to come? — Agent Smith

If the future wasn't constrained at all, then that'd be terrifying ! I've seen the idea that God may yet arrive, but then this God is not a creator but a kind of wonderful alien, an even bigger and nicer BFG (as in Roald Dahl's creation.)

https://roalddahl.fandom.com/wiki/Frobscottle#:~:text=Frobscottle%20is%20a%20green%2Dcolored,the%20drinker%20fly%20and%20fart.

proto-consciousness — Agent Smith

mirror — Agent Smith

1. What you sow you reap.

2. What goes around comes around.

3. Action = Reaction (Newton's 3^rd Law)

4. Karma

5. Reciprocity

My mind's thoughts/speech/actions are reflected back at me by other minds.

Minds = Mirrors :chin:

Consciousness is a complex awareness in which an integrated life event creates a variation in its structural arrangement (of interacting molecular change) in relation to an ‘other’ event with which it interacts - ie. the world. Each variation relates to the next to gradually build and rebuild a conceptual structure of the world as a predictive reference for the brain, in much the same way as DNA builds an updated blueprint for the organism. This integrated structure of predictions about the world is then able to create an ‘image’ of the world or the self as it develops self-consciousness - creating potential or simulated variations to test how such an arrangement might affect the organism’s ongoing structural arrangements of molecular change. — Possibility

This doesn't make me understand a single bit what consciousness is. It's like you analyze a dead stone.