That's cool, a lot of writers on this forum don't like Hegel. — Gregory

I think this is the tender-minded thing. There's also the tedious anglo-versus-continental thing. I got around to Hegel because so many thinkers I already liked make positive references toward him, but that's my general method for finding stuff.

Anyway, here's one of my favorite Hegel quotes.

What is “familiarly known” is not properly known, just for the reason that it is “familiar”. When engaged in the process of knowing, it is the commonest form of self-deception, and a deception of other people as well, to assume something to be familiar, and give assent to it on that very account. Knowledge of that sort, with all its talk, never gets from the spot, but has no idea that this is the case. Subject and object, and so on, God, nature, understanding, sensibility, etc., are uncritically presupposed as familiar and something valid, and become fixed points from which to start and to which to return. The process of knowing flits between these secure points, and in consequence goes on merely along the surface. Apprehending and proving consist similarly in seeing whether every one finds what is said corresponding to his idea too, whether it is familiar and seems to him so and so or not.

Analysis of an idea, as it used to be carried out, did in fact consist in nothing else than doing away with its character of familiarity.
— Hegel

Lots of what I also find in Wittgenstein & Heidegger in that.

:up:

:clap:

I wanted to find a 'salute' emoji, but no luck. I'd be glad to hear any thoughts you have on that quote. It's rich!

I'd first read Nishida's An Inquiry Into the Good in the mid-1980s after I had briefly studied Zen Buddhism a few years earlier which helped reorient my ontological stance(?) from an individualistic to a holistic, or ecological, commons of 'thinking and doing'. Heidi came after but by then seemed redundant and profoundly unclear after Nishida and Laozi, Hume and Schopenhauer, Marx and Kropotkin, Nietzsche and Camus. Later on Peirce and Dewey, Wittgenstein and Jaspers, Buber and Levinas, de Beauvoir and Arendt, Cassirer and Adorno, Popper and Feyerabend, Nussbaum and Haack, then (back to) Epicurus-Lucretius and Spinoza, which, for me, (ultimately) had nailed Heidi's (& his p0m0 acolytes') coffin shut by the early 90s.

Agency, for instance, I'd begun to conceive of as an inclusive commons (from Witty's "Private Language Argument" and by adapting Amartya Sen's & Martha Nussbaum's "Capabilites Approach") and thereby an analogue – I admit with no shame – for Dasein (or, even more so, Existenz), but only in so far as it's informed by (the dialectical and yet non-dual/non-cartesian approaches of) e.g. Buber, Jaspers, Levinas & Merleau-Ponty rather than Heidi's man-shaped hole ("Lichtung") in being.

Thank you! Amatya Sen is a new name for me. I've been curious about Cassirer (I like Gadamer, and they are connected rightly or wrong in my mind.) I'm just recently really looking into and appreciating Peirce. Couldn't get into Merleau-Ponty when I tried, but perhaps the moment was wrong. I do like Epicurus, and in general Lange's history (which really celebrates him) impressed me. (I could only get the first volume, so I guess he's barely in print.) I stop there, even if some of the other names tempt me to say more.

I like that you mention the order of your exposures/studies, because that seems important here. For you, Heidegger wasn't offering anything fresh. I read and thought about Wittgenstein first, so I largely understood him as being systematic and explicit where Witt was elusive and aphoristic. I'd also read many criticisms of his work, so I went to the wizard well warned. I wasn't completely numb to the dark charisma of the ethical stuff, but I could never quite make sense of it, and I'm not sure that Heidegger could either. I like Van Buren's dissertation on his early stuff.

Anyway, I think our ontological stances are similar, and I appreciate you taking the time to pass on some experience.

Yw.

Amartya Sen is an Indian economist who studied famine as a function of policy, hunger as a political issue. He went on to define poverty as a lack of power, abilities or possibilities, and the fight against poverty as an effort to empower the poor.

After being a Roman Catholic for many years I've searched to replace the faith with something else. The rationality of that religion, which is simply unreal to me, is that God could have gotten everyone to heaven through them doing good and receiving grace, but instead had his Son die so that some would be damned and others gotten to heaven from the merits of someone who was tortured for them. It's a sinners' joy first, man-centered belief that masquerades as "giving glory to God". I recently read Jung's work on Job and have been listening to "3000 year melody" series on Youtube would helps me to see divinity within my psyche. It's a great experience and allows me to find more joy in life

Spinoza speaks of the Jewish idea that God's essence and what he thinks about are identical (someone refreshed my memory by quoting him on another thread a few minutes ago). This is Kaballah and has much to do with Hegel's system. Hegel defended free will however while Spinoza said it was an illusion. In the 1920's Einstein was defending a deterministic version of quasi-idealism and maybe it was this that lead Heidegger to defend the "being" of objects and try to figure how to explain it in philosophical terms

Amartya Sen is an Indian economist who studied famine as a function of policy, hunger as a political issue. He went on to define poverty as a lack of power, abilities or possibilities, and the fight against poverty as an effort to empower the poor. — Olivier5

:up: :up: :up:

Nice, thanks!

Whitehead. Thales. Feuerbach. :roll:

Einstein said the universe wasn't matter connected by magnet-like forces nor matter moving because its naturally heavy and falls when space is empty. So he threw out the Newtonian and Aristotelean ideas. Its not entirety clear how the universe even can be said to exist in his system. Heisenberg and Bohr thought (in the 20's) that the world was probability waves (potential) that was actualized by consciousness (Copenhagen interpretation). Einstein rejected the randomness in his system but with the "equivalence principle" the reality of the universe falls out of view just as people's thoughts fall to oblivion when they mentally accept that principle

Maybe we can't detect a difference between acceleration by force and free fall. But in Einstein system there is absolutely no way things can truly move, which is why he said he "proved" B time

Ah, er, um ... No. :confused:

Then why. You seldom engage others and instead write wordy sophistries. Einstein showed that matter has no objective size but it has objective substance whether you or he like it or not

What makes things move in general relativity. Easy question

I try VERY hard to find the truth on issues and I have no interest in maintaining any bias

but instead had his Son die so that some would be damned and others gotten to heaven from the merits of someone who was tortured for them. It's a sinners' joy first, man-centered belief that masquerades as "giving glory to God". — Gregory

—The fate of the Gospels was decided by death—it hung on the “cross.”... It was only death, that unexpected and shameful death; it was only the cross, which was usually reserved for the canaille only—it was only this appalling paradox which brought the disciples face to face with the real riddle: “Who was it? what was it?”—The feeling of dis may, of profound affront and injury; the suspicion that such a death might involve a refutation of their cause; the terrible question, “Why just in this way?”—this state of mind is only too easy to understand. Here everything must be accounted for as necessary; everything must have a meaning, a reason, the highest sort of reason; the love of a disciple excludes all chance. Only then did the chasm of doubt yawn: “Who put him to death? who was his natural enemy?”—this question flashed like a lightning-stroke. Answer: dominant Judaism, its ruling class. From that moment, one found one’s self in revolt against the established order, and began to understand Jesus as in revolt against the established order. Until then this militant, this nay-saying, nay-doing element in his character had been lacking; what is more, he had appeared to present its opposite. Obviously, the little community had not understood what was precisely the most important thing of all: the example offered by this way of dying, the freedom from and superiority to every feeling of ressentiment—a plain indication of how little he was understood at all! All that Jesus could hope to accomplish by his death, in itself, was to offer the strongest possible proof, or example, of his teachings in the most public manner.... But his disciples were very far from forgiving his death—though to have done so would have accorded with the Gospels in the highest degree; and neither were they prepared to offer themselves, with gentle and serene calmness of heart, for a similar death.... On the contrary, it was precisely the most unevangelical of feelings, revenge, that now possessed them. It seemed impossible that the cause should perish with his death: “recompense” and “judgment” became necessary (—yet what could be less evangelical than “recompense,” “punishment,” and “sitting in judgment”!). Once more the popular belief in the coming of a messiah appeared in the foreground; attention was rivetted upon an historical moment: the “kingdom of God” is to come, with judgment upon his enemies.... But in all this there was a wholesale misunderstanding: imagine the “kingdom of God” as a last act, as a mere promise! The Gospels had been, in fact, the incarnation, the fulfilment, the realization of this “kingdom of God.” It was only now that all the familiar contempt for and bitterness against Pharisees and theologians began to appear in the character of the Master—he was thereby turned into a Pharisee and theologian himself! On the other hand, the savage veneration of these completely unbalanced souls could no longer endure the Gospel doctrine, taught by Jesus, of the equal right of all men to be children of God: their revenge took the form of elevating Jesus in an extravagant fashion, and thus separating him from themselves: just as, in earlier times, the Jews, to revenge themselves upon their enemies, separated themselves from their God, and placed him on a great height. The One God and the Only Son of God: both were products of ressentiment....

—And from that time onward an absurd problem offered itself: “how could God allow it!” To which the deranged reason of the little community formulated an answer that was terrifying in its absurdity: God gave his son as a sacrifice for the forgiveness of sins. At once there was an end of the gospels! Sacrifice for sin, and in its most obnoxious and barbarous form: sacrifice of the innocent for the sins of the guilty! What appalling paganism!—Jesus him self had done away with the very concept of “guilt,” he denied that there was any gulf fixed between God and man; he lived this unity between God and man, and that was precisely his “glad tidings”.... And not as a mere privilege!—From this time forward the type of the Saviour was corrupted, bit by bit, by the doctrine of judgment and of the second coming, the doctrine of death as a sacrifice, the doctrine of the resurrection, by means of which the entire concept of “blessedness,” the whole and only reality of the gospels, is juggled away—in favour of a state of existence after death!... St. Paul, with that rabbinical impudence which shows itself in all his doings, gave a logical quality to that conception, that indecent conception, in this way: “If Christ did not rise from the dead, then all our faith is in vain!”—And at once there sprang from the Gospels the most contemptible of all unfulfillable promises, the shameless doctrine of personal immortality.... Paul even preached it as a reward....

...
In Paul is incarnated the very opposite of the “bearer of glad tidings”; he represents the genius for hatred, the vision of hatred, the relentless logic of hatred. What, indeed, has not this dysangelist sacrificed to hatred! Above all, the Saviour: he nailed him to his own cross. The life, the example, the teaching, the death of Christ, the meaning and the law of the whole gospels—nothing was left of all this after that counterfeiter in hatred had reduced it to his uses.
...
When the centre of gravity of life is placed, not in life itself, but in “the beyond”—in nothingness—then one has taken away its centre of gravity altogether. The vast lie of personal immortality destroys all reason, all natural instinct—henceforth, everything in the instincts that is beneficial, that fosters life and that safeguards the future is a cause of suspicion. So to live that life no longer has any meaning: this is now the “meaning” of life.... Why be public-spirited? Why take any pride in descent and forefathers? Why labour together, trust one another, or concern one’s self about the common welfare, and try to serve it?... Merely so many “temptations,” so many strayings from the “straight path.”—“One thing only is necessary”.... That every man, because he has an “immortal soul,” is as good as every other man; that in an infinite universe of things the “salvation” of every individual may lay claim to eternal importance; that insignificant bigots and the three-fourths insane may assume that the laws of nature are constantly suspended in their behalf—it is impossible to lavish too much contempt upon such a magnification of every sort of selfishness to infinity, to insolence. And yet Christianity has to thank precisely this miserable flattery of personal vanity for its triumph—it was thus that it lured all the botched, the dissatisfied, the fallen upon evil days, the whole refuse and off-scouring of humanity to its side. The “salvation of the soul”—in plain English: “the world revolves around me.”.
— link

https://www.gutenberg.org/files/19322/19322-h/19322-h.htm

This point is also in Feuerbach. Personal immortality is something like the most intense expression of egoism. It encourages petty identifications with face, name, a thousand idiosyncrasies, and the all-too-typical negative narcissism that can't lose itself beautifully in a project, with other human beings, down here, in this world, the real world, the only world.

I try VERY hard to find the truth on issues and I have no interest in maintaining any bias. — Gregory

I trust in your sincerity. To be honest, though, your style is a bit all over the place. IMO, you might want to quote more.

Thanks for the criticism. Its hard to quote when I'm not on the desktop but can do better I think.

I think sin is a possibility and so must hell be as well. Heaven and virtue are a "not giving in to sin" but I don't know if anyone knows for sure if they are virtuous. The Christian system though has a God who couldn't make a world where people were good and went to heaven based on merit and grace, otherwise he would have done so. Indeed, by predestination, he has actualized the damnation of people who could have acted virtuously is he allowed, and the salvation of the guilty who don't deserve heaven. By a self-sacrifice Jesus took on torture to let the guilty into heaven but also allowed everyone to sin when they could have gone to heaven by being virtuous. No corruptor system of theology has ever been devised by man and Nietzsche is right in saying Paul played a large role in its acceptance (as did Augustine). A little latter today I will provide verses from the Bible so those who are unfamiliar with Christian theology can see these arguments for themselves

Let me reestablish the argument:

1) God could have immaculately conceived everyone and had them all enter heaven based on their merits and God's favor

Or

2) God could not have created this way

So either 1 is true and God doesn't do what's right, or 2 is true.

If 2 is true we have God allowing people to sin and then getting them to heaven in spite of their total worthlessness, we have a God who is forced to set up an absurd and unrighteous system in order to create in the first place

Being merely a creature, I am not sure how to view these options you ascribe to "God."
I don't understand how "total worthlessness" relates to the idea that sin is an offense against one's own existence. There are many contradictory ideas about what that might entail but they all come back to a simple idea that you have been given a precious thing and you fucked it up.

If that is what sin is. Or is it malicious?

Romans 3:23 " all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God". If God can help them redeem themselves, that is merciful and righteous. If God dies to give his merits in atonement for sin, that is unrighteous

What text are you quoting from? Your translation does not correspond to any that I am familiar with.

Thanks for taking my criticism in such a friendly spirit.

On the absurdity of the usual theology, you mention one of many issues. Even if the afterlife experience was merit-based, there's still the issue of free will, which I can't make sense of. The idea seems intrinsically vague and magical, something like a pure randomness that one has to nevertheless take responsibility for. For whatever reason, this was the crack in the dam for me. I could not figure out how the God I was told about as a child was a good guy. It's absurd to worship a monster just because he's got 10 million teeth. Hellfire is the most evil and hateful fantasy I can think of. Threatening children with eternal torture is a wee bit problematic.

NIV. You might be looking at the wrong verse

NIV, Job 5:18 "he wounds.. he injures" . So God is behind the destruction and the recreation. If nature reflects God, then how can anyone go to hell and how can people only get to heaven by the merits of a torture sacrifice?

Don't try to figure out free will. There too many monsters of the conscience that interfere with objectivity. Daoists say to live spontaneity, as I read in Huston Smith's book on religions and the newer book God is not One (which is an ironic title)

Don't try to figure out free will. There too many monsters of the conscience that interfere with objectivity. Daoists say to live spontaneity, as I read in Huston Smith's book on religions and the newer book God is not One (which is an ironic title) — Gregory

I gave up that impossible project many years ago. I'm something like a soft determinist. I'm simply not troubled by religious issues (which is not to say that I don't have the usual human troubles.)