Well, the dichotomy is in the language and is present in much philosophising, including yours. I believe we are constantly both reasoning and emoting and that yours is as false a dichotomy, between being and doing, as whatever you thought mine was. — mcdoodle
The general feeling I have is that many critiques of 'spirituality', including yours, fail to account for spiritual feelings and emotions. What is it that the religious are feeling when they describe profound emotions? — mcdoodle
The Dawkins/Dennett approach is largely to ignore that aspect of things, and to treat religions as if they were pseudo-sciences, with all the emotion distilled into propositions. I should like to begin with mutual respect, between atheist and believer, and such mutual respect seems to me to involve accepting that 'spiritual experience' happens, feels profound to the person it happens to, combines deep thought with deep feeling, and as such has considerable standing in one's evaluation of how things are, how the world is. Even if you're an atheist like me! — mcdoodle
Everyone I know, or at least anyone that is taken the least bit seriously in the world, that argues against spiritualism, publicly and repeatedly acknowledges that people have experiences which they believe to be spiritual, and that are very emotionally moving. Of course people do. Everybody knows that. It doesn't change the fact that to many of us, we believe that those experiences that people have can actually be best described in terms of material causes. — Reformed Nihilist
Well, then you need to continue your dialogue with Mariner, for it's not clear to me that it's any *better* to describe how I feel when listening to Shostakovich or feeling a sense of oneness with the universe 'in terms of material causes'. I talk about artistic feelings in artistic terms usually, political matters in political terms, and and spiritual matters in sometimes spiritual terms and language. What your claim to 'best description' seems to involve is a rejection of the very possibility of 'spiritual terms and language', i.e. I am welcome speak on your terms, about science and stuff, but you won't speak on my terms, because you claim your terms encompass my terms. Pomos would talk about 'discourse' here and I think that's a useful term. — mcdoodle
For myself, I can imagine there might be some sort of sociology-biology-chemistry-physics chain of explanations that could in an imaginary future universe show me the 'material causes' of my saying, say, 'I believe there are more things in heaven and hearth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy.' But it's a long way off, and involves a leap of faith in the scientific enterprise. It isn't here now, revealed in the fmri scans of 23 Columbia Uni students to be the basis of thought. — mcdoodle
I disagree about emotions, incidentally, and I think that's a contributory factor here: I take emotions more seriously, as cognitive factors, than I think you do. Emotions are, under one sort of description, judgments about the world, and it's useful to talk of them in that way as well as in terms of hormones and a brain. When you argue for 'material causes' you seem to me to make a commitment to the rightness of a certain kind of scientising enterprise, and that commitment is as emotionally-based as any reasoned 'spiritual' commitment. — mcdoodle
“What do you think science is? There's nothing magical about science. It is simply a systematic way for carefully and thoroughly observing nature and using consistent logic to evaluate results. Which part of that exactly do you disagree with? Do you disagree with being thorough? Using careful observation? Being systematic? Or using consistent logic?” — Steven Novalla
The next step in symbolization, you mean. To insist on a reasoning before we straighten that out would skip the important steps. — Mariner
History can be of two kinds: personal (psychological) or social (i.e. cultural). — Mariner
What is needed now is the study of how (a) a baby learns how to develop the notions of experiencer/experienced (and what are the names given), or (b) the etymology of the words matter:spirit. — Mariner
Note that this approach is prior to any questions regarding argumentation or reasoning. We are trying to understand the origin of the symbols being used, and to trace those symbols to the underlying experience. — Mariner
You responses seem to be based on a pre-defined characterization of what you think an "angry atheist" or "evangelical atheist" looks like, and you seem to be offering critiques of that characterization. I am an empathetic, creative, caring person, who is interested in the truth. — Reformed Nihilist
I think we can say without any scientific controversy that personality, emotions, identity (and it's locality inside or outside your body) and everything else we would identify as "cognative" are a result of brain processes. Is it theoretically possible that there is a "something else" involved? Sure, there's nothing that makes that logically incoherent. There's also no good reason to assume that there is such a thing. Or at least none that I'm aware of. — Reformed Nihilist
If you aren't presenting your reasoning to me, then what are you doing, and (honest question) why should I care? — Reformed Nihilist
It doesn't change the fact that to many of us, we believe that those experiences that people have can actually be best described in terms of material causes. — Reformed Nihilist
I consider the word "spiritual" to be best translated as "psuedo-religious" in most uses. You mean something else I assume? — Reformed Nihilist
This seems to be an area worth exploring. I would tend to say 'bodily' rather than 'brain', I would worry about 'result', - but I would also say that this whole section is a 'scientific' way of speaking that slips into assuming it can represent other ways of speaking, that it can speak for us all in all contexts.
It's still much more useful, for example, to talk about 'personality, emotions and identity' in terms that aren't *reducible* to brain processes. So to argue that they are 'the result' of brain processes troubles the Humean in me: how has this been demonstrated? The models are primitive. 130 years since William James and the present-day psychological work on emotions, for instance, is amazingly primitive and lacking a secure philosophical basis, or so it seemed to me earlier this year when I was reading up about emotion. — mcdoodle
As distinct from non pseudo religious? It does not seem like a good place to start; it looks as though you want to translate spiritual into material, which is why I suspect, Mariner wants to look at the distinction rather than try and 'correct' your translation — unenlightened
Spiritual: pertaining to the general condition of the experiencer. — unenlightened
Spiritual: pertaining to the general condition of the experiencer.
— unenlightened
Would that make it synonymous with "subjective"? If so, why not just use that word, which is laden with much less metaphysical baggage? Also, what would make a spiritual experience distinct from a garden variety experience?
Edit: That definition also doesn't account for the way the word gets used. By this formulation, "I listened to a Beethoven sonata, and it was a spiritual experience" is roughly equivalent to "I had a piece of cold left-over pizza, and it was a spiritual experience", and there's not much meaningful difference between just saying you listened to the sonata or ate the pizza. — Reformed Nihilist
and it is a life-changing experience, then I would call it spiritual. Obviously, there is no absolute delineation that separates ordinary experience from spiritual, but one can say, perhaps that everyday experience accumulates as habit whereas spiritual experience disrupts. — unenlightened
To be devoid of spirituality is to be homeless. At least that's what it seems to me.
spirituality is incomprehensible if the student does not explore a time (historical or psychological, both avenues are fruitful) in which spirituality and materiality were merged in a single, unnamed concept
Spirituality: The inner life of the outer experience of the world.
It is more than mere intensity. If one has a spiritual experience, one is not the same person after it as one was before; it is traumatic, though as I said it gets mis-used for the merely dramatic. If you are indeed re-formed, then I would think you have had a spiritual experience. — unenlightened
Is there a reason why you are so resistant to adopt that term? — Reformed Nihilist
Is this [metaphysical model] something that doesn't already exist in the broader philosophical canon? I might already know it, or could read up without having to take every small step with you. If it does, give me the origin, and we can save some possible confusion. — Reformed Nihilist
I'm resistant to use a term that does not describe reality. — Mariner
Well, the entire pre-Cartesian worldview — Mariner
So you think reasoning is just make believe? — Reformed Nihilist
Also, I've been pretty laid back about this because I always remembered you being someone who was fair-minded and easy to discuss with, but I really find it hard to discuss with you when you make statements in the form that present yourself as the authority on reality. — Reformed Nihilist
You say that like there is a singular, monolithic pre-Cartesian worldview. — Reformed Nihilist
I'm struggling to imagine a reading of my last post that reaches this conclusion. — Mariner
That question of yours is being "laid back"? — Mariner
Yes, on this specific question of the nature of spirit, there was a singular, monolithic pre-Cartesian worldview. So, you don't have to read every book written before 1600 AD -- pick any book you like (including Shakespeare, incidentally) and you'll see it there. — Mariner
What exactly do you expect from this conversation? (Not a rhetorical question. If you tell me what you want from me, there is a greater chance that I'll be able to deliver). — Mariner
So spiritual is synonymous with "life changing" then? — Reformed Nihilist
So spiritual is synonymous with "life changing" then? Why not say that? Or "transformative"? Why cop-opt terms of religion, with all the baggage and possibility of misunderstanding that it entails? I guess if the context makes it clear that there is no implied metaphysical baggage, then communicating however you want is fair game. I'm just saying that it often isn't clear. Not to the listener, and (more controversially) to the speaker. Let me give you a few quotes from this thread to highlight this: — Reformed Nihilist
Compare:To be devoid of spirituality is to be homeless. At least that's what it seems to me.
The unexamined life is not worth living.
Surely the notion that something is life changing doesn't defy rational analysis? — Reformed Nihilist
We are destroyed and reformed all the time. Mostly it happens so gradually, little piece by little piece, that we don't notice, but sometimes we mark a specific event on the road if our reinvention as being epiphanous, because it is great enough in it's effect to move above the background noise of the constant change. How is that not a matter of intensity? If it isn't a matter of intensity, what is it a matter of? — Reformed Nihilist
But still you need to be a little charitable in understanding that I am not talking about the change from an empty to a full stomach. Thus losing a limb is no doubt a life-changing experience of the exterior life; it may or may not be also life changing in one's relation to oneself, and in such case it is also a spiritual experience. But one also talks about a 'spiritual person', or the spirit of the times, or as I mentioned before, of a group. — unenlightened
You bring your own metaphysical baggage with you, and on that basis complain about another's. — unenlightened
Something that changes the rational analyst does exactly defy rational analysis. — unenlightened
Are you unaware of the religious metaphysical baggage of "epiphanous — unenlightened
Surely there needs to be a thread of constancy on which change hangs, and against which it can be compared. Or is this just a theoretical, metaphysical claim? I'm not even disagreeing with you here, except to clarify that an experience can be intense without changing the direction of one's life. — unenlightened
But I have the sense that you are just refusing to engage in an exploration of inner life, and in such case you can have no 'home' in which you can entertain such ideas. — unenlightened
So a spiritual experience is one that is life changing about one's sense of self? Doesn't that make it basically the same as "transformative", which wouldn't normally refer to incidental out exterior changes? If not, in what way is it distinct? — Reformed Nihilist
Well, 98% of the atoms in our body are exchanged every year, yet we still consider it the same body. For some practical reasons, we seem to have to apply a sense continuity to objects and ideas that change slowly. We often feel that implies that there is a sort of "essential" "necessary" or "defining" quality, but that's just an assumption, and it doesn't add any explanatory power to things, so I didn't bring it into the discussion. — Reformed Nihilist
I don't know where you get that sense. I'm often accused of being too introspective and self-contemplative, so that's an odd thing for people to think about me. I don't think it's true. — Reformed Nihilist
If we can agree that there is the possibility of something real that defies analysis, then there is room in our discussion for terms that refer to it. There might be a possibility of some understanding that does not derive from analysis, but from analogy, or imagery, or whatever.Something that changes the rational analyst does exactly defy rational analysis.
I asked why the term bothered you. You said it didn't reflect reflect reality. — Reformed Nihilist
You just state authoritatively that there is a singular worldview. I say there wasn't. — Reformed Nihilist
I want to understand the steps in thought that led from either having no conception or a previous, and different conception of spirituality, to your current conception of spirituality. I want to understand mentally how you got to where you were to where you are now. — Reformed Nihilist
Yes, in that context, 'transformative' works fine. But if one were to talk of 'transformative practice' rather than 'spiritual practice', then it would be a strain; seeking is not always finding, though one seeks to find. — unenlightened
Same thing happens to rivers, I don't think it's a problem; there is great explanatory power in noticing that there is a river in a certain place, the flow is rapid and yet one knows where to put a bridge. The river rises and falls with the seasons, and the water is ever-changing. But for a river to change its course is another kind of change that deserves its own language and understanding. — unenlightened
If we can agree that there is the possibility of something real that defies analysis, then there is room in our discussion for terms that refer to it. There might be a possibility of some understanding that does not derive from analysis, but from analogy, or imagery, or whatever. — unenlightened
You just made a jump that I'm not sire I'm following. What's a spiritual practice? — Reformed Nihilist
Wouldn't you want to change it to whatever you preferred, and then leave it that way (practice often implies long term change from repeated iterations)? I know I'm generally good with my sense of self, so gradual, incremental change works for me. — Reformed Nihilist
Sorry, I think I misread you previously. I think that rational analysis and realness are 100% unrelated. You can do rational analysis on the effectiveness of Frodo's route to Mordor, and you can babble nonsensicaly about main street. I can't imagine what non-rational analysis would look like excepting irrational analysis, which I imagine we both think would be a bad idea. If you think there's something beyond or outside of that, you'll need to clarify. — Reformed Nihilist
Ok, and now I ask for evidence. Show me one pre-Cartesian work in which the notion of spirit is not used as a polarized concept (as explained earlier in the thread). Perhaps you can do it. If you do it, then I'll be shown to be wrong. It's no big deal to be wrong -- even if one "states authoritatively", which apparently is a criticism of style, and not of content. — Mariner
Prayer, meditation, self-flaggelation, peyote consumption, self-hypnosis, psychoanalysis, I don't want to draw an exact boundary, but people talk about spiritual practices, like retreats. It may all be nonsense in the sense of being ineffective, it may all not suit you or me, but it is a meaningful term for some effort to change oneself that has a long history and a current popularity. — unenlightened
Consider this in relation to my previous post, and then consider if there might be something that is not analysable — unenlightened
I don't know what it would mean to be non-analysable. Analysis is something that we do, not a property of something. I could imagine that an analysis could feel unsatisfactory or inconclusive, but I'm not convinced that wouldn't say more about the failings of the analysis than about the subject of the analysis. Saying that you can't analyse something is like saying you can't look for something.
Regarding the XYZ stuff, and the "analysing the analyser" stuff, I don't think I see the point you're making. It just seems like a needlessly complex framing of something that maybe isn't that complex. — Reformed Nihilist
First, most of the items in the list have an historical connection to religions. — Reformed Nihilist
Then I don't know how to go on, I'm afraid. — unenlightened
That is about the sum of your objections to many things said in this thread, isn't it? ';Sounds religious'. It's like the topography of an underground object, the part of the iceberg below the water-line - you can only sense its outlines, but anything associated with 'religious baggage' is rejected on that account. Excludes a lot of ideas. — Wayfarer
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