I may have missed it but tell us (again?) why – on what basis – you "don't believe
... encounters with uncreated light" are delusions. — 180 Proof

See my response to Banno, about 7 entries up.

Art48
I've quoted that very passage numerous times on this forum. Doesn't change anything I said. There's no point discussing these kinds of ideas on this forum. — Wayfarer

OK, you have much more experience on this forum than I, so I believe you. But I'm puzzled. Why is there no point in discussing a "a perennial philosophical reflection" on a philosophy forum? Can you elaborate?

Banno,

OK. People can "see stars," and weird things may occur when someone is dying. But people "see stars" when they are bumped on the head and don't claim the experience was of God. The experience of uncreated light, per Augustine, is "Not this ordinary light, which all flesh may look upon, nor as it were a greater of the same kind". Augustine goes on to call the light, God, and went from being a libertine to a saint. It seems like his experience was something more than "seeing stars."

Accounts like Augustine's seem to be what mysticism is based on. Here's another account.

In 1945, a 42-year-old Jungian psychiatrist raised Protestant, had an unusual experience.

There was light everywhere. . . . [T]he world was flooded with light, the supernal light that so many of the mystics describe . . . [T]he experience was so overwhelmingly good that I couldn’t mistrust it. . . . [G]lory blazing all around me. . . . I realized that some of the medieval poems I had been so innocently handling were written to invoke just such an experience as I had had. (That stuff is still alive, I tell you.)

Her experience lasted for five days; the aftereffects lasted longer. At age 82, she wrote her experience was “. . . so far from anything that I had thought in the realm of the possible, that it has taken me the rest of my life to come to terms with it.”

The quote is from Foster, G. W. (1985). The World Was Flooded with Light; A Mystical Experience Remembered. Pittsburgh, PA: Univ. of Pittsburgh Press, p. 33-34

I'd say the evidence can be interpreted either way. I don't deny that people who have had life-changing encounters with uncreated light may be deluded. I just don't believe they are.

The majority will never accept that there is the kind of state of self-realisation or higher knowledge that the Advaitins are speaking of, as it has no reference points in modern philosophy or Western culture generally. — Wayfarer

It is a perennial philosophical reflection that if one looks deeply enough into oneself, one will discover not only one’s own essence, but also the essence of the universe. For as one is a part of the universe as is everything else, the basic energies of the universe flow through oneself as they flow through everything else. For that reason it is thought that one can come into contact with the nature of the universe if one comes into substantial contact with one’s ultimate inner being.

From the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy entry on Arthur Schopenhauer:
https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/schopenhauer/
in the section 4. The World as Will

I've added the bold

When the retina is deprived of oxygen, it fails to send a signal to the brain, which is interpreted as white light.
Hypoxia mistaken for ontology. — Banno

The Cleveland Clinic page on Hypoxia doesn't mention the experience of white light.
> https://my.clevelandclinic.org/health/diseases/23063-hypoxia
Can you provide a source for your assertion?
Also, can a retina be deprived of oxygen without the entire body being deprived of oxygen?

I already acknowledged that experience of uncreated light may be illusory when I wrote "Quite possibly."
Are you now arguing that it is illusory?

To be fair, they were not talking to or about children, but grown men. — Vera Mont

Don't you mean "God was not talking to or about children, but grown men."?
If so, can you explain how you know what was in the mind of God?

OK, let's imagine some horrible person who turns to Jesus moments before death and ends up in heaven, enjoying the beatific vision of God. Does heaven's lack of divine hiddenness imply the person will not be able to exercise their free will (are they now a robot?) and will not be able to grow morally? Or are they somehow magically transformed upon entrance to heaven so that they don't need to grow morally or exercise their free will?

It seems to me more likely than not that these "experiences" are "similar or identical" cognitive illusions. — 180 Proof

Quite possibly. W. T. Stace in his Mysticism and Philosophy points out in chapter 3 "The Problem of Objective Reference" that severe alcoholics commonly see snakes and spiders that aren't real. On the other hand, as Stace notes, there are multiple reasons for accepting the reality of some visions as experiences of an objective reality. Much depends on one's ontology. If it doesn't include God, then obviously experience of God is impossible. If it includes an ultimate ground of existence, then how can we not experience "it", if that is what we are, if we are literally its image?

I was taught in Catholic school that the Roman Catholic Church is the "One, True Church." Which means God allows almost everyone to be born into one of the Many, False Churches. So, either I'm extra-special, or I, too, was born into one of the Many, False Churches. I'm not extra-special. So, I decided that truth was something to be pursued, not something to be spoon-fed to children. If you want to see where I ended up, here's an account of what I believe.
https://adamford.com/NTheo/NewTheology.epub
https://adamford.com/NTheo/NewTheology.pdf

The wager is a pretty shallow and ineffective idea. For a start, what if Allah is real and you are praying to Yahweh? Or what if Brahma is god but you're banking on Jesus? Or what if Yahweh subscribes to Presbyterian sectarianism and thinks Catholicism is condemnable heresy and you are posing as a Catholic? — Tom Storm

Yes. Even in Christianity, some denominations say they have the means of salvation and other Christian denominations do not. So, Pascal's wager becomes Pascal's lottery - spin the wheel to pick which religion and which denomination to believe in and then hope to God you've picked right.

The belief that a book with a talking serpent represents God's will is the fundamental false belief that engenders lots of questions like the one in the OP. Here's another "gem" from what many misguided people take to be God's Word.

Old Testament.
• “Whoever curses his father or his mother shall be put to death. Exodus 21:17
• For anyone who curses his father or his mother shall surely be put to death; he has cursed his father or his mother; his blood is upon him. Leviticus 20:9

In the following verses, it is Jesus himself who is speaking.
• For God commanded, ‘Honor your father and your mother,’ and, ‘Whoever reviles father or mother must surely die.’ Matthew 15:4
• For Moses said, ‘Honor your father and your mother’; and, ‘Whoever reviles father or mother must surely die.’ Mark 7:10

The Biblical teaching about what should be done to a child who curses a parent is quite clear. And quite monstrous and evil.

Art48
It's more that, the approach of saying there is some vital truth presented in something like Advaita Vedanta - let's take that as scientific fact, leaving behind the religious fairy tales. But what if that vital truth is inextricably connected to the religious element in the tradition? — Wayfarer

OK, but I don't believe the idea is that consciousness is like a mirror which reflects physical, emotional, and mental sensations but is unaffected by them is inextricably connected to anything. The idea happens to occur in Vedanta but it's an idea that anyone, East or West, might believe or, at least, find interesting.

Wanting to extract 'the good bits' from that, and leave behind the cultural accretions, may distort the understanding of what actually is at issue. — Wayfarer

I believe it's a clear and distinct idea which should stand or fall on its own merits. Vedanta doesn't own it.

Augustine is Neo-Platonist, and "the Light" referred to by him is "the good" of Plato's "Republic". — Metaphysician Undercover

He may have described or thought of his experience in Neo-Platonic terms, but the actual raw experience is arguably the same for anyone. A person in India might have the same experience of uncreated light and equate it with an experience of Krishna. And then there's the Buddhist Clear Light of the Void. Descriptions differ but experiences may be similar or identical.

Without cultural appropriation, Western science would still be using Roman numerals!

I would question that. I think the attempt to distill this kind of understanding outside the philosophical-religious frameworks in which it was articulated often amounts to an act of cultural appropriation. — Wayfarer

Cultural appropriation is a concept for which I have no sympathy. If China uses quantum mechanics, is that cultural appropriation? If someone in India wears Levis and uses an iPhone, is that cultural appropriation? If so, I don’t care.

Science takes the truth wherever it finds it. Religion would be better off if it did the same.

If so, then how is it that a property as fundamental as "consciousness" is so easily and frequently lost (e.g. sleep, head trauma, coma, blackout, etc) as well as altered by commonplace stressors (e.g. drugs, alcohol, sugar, emotions, violence, sex, illness, video games, porn, gambling, social media, etc) if "consciousness is closest to the ultimate ground of existence"? :chin: — 180 Proof

Excellent questions. The answer is to think of consciousness as the subject, entirely independent of objects of consciousness. Consciousness is like a mirror which reflects physical, emotional, and mental sensations but is not changed by them. In this view, consciousness doesn't cease in deep sleep but memory does, so on awakening there is no memory of being in deep sleep. Vedanta has this view of consciousness. Here's a reference.
> Consciousness beautifully explained in 200 sec
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9n6NvDpcwLM

If you're interested in this kind of thing - human peak experiences and how they relate to reality, metaphysics, etc., I would highly suggest getting into Plato and the Neoplatonists. — Tzeentch

Good point. It worth noting the debt that Christianity owes to Neoplatonism. Neoplatonic ideas were smuggled into Christianity thanks to the the writings of Dionysius the Aeropagite (also called Pseudo-Dionysius). In brief, the story is as follows. St. Paul converted a man named Dionysious who was a member of a ruling counsel of Athens called the Areopagus. About four centuries later, an unknown monk wrote "On the Divine Names" and "Mystical Theology," which were Neoplatonism with a thin veneer of Christianity. The monk used the name Dionysius the Aeropagite, so his writings were credited by later Christians as having an authority just a bit below St. Paul's. For instance, Aquinas repeatedly quotes Pseudo-Dionysius as an authority.

One reference is chapter 6 of Rufus Jones' Studies in Mystical Religion which is about Dionysius.
> https://archive.org/details/studiesinmystica00joneuoft

You will find nearly all these accounts presented in the context of religious cultures. There is a tradition of 'the uncreated light' in Eastern Orthodoxy also, and even in Buddhism there is a reference to the 'luminous mind'. There's an SEP entry on 'divine illumination' referring back to Augustine. So the degree you can disentangle it from 'religious fairy tales' and still keep the gist of it is dubious. — Wayfarer

Ultimate ground of existence is a purely secular/philosophical idea as is the idea it can be directly experienced as uncreated light. That the idea occurs in different religions is further proof it is not tied to any one religion (in contrast, say, to the idea of the Trinity). That the basic idea is not tied to any one religion also indicates it is independent of religion.

Within those traditions, those who seek to encounter the source of the 'uncreated light' are generally ascetics, renunciates and contemplatives. — Wayfarer

True. The general populace often isn't terribly interested in the truth, much less a direct encounter with it. Many scientists, however, are deeply interested in the truth.

The 'fairy tales' you refer to are mythological and symbolic means to convey religious maxims to a general audience, the vast majority of whom won't be monks or mystics. — Wayfarer

Sometimes the stories are just nonsensical. For instance, in the story of the Passover, the OT God repeatedly tampers with the Pharaoh's free will (i.e., "hardens the Pharaoh's heart) and then repeatedly punishes the entire Egyptian nation. It's a sickening the story of the OT God toying with the Egyptian nation like a sick little boy tortures a helpless little animal. And then there's the story of Jesus cursing a fig tree for not having figs when it was not the season for fig trees to be bearing figs. Or the following: This is what the LORD of Hosts says: ‘I witnessed what the Amalekites did to the Israelites when they ambushed them on their way up from Egypt. 3Now go and attack the Amalekites and devote to destructiona all that belongs to them. Do not spare them, but put to death men and women, children and infants, oxen and sheep, camels and donkeys.’ ” Of course, that's not to say clever preachers can't invent and superimpose some plausible religious meaning.

Something always is. Is this 'is' 'deeper' than 'consciousness' ? — plaque flag

Consciousness seems to be the part of us closest to the ultimate ground of existence, if not actually identical with it.

They are not reality because they cannot be instantiated. — NOS4A2

I don't understand. What can't be instantiated? The visual perception of white or black? The auditory perception of the rain? The odor of food cooking? In what sense is the sense data delivered by my five physical senses not instantiated?

You are sensing sensations. You see sight. You smell smells. It’s not reality because it doesn’t apply to anything in reality. — NOS4A2

Sensations (or sense data) IS reality.
They are what I directly and immediately know to exist.
Ideas such as mind, matter, ego, etc. are concepts.
In a mirage, the idea of water arises in my mind but there is no corresponding reality of water.

If sensation is reality, what are you sensing? — NOS4A2

Sight, taste, touch, smell, sound

Over the years, I have often heard people debating god versus no god - and the argument I seem to hear from many theists is that the world is uglier and less enchanted without a god and/or without contemplative practice. The person expressing such a view appears to regard atheism and humanism and the privileging of science over the 'supernatural' as unattractive, mean and an example of bad taste. — Tom Storm

I’ve encountered this attitude many times. To me, it demonstrates just how far some religious people are from reality. Let’s see, God created an eternal torture chamber and, at one time, sent everyone there because of the sin of Adam and Eve. But wait! There is “good news”! God is loving; so he impregnated a woman who wasn’t his wife so their little boy could grow up to be horribly tortured to death. Now, God lets a select few people into heaven – all those that accept his son as their personal savior. No, it’s all those who follow the dictates of the One True Church, the Catholic Church. No, that’s not right either. It’s all those who are baptized by immersion. Hm. It looks like his son didn’t clearly say what is needed to get into heaven. But if you’re a Christian – and you’re lucky enough to be in the right denomination and have the right belief – they you get to go to heaven. Everyone else, hell.

A wonderful world view? I leave the answer to the reader.

Do you experience experience? Or sense sensations? — NOS4A2

Sensations are what I directly, immediately experience.
Mind and matter are ideas which make my sensations coherent.

Sensations are by definition mind-dependant. — NOS4A2

You are free to define "sensation" however you wish.
For me, sensation is primary. It's what I actually experience. It's reality.
Mind, on the other hand, is a concept that describes the hypothetical experiencer of sensations.

↪Art48
the common sense view is that mind can experience things outside the mind in the world - the blue sky, the green leaves, the singing birds. — lorenzo sleakes

The common sense view also says the Earth is flat and stationary.

Are you saying that matter and mind are merely useful fictions and dont really exist? I would agree that sensations are epistemologically primary - all of our knowledge is based on them. But then we can theorize that matter and mind are real in that matter lies behind and helps make sense of sensations and mind is real in its capacity to experience them. — lorenzo sleakes

If I call them fictions, then I have a burden of proof. But it seems plain they are hypothesized entities, theoretical constructs. Sensations are fundamental and unarguable. If I'm a brain in a vat, then the matter I experience doesn't really exist but the sensations unarguably do. Mind is our name for an hypothesized entity that experiences sensations. Mind and matter are theoretical constructs; they are hypothesized entities, which may or may not exist in reality.So, if someone says sensations are mind dependent, then they are explaining the undeniable (i.e., sensations) in terms of theoretical constructs (mind and matter) which may or may not exist in reality. Explaining the certain in terms of the uncertain seems a risky strategy.

A different perspective is that sensations are ontologically primary and fundamental. Mind is the idea of that which experiences sensations. Matter is an idea we use to make sense of sensations.

But do we know that sin exists? — Tom Storm

We can define sin as doing something against the will of God.
But if God doesn't exist or if God doesn't care one way or the other what we do, then sin becomes a concept like unicorn or luminiferous aether.

We have sin. — plaque flag

I've argued elsewhere if sin is doing something against God's will, then it is impossible to knowing sin because God hasn't bothered to make his (or her) will known. All we have is various preachers giving us contradictory stories about what God wants and doesn't want.

'Field excitations' are events, I think, not "acts" (i.e. intentional agency). — 180 Proof

Good point. However, I don't mean act as intentional agency.
An event can be seen as the act of the field.
The field is doing something as opposed to when it's in the unexcited state.

Brahman. Dao. Democritus' "void". Plotinus' "the one". Ein Sof. Spinoza's "substance" Schopenhauer's "the will" ... Meillassoux's "hyperchaos" ...
I haven't seen Meillassoux's "hyperchaos" before. I'll have to look into it.

My view is that there is no conceptual equivalent for the uncreated in the modern lexicon. — Wayfarer

I've seen energy (which cannot be created or destroyed) used in that way but, of course, there are differences between that and Buddha's unborn and the One of Plotinus. The idea of one principle that underlies the universe is the object of science's search for a theory of everything. So, we have multiple concepts which, thought dissimilar, seem to point to a monist view of the universe.

I’m merely asking you to entertain for a few minutes the idea that Jesus was just a normal human being who had some good teachings about how to live. — Art48

I don't think so. For instance, Rabbi Yeshua ben Yosef is reported to have taught support of "evil" by not resisting "evil-doers" (re: "turn the other cheek" Matthew 5:38–42, "love your enemies" Luke 6:27–31, “Whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me" Matthew 16:24, etc). :brow:

Not a "word" preached against marital rape or incest, against slavery, against executions, or in favor of thinking for oneself – nothing but teachings on how to live self-abegnating lives like "sheep" to be flocked and fleeced by "the shepherd" for his piously mysterious (i.e. "revealed") purpose. — 180 Proof

I hear you. He had some truly atrocious teachings.

For instance, the Old Testament in two places says a child who curses a parent must be put to death.
• Whoever curses his father or his mother shall be put to death.—Exodus 21:17
• For anyone who curses his father or his mother shall surely be put to death; he has cursed his father or his mother; his blood is upon him.—Leviticus 20:9

There are two places in the New Testament where Jesus specifically cites those Old Testament laws with approval!
• For God commanded, ‘Honor your father and your mother,’ and, ‘Whoever reviles father or mother must surely die.’—Matt 15:4
• For Moses said, ‘Honor your father and your mother’; and, ‘Whoever reviles father or mother must surely die.’—Mark 7:10

And his teaching about disease being the result of sin and demons set medicine back a few centuries.

But I don't deny he had some good teachings, too.

↪Nickolasgaspar
These are not steps in a philosophical method, they are branches of philosophy, areas of philosophical study. What you might find in a college philosophy course catalog. — Fooloso4

I agree. Calling them steps of a method implies a certain order that must be followed. For instance, beginning with epistemology, we'd have epistemology then physics then metaphysics then aesthetics then ethics then politics.

But it's trivial to find philosophers who never wrote about about one or more of the "steps," who, for example, never wrote about aesthetics or ethics or politics. In other words, they didn't follow all the steps of the philosophical method. And consequently what? That they aren't genuine philosophers? That they weren't genuinely practicing philosophy?

Me thinks not.

If evolution is only a part of the "headset", how is it that it can explain that we are evolved conscious agents? — Banno

Because evolution is in the headset, it explains what happens in the headset.
But "conscious agents" is Hoffman term's for what lies beneath the headset.
Can you rephrase your question?

Some "goals" are moral and some are not; how do we tell the difference? — 180 Proof

Human flourishing is one, admittedly vague, answer. But it's far superior to the Bible's "morality" which says "witches" are to be put to death and which gives specific rules for the buying and selling of slaves.

Tallis' argument is clear. Hoffman claims on the one hand that "There are no such things as objects as they are usually understood as discrete items localized in space and time". But such objects are the very basis of the theory of evolution, and of science more generally. Hoffman thereby undermines the basis of his own theory.

Hoffman uses objective reality to deny objective reality. — Banno

Untrue. Hoffman says objects and spacetime are part of the headset, which implies that evolution is, too. There's no contradiction.

Science, so far, describes the headset. Hoffman is trying to discern deeper structures which project into spacetime and gives us objects, evolution, and, most importantly, the taste of chocolate. :)

Science, as we all learn, can't give us an ought from an is. — Tom Storm

At the risk of diverting this thread, I'd say that science + goals can give us oughts.
Think of science as a map. I want to go from A to B. There are rivers, mountains, and private property between A and B. So, I look at the map and plan my optimum route. If I want to get to B as quickly as possible, I ought to drive the turnpike. If I want to take a scenic route, I ought to take highway H. Etc.

The gulf between theory and practice is one of the things which makes us human. — Tom Storm

Do scientists have a gulf between theory and practice? If science says plutonium is deadly, do some scientists nonetheless carry plutonium in the pockets? Religion claims possession of the Truth (with a capital "T") but I'd say science respects the truth much more than religion.

TheMadMan — TheMadMan

Yes. And I like the Fromm quote.

Tom,

Most Christians say they believe God commands us to love our enemies and forgive seventy times seven. Yet when 9/11 happened, I don't recall any Christian saying we should turn the other cheek.

I'm NOT saying we should have turned the other cheek. I'm merely pointing out that there's an enormous gulf between what Christians (and other religious people say) and what they do, possibly in the Christian case enabled by the lofty view of who Jesus is.

Is there not a place for articles like this, and pop philosophy in general?
Sure. Why not? You can find good ideas anywhere, even in a fortune cookie.

Are they helpful or do they do more harm than good?
Both probably, as quality of articles may vary.

Was my initial reaction just an instance of snobbery, a kind of intellectual elitism?
If you were evaluating the source, rather than the ideas themselves, then maybe yes.

Can it even be done better than the philosophers and spiritual leaders from which it derives?
Absolutely. Not everyone understands "eschew obfuscation" but most people understand "strive to speak and write clearly".