Also, per however you're using the terms, you'd not actually be answering the question I asked, which is whether thoughts, desires etc. aren't "in" or "of" minds in your view. If mental phenomena can be objective per whatever definition you're using, saying that thoughts and desires can be objective doesn't answer the question I asked. — Terrapin Station

The question you asked depends on a framework. The framework involves certain presuppositions about thoughts, reality, and how they relate together. For example you presuppose a distinction between subjective and objective. But this framework is precisely what I am denying. So of course I don't have an answer to your question - the question simply doesn't make sense under my framework, it's a false problem.

Because you think that everything is some "blurry" combo of mental and not-mental? — Terrapin Station

Again - mind to me is not purely subjective, so this question doesn't make sense in my framework.

Okay, so thoughts, desires, etc. aren't "in" or "of" minds in your view? — Terrapin Station

Thoughts, desires, etc. can be objective states of the world. It's objective that X is thinking Y. Furthermore, certain experiences can objectively demand certain feelings - such as when your mother dies, you don't start laughing - you start crying.

Re the way I use the terms, subjective simply refers to minds--or we could say, "in" or "of" minds, and objective is the complement--"outside" of minds. — Terrapin Station

Okay. Then I don't think there's any such thing as purely "subjective" and "objective". I also don't think things are "in" minds. Rather minds are in existence.

That is very confusing for me. What do you mean there are minds and existents that are not minds? Mind is not purely subjective, neither is the world purely objective.

What is acceptable as a ground for morals anyway (if anything)? — jorndoe

Virtue ethics, as developed in the Aristotelian tradition. And I agree with Wayfarer that the subjective/objective distinction is just a tool of thought, not something to be found as part of reality.

I'm sorry to say it Agustino, but I find most of what you say highly disagreeable, even repugnant.

I cannot see anything in it that persuades me you would be open in the slightest to any alternative reason on these matters, so I feel no inclination to engage with you further; it would it seems just be a complete waste of time. Good luck with your life, man... — John

Well it's quite clear that your mind isn't open to consider alternatives from what you have been taught by mainstream liberalism - hence finding what I say "highly disagreeable, even repugnant". That's a symptom of it - called in psychology avoidance, and the associated emotional reactions.

I don't find what you say repugnant - I just think you're wrong, and that's that. This is a philosophy forum, not a counseling forum. Here we're supposed to question things, even if they are cherished beliefs. I don't mind questioning for example whether tradition is important or not. Certainly you never brought the question up. I don't mind discussing the importance of authority in religion or in society - but again you never brought that up. You take your liberal principles as a priori truth, and aren't even willing to discuss them, much less question them. You consider them holy truth, and disgusting to even dare to question them! In fact principles which are different are emotionally repugnant to you. But hey - each to their own!

Also it seems to me that you don't want to admit that there is a mystical tradition at the very heart of Orthodoxy, which isn't against Orthodoxy, but is Orthodox itself. I don't see why not. You just want to monopolise mysticism for some progressive-liberal politics, but if you look at history this isn't the case in many actual cases.

And if you think I'm a proselytiser or fundamentalist, please then report me to the moderators. See what they think, as they have a rule against such people :) You can just drop them a line, they are decent and friendly people, and I'm sure they'll let you know, and also let me know if I am doing something wrong!
http://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/480/site-guidelines#Item_1

I'm not sure that very many people believe in the afterlife in their guts — Hoo

You're not, but Jung certainly was ;)

True, I think Jesus does call for repentance, but if the woman went and sinned again, he still would not judge, but patiently urge repentance again. Repentance is not some form of behavior simply taken on from without once it is shown to you, but something that must come genuinely from within, from the "still, small voice" of moral intuition. — John

Because you have divorced yourself from the culture of the time (and also from the Church which could have guided you), you have misinterpreted that part of the Bible, which people who had lived back then would have understood the way it was meant to be understood. First of all the law of the written Torah:

And the man that committeth adultery with another man's wife, even he that committeth adultery with his neighbour's wife, the adulterer and the adulteress shall surely be put to death. — Leviticus 20:10

Second of all, the unwritten, oral Torah requires evidence regarding both the adulterer and the adulteress to be brought up before sentencing them to death. Now let us remind ourselves of the situation in the New Testament:

Jesus returned to the Mount of Olives, but early the next morning he was back again at the Temple. A crowd soon gathered, and he sat down and taught them. As he was speaking, the teachers of religious law and the Pharisees brought a woman who had been caught in the act of adultery. They put her in front of the crowd.

“Teacher,” they said to Jesus, “this woman was caught in the act of adultery. The law of Moses says to stone her. What do you say?”

They were trying to trap him into saying something they could use against him, but Jesus stooped down and wrote in the dust with his finger. They kept demanding an answer, so he stood up again and said, “All right, but let the one who has never sinned throw the first stone!” Then he stooped down again and wrote in the dust.

When the accusers heard this, they slipped away one by one, beginning with the oldest, until only Jesus was left in the middle of the crowd with the woman. Then Jesus stood up again and said to the woman, “Where are your accusers? Didn’t even one of them condemn you?”

“No, Lord,” she said.

And Jesus said, “Neither do I. Go and sin no more.” — John 8:1-11

Notice the progression. A woman (without the man with whom she committed adultery) is brought up by the Pharisees to Jesus and they ask him what shall be done with her, as she was caught in the act of adultery, which is against the law of Moses. Notice that if indeed she was caught in the act, then the man must have also been caught. Now they tried to put Jesus in a place where regardless what he answered, he would have answered wrongly. If he said "stone her" he would have broken the law because he would have preferentially punished just the woman. If he said "let her go" he would have also broken the law by not punishing adultery. Now Jesus outwits them and agrees with them "All right" (thus agreeing that adultery is wrong), and then adds "let the one who has never sinned throw the first stone" pointing to the fact that in bringing the woman alone, and not the man to be judged, the Pharisees themselves had broken the law of Moses, which demands that both be brought to judgement, especially if caught in the act as they said they were, and not preferentially, in this case just the woman. As no accusers are left, Jesus upholds the law and lets the REPENTANT woman go. Notice that she wasn't some feminazi claiming "I can do whatever the fuck I want with my body, these folks don't have any right over what I do with my body" yadda yadda yadda. She wasn't self-righteous like that. If she had been self-righteous we would have had quite a different story, as has been illustrated numerous times regarding self-righteousness in the Bible. There is nothing more despicable than self-righteousness associated with immorality. She was repentant, conscious, guilty and sorrowful of her sin, which is noticed from the way she addressed Jesus, by "Lord". The problem today is that people who commit adultery aren't most of the time that way - they are quite the opposite, self-righteous. Part of the problem brought on by rampant progressive liberalism. And again, it's a very big problem that people think they can just open the Bible and understand what is being said. That is very wrong. People need the guidance of an authority, which retains the customs and traditions in memory and can guide them. Religious texts aren't novels that can be read while being detached of the culture and environment in which they appeared, and the tradition through which they have passed.

self-righteous fool. — John

According to you one cannot uphold morality without being self-righteous? The two don't have a necessary connection together you know...

This is all just malicious unsubstantiated gossip, unless you can show clear evidence for those claims about Osho and Krishnamurti . — John

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1984_Rajneeshee_bioterror_attack
Wayfarer has already provided evidence for Krishnamurti.

And again, even if those claims were true; so what? — John

The point is to show you possible effects of the statement "I am God" from people who have made the statement.

"Judge not, that ye be not judged.

For with what judgment ye judge, ye shall be judged: and with what measure ye mete, it shall be measured to you again.

And why beholdest thou the mote that is in thy brother's eye, but considerest not the beam that is in thine own eye?" — John

Said as a way to counter-act self-righteousness, which is different from upholding the law, asking people not to sin, and explaining why sin is wrong and its consequences.

I haven't anywhere denied that, or spoken about individuals becoming God in the sense of being raised above the rest of us to be beyond morality or the law — John

I agree, I just outlined to you the consequences of your discourse, whether you intend them or not. History teaches us that these are consequences of it.

but it will not do to prosecute and punish people for transgressing what are merely moral injunctions — John

Of course. That's why social means and social pressure is used to combat those. Although maybe some immoral things ought to also be illegal - say adultery. But that is a different debate.

Those matters must be left up to the individual; they are between the individual and their God, so to speak — John

Not only. Also between the individual and everyone else who is affected. The individual isn't some atom that is irresponsible with regards to how other people are affected by their actions.

the moral approbation or disapprobation their acts occasion in their fellows, and feel in their own hearts whether they have done right or wrong. — John

Yes.

Remember the official church position did not always recognize the mystics; it is only with time, distance and the softening of dogma that they have become incorporated into the official canon of the churches. — John

This is just not true. Which Church first of all? The Catholic? That's not the only church out there. You're using a simplistic narrative just because you need it to prove a point.

You're taking my words out of context and running two different things said on two different contexts together. I had said that what Aquinas thought cannot properly be argued about. If he made a clear statement about what he was thinking then there would be no argument; and if he didn't then it may only be not very fruitfully speculated about. — John

That wasn't what I was referring.

Voegelin, if I remember right, believes that the transcendent God cannot be known, which is contra the Gnostics and the whole Hermetic and Theosophical traditions, the whole tradition that I believe Hegel's philosophy reflects. Hegel believed in an evolution of spirit, and this is just what Voegelin rejects. He wants to adhere to the Orthodoxy of the religious institutions, which would keep God well away from the reach of man. I think this is absurd; God can either be experienced or else must be nothing to us.

I also believe there is a logical, reflecting a spiritual, trajectory to history. But, in any case, this is not the sort of thing that can be properly argued for or against; you either see it, and are thus convinced, or you don't. For me the same goes for God, and the spiritual dimension. — John

The other point was about church dogma, and ultra-conservative fundamentalist interpretations thereof; which I think you are guilty of — John

LOL! It's laughable if you think my interpretation are ULTRA-conservative FUNDAMENTALIST. Really - I can't be bothered to answer such nonsense. First of all fundamentalism... have I claimed the Earth was created a few thousand years ago? Have I claimed Christianity is the only way? Have I claimed evolution is wrong? No. So please get your concepts straight. Just because you don't like conservatives doesn't mean you get to throw with pejorative statements. There is a long, and respectable tradition in all religions. That isn't ultra conservative. That's just the wisdom that was passed through the ages.

self-righteous purism — John

Yeah. Good that I agree with Voegelin then that Puritanism is a form of gnosticism ;) . I guess that makes me very self-righteous and puritanical. Look - just because you unquestioningly take over the dominant stream of thought - liberalism and progressivism - doesn't give you a right to panzer over those of us who have spent time to think through these matters and question the assumptions that were given to us by the world. The fact that for you upholding moral values is purism - that is indeed very sad.

'Transcendent" means something like "that which cannot be known or experienced'. — John

Well not to me. Transcendent simply means something that is in some form "beyond us".

completely and utterly beyond us — John

I have never said "completely and utterly". These are strawmen.

Your pronouncements are truly laughable, as if you know me! — John

"as if". Read it again.

and to be as mindful as possible of our own acts, not to worry about the acts of others, and sit in judgement of them, as you do — John

I think that is quite naive. Others affect us, and therefore our well-being depends not only on us, but on our whole society. That's why in turn we care about our society. Because we understand that the pain of my neighbour is my pain.

But in the realm of ethics, because each one of us is a unique individual there will always be nuances in unique situations, such that it cannot be right to make blanket moral pronouncements such as "divorce is wrong", "adultery is wrong", "homosexuality is wrong" and other like ultra-conservative dictatorial claims such as the ones you make on these forums. — John

... For you, Orthodoxy is ultra-conservative. That's false. It is historically false to say the least. Adultery is wrong means it is harmful. Always. That's not ultra conservative. Please go research what ultra conservative is. Or read the article I have read just yesterday http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/conservatism/

Again, as I see things, you are just adopting liberal and progressive prejudicies without thinking about it. You are never even questioning them. You think saying adultery is wrong is ultra conservative. Hell - even saying sex before marriage is wrong isn't ultra conservative. Those are things that people have believed for most parts of history, and in most societies. Ultra-conservative are reactionary movements - such as Puritanism. There's a difference between the two. Apparently you don't think there is.

Can he see them, you know, being dead and all? Why would I care in any case? — John

It was a joke :)

Being is the being of beings, so how transcendent? — John

Because there is an ontological difference to speak Heideggerian to you between Being and beings.

No, the dialectical possibilities of philosophy must actually be unfolded along with the dialectic. The ideas of for example Descartes, Spinoza, Leibniz , Kant and Hegel are all new. Hegel's master idea of the whole of philosophy as the logical shapes of spirit is unprecedented. It closes the circle and brings the whole tradition together. Any ideas since have been merely explication revisitations of ideas already inherent in the tradition; or reworking variations on Hegel's system such as we find with Peirce and Whitehead, for example. — John

I have my reservations about this. What about Wittgenstein's philosophy? Or Heiddeger? What about speculative realism? What about Marxism? What about eliminative materialism? Many of these philosophies tackle quite new questions or have very new ways of approaching them.

Once philosophy as the unfolding of of all the logical shapes of rational/ empirical consciousness is complete, then the next step for spiritual science is into the supra-sensible realm of experience and knowledge. — John

Why do you think things have to continue in steps? There is an undiscussed assumption of progress underlying your discourse. And I'm not quite sure that assumption is justified, that's all.

I read the Echiridion. There were some useful ideas in it but overall I was struck by how many "do's" and "do not's" there were, as if we had to jump through so many hoops just to maintain some element of virtue. The resolutions only seemed to illuminate the problems more. — darthbarracuda

"But everything excellent is as difficult as it is rare" - someone wise said that. But people today expect everything on a silver platter...

You make mysticism sound like gym membership. — Hoo

But on the contrary my friend, gym membership isn't earned, you can just buy it and walk right into the gym. Mysticism isn't like that.

"God has to be earned!" "Look at all of these fakes!" Real Christians/mystics/philosophers/men/whatever do it THIS way, MY way. — Hoo

I never claimed Christianity is the only way though. I personally believe Christianity is the highest religion, but I can see nothing wrong with other religions being ways which lead to just the same divinity. The idea of there having been a single revelation is foolish. Certainly transcendence has revealed itself in different parts of the globe and in different ways. But all these ways involve order, the virtues, and humility. They don't involve reckless arrogance about the power and capacities of the human soul.

But of course my Christ is a symbolic Christ. Yours is a man of the Law. — Hoo

Yes indeed. In my mind the Law is required to achieve the symbolic Christ you talk of. I agree the symbolic Christ goes beyond the law - it fulfils the law. But it's not a negation of it. If the Law is the seed, then Christ is the flower :) The flower and the seed have a necessary connection with each other, even though the flower transcends the seed.

But as Rumi says, there would be no fool's gold if there were no gold. — Wayfarer

I agree to that - as I said mysticism in Christianity is a reputable tradition, and is even the culmination of everything else. But some people apparently think that it is possible to have the peak of the mountain without its body! They want to do away with the Churches, away with the traditions, jump straight to the peak! This is nothing but modern arrogance and infatuation.

I might as well say that in today's world it's so easy to be a mystic. In the past it took years of following rituals and traditions, and personal submission and exploration, countless hours of repetitive prayer and meditation until one even got near to mysticism. Now it's so easy - every Joe claims he is a mystic. This is a great absurdity.

I think it is far more likely that he came to think that it was not an accurate description of the reality of God, as that was revealed to him by his mystical experience. "As straw". But, you are entitled to your alternative interpretation; as I already said it's not something that is susceptible to determination by argument.. — John

Well it certainly is much more likely as an explanation. Aquinas certainly did not renounce any of his writings as wrong. Only insignificant in relation to the full truth - like straw. Nor did he renounce the importance of the Catholic Church for that matter. So the presumptuous interpretation is clearly not mine. You are making a series of blatant assumptions about him, which are simply not warranted given his entire life. Not that they are impossible - they are certainly possible. Only that very unlikely.

For one; there are only the usual dogmatic or doctrinal differences between 'becoming one with God" and "becoming God" that stand in the way of my alternative interpretation; and I have already made a point of not accepting the logical validity of those theological orthodoxies; so there doesn't seem to be much point to throwing them back at me again. — John

No those "doctrinal" differences have practical significance. Becoming God can very easily be associated with anything being permitted for you. Like Osho Rajneesh having promiscuous sex with his disciples. Or poisoning a community. Or Krishnamurti having sex with one of his friend's wife behind his back, and having her have an abortion. These are very practical consequences of believing you become God. Furthermore it is also a practical consequence that some people will be deceived and think you are justified to break moral laws because "you are God". So how can I adopt a position which will put you beyond any possible criticism or restraint - because now you are God? That is nonsense. That clearly cannot be a principle of order. "You shall know them by their fruits"

I have asked you to explain clearly what necessary logical or experiential differences there are between becoming God and becoming one with God. — John

I just did. I may add that becoming one with God implies sharing in his holiness, and gives a different attitude. Furthermore, it allows verification and rational criticism. Others can look at you and determine objectively if you have become one with God by comparing you with Christ.

I mean presumably all mystics are speaking about basically one kind of experience — John

From where do you get this assumption? Experiences of the transcendent can be quite varying. That's why it's a personal relationship with the transcendent. No two people's experience will be the same, or even necessarily alike.

What philosophy is (or should be) about is finding the way to speak about these experiences which is most logical and in accordance with human experience generally. — John

Yes - and also to promote order, exactly as Plato said.

Regarding Eckhart's sermon. Yes I agree with it, the human soul, pneuma, literarily means breath - hence the breath of God. So certainly man is in his deepest nature divine. Furthermore Eckhart makes the necessary distinction between "the essence of God" which is above what he terms God. So in stating he is above God he merely claims that in him lies something that is of the essence of God - the pneuma. This is entirely orthodox, and has no Gnostic content. It is indeed a mystical experience and revelation. But there is a mystic tradition in Orthodoxy. Only Gnosticism is heretical - mysticism is not, regardless of some mystics who were falsely accused. So I have nothing but respect for such mystical tradition, but I understand that such a tradition can only flourish when order exists in society - when there is a religious authority.

I disagree with the rest of what you say because it is nothing more than a determinately one-sided expression of orthodox theology; a kind of fundamentalism. But there is no point arguing about it, because fundamentalists are never convinced by arguments. — John

Funny that the person who says some things cannot be argued is then the one to suggest that fundamentalists can never be convinced by arguments. Well neither can you! That's why you claim some things cannot be argued. I make no such claim. I think everything should be open to disagreement and rational exploration. But you refuse to explain or provide any justification for your claims that could be argued or debated. You play the line "not everyone has the experience - thus not everyone gets it" as a run-away tactic. There's nothing I or anyone can say to disprove you. We cannot deny your experience. You place yourself beyond rational criticism. I don't. I explain how my beliefs are necessary for order, and how order is necessary for the flourishing of society and the happiness of man, including the achievement of mysticism.

You speak about maintaining order in the name of transcendence, but this is a vacuous notion since anything genuinely transcendent could not be known at all, and would be nothing to us. — John

Unless a part of us, the part Eckhart is talking about, is also transcendent :)

What you are really valorizing is the enforcement of order by earthly authorities that arrogate to themselves the mandate of a divine authority. This idea is truly repugnant to any free spirit. — John

We are beings of flesh as well as spirit. Fulfilment of our nature requires divinization of the flesh, not its repudiation. You seem to ignore that we live in the world, and not in mystical flights of fancy - this is what typically happens when someone approaches mysticism on their own, not guided by the wisdom of tradition. So yes - order is necessary, without order there is no stability, and without stability nothing great can be achieved.

But I'm thinking something more along these lines: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antinomianism — Hoo

That is incoherent to me. Whether they follow the law of Moses is precisely the verification for whether they are saved. Someone who no longer lives in sin, does not live by breaking the Law.

In the case of psychological problems, cognitive behavioral therapy, which owes much to Stoicism, has been employed successfully to combat depression. — Ciceronianus the White

Yes I agree. CBT in fact is very much like stoicism - apart from the metaphysical propositions and the worldview. I think actually stoicism is superior as it is a worldview (great applicability) - CBT is a therapy designed to cure particular problems - say fear of airplanes, or health anxiety - and thus has a smaller scope. I found ACT therapy to be an improvement on CBT and stoicism though - basically a combination of CBT and mindfulness, and somewhat better than CBT at changing a person's attitudes not only in regard to a specific problem, but in the entire way they approach life. One of my best friends is a psychologist who works primarily using ACT - they often deal with patients who have to live with chronic pain and other such conditions.

If a resolution isn't being sought, what can be said? — Ciceronianus the White

Well the seeker has to start disliking the way they experience the world - maybe because it is unfulfilling - and seek after a different way of relating with it. There's many different ways of experiencing the world. Even after one recovers from depression, even that recovery may not be an optimal state yet. Very often people who recover from severe depression or trying circumstances retreat from life - in the sense that they become easily satisfied, and prefer to do as little as possible so long as they can remain comfortable doing that. And when discomfort comes, they just bear it - but they don't reach out into the world very much - their desires become quite minimal. Their consciousness is quite stoic - so they attain to equanimity, but their life becomes quite tedious too. They learned to deal with pain and adversity, but maybe they could live a bit more colorfully while retaining those lessons. All that can be done in that case is suggest the possibility to them - sooner or later they will understand that they are living a good life, but could perhaps live better. Not by renouncing what they learned - but by incorporating it into a practice that is more expansive in the world.

That it transcends may be so - but the notion of Freedom (what you term Christ) without Law is incoherent for me.

There's also some anarchism, etc. in this:
Christ is the end of the law.
— Paul
And so on. — Hoo

:D Not really no - that means Christ is the TELOS (goal, but often translated as end) of the law. Not the abnegation of it, but the fulfilment of it. Christ can never be opposed to the law.

I've just finished this wonderful article! Finally something I can agree with politically!
http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/conservatism/

That's why I think Epictetus is pertinent, though. It's life (I think!) that's being addressed in this thread, and rather shabbily. It seems to me this is due to an excessive concern over things which aren't in our control (to use Stoic phraseology). And for my part, I think that concern is unreasonable, if not irrational, and in that sense Stoicism can "rationally enlighten" us. — Ciceronianus the White

I agree but I lean more towards thinking that the thread is about a particular state of consciousness which experiences the world in a certain way. This is ultimately a self-contradictory state of consciousness as it undermines itself - it is unhappy with its own way of being, and seeks for a sort of escape. There is no question of rationality here - the pessimist / instrumentalist or however else he is to be called understands that there is no point in complaining about the world. And yet he still does it, the way a bird would still sing its song even if there were no purpose to it. So making one understand that it is not rational will not change their act - they understand that, and their song is a protest - a self-consciously absurd one. It's their attitude and reaction to something that has to be changed, and yes, stoicism does potentially have the tools to do this. But it's not about rationality. It's about showing that the fulfilment of this state of consciousness lies outside of itself, and then of course in actually inducing the switch. Because it is like a switch - change the glasses, and then the world looks and feels entirely differently.

For those who live, Epictetus' recommendation is sensible--do the best with what you have and take the rest as it happens. — Ciceronianus the White

Well could one for example make the best with what one doesn't have? Or could one take what is out of one's control any way but the way it happens? I think the greatness of the stoics lies primarily not in the rationality of their philosophy but in engendering good attitudes - the purpose of stoic discourse obviously can't be to rationally enlighten someone - it's patently obvious that one can only do the best with what they have, and can do nothing but accept what is outside of one's control. The purpose must be to create the attitude in the soul, such that when one encounters a certain type of experience (obviously a difficult one) then one's reaction is changed. Furthermore, one develops certain virtues, such as resilience in the face of adversity, perseverance, courage, and so forth. Stoicism is less philosophy and more way of life, achieved via a certain oft-repeated discourse aimed at re-minding one of key principles.

A man so extraordinarily brilliant, quite possibly the greatest philosopher ever — John

Have you yet started praying so that Schopenhauer won't see those words? ... X-)

Being immanent has no such connotations for me. Immanence is the being of things; being cannot become an object for a subject, to say that is to evince an incoherent dualistic mode of thinking, that is, if you intend it to carry any significance beyond being merely a convenient mode of locution; to repeat: being is immanent in both subject and object. — John

Yes but Being itself is different than any particular being. Being is transcendent relative to being.

Thus, there are no possible new questions now, that is. — John

Why would this not hold true in the time of Aristotle? Voegelin's vision would be the possibilities of consciousness are always there - whether in Aristotle's time, or Hegel's. Thus history cannot be divided into blocks, or assessed linearly.

Now, with modern science being where it is, spiritual science is possible; which will yield endlessly new knowledge in the spiritual evolution of humanity, if all goes well. — John

This seems to be a very gnostic structure - I'm not sure what will actually happen - I don't know the end of history, and I think it is a mistake to think we do.

Maybe he would have come to see God as an absolute immanence, and thus to have come to think that his writings about the transcendence of God were "as straw". It's not really a point worth arguing about, in any case, since what he thought can only be speculated about. — John

Highly unlikely. He did not dismiss the Summa as wrong - but as completely incapable of describing the extent of reality, being equivalent to a small corner of a large puzzle.

I am not familiar enough with the writings of the other two to comment; but Eckhart speaks extensively about becoming God, so he might be seen as a thinker of the immanence of God. He expressed a kind of panthentheistic vision of God, and was charged with heresy for that. — John

"In Him we move and have our being". Wayfarer is right, Eckhart never claimed one becomes God - rather that it is possible to achieve union with the divine - in Christian terms this would happen when one's will is entirely aligned with the Will of God. This is not immanence, because the divine always exceeds. One merely has their being in the divine - it isn't the whole of the divine.

For me this is an extremely facile point, There are many things which can be "experienced and encountered" for example, love, truth, beauty, hope, faith, etc., in that sense known, which cannot become objects. — John

They are objects in consciousness (for the most part - some of those experiences like love can and sometimes to point to the transcendent, and in-so-far as they do that, they too are transcendent). The experience of the transcendent is precisely that which you experience, but you never fully surround with your consciousness. There is always something missing in that experience. Rudolf Otto's The Idea of the Holy or Mircea Eliade's The Sacred and Profane are good reads on these themes.

I can't see a difference that makes a difference between the idea of becoming God and becoming one with God. — John

Becoming God = becoming Being itself. Becoming one with God = "in him we move and have our being". The two are radically different. Theosis - divine union - is also different. According to Eastern Orthodox Christianity, which has this view (and I know as I am an Eastern Orthodox), all of us achieve theosis after death - we are all united with God. Those who hate God perceive God's love as hell - those who love God perceive it as Heaven. Furthermore, it is possible for people like monks to achieve the experience in this life also. Theosis is when the sinful human being becomes divine - like God - BUT NOT IDENTICAL TO GOD. No being can achieve ontological oneness with God.

A sure warrant for looking forward with hope to deification of human nature is provided by the Incarnation of God, which makes man God to the same degree as God Himself became man ... Let us become the image of the one whole God, bearing nothing earthly in ourselves, so that we may consort with God and become gods, receiving from God our existence as gods. For it is clear that He Who became man without sin will divinize human nature without changing it into the Divine Nature, and will raise it up for His Own sake to the same degree as He lowered Himself for man's sake. This is what St. Paul teaches mystically when he says, "that in the ages to come he might display the overflowing richness of His grace" — St. Maximus the Confessor

Thanks for remedying my foolishness Wise Willow :D

And I haven't said anything about knowing or experiencing the transcendent, because both notions are incoherent. There is no transcendent apart from the immanent, and that is precisely Hegel's point. — John

Well it is precisely Voegelin's point that there is something which cannot be known - which will forever exceed the human grasp, even though it can be experienced and encountered, but it can never become object - the known.

Can you name some of the mystics you are referring to here? If St Thomas cast aside the Summa on the basis of a mystical experience, then we may conclude that he would have come to a place where he would have disagreed with Voegelin. — John

Why do you think he would have disagreed with Voegelin?

Can you name some of the mystics you are referring to here? — John

Bodin, Pseudo-Diyonisus (who by the way was the biggest influence on St. Thomas after [well, before chronologically speaking] Aristotle), Eckhart. These are some of the names that come to mind. Voegelin also expressed respect for Bergson if he counts.

For me, you are performing an incoherent separation here. "Meaning, love, hope, value" are not in things in the sense of "being contained' by them, but in the sense of being inherent in them. — John

I agree with Aristotle about most things - forms are immanent. But the Neo-Platonists also have a point about Forms which are transcendent - don't have an object in this world.

This is just what it means to say that God is immanent, 'right here with us', as opposed to transcendent ' impossibly distant from us' — John

Immanent also has connotations of meaning something that can become another object for you. Something is immanent - it can be an object to a subject. God cannot be an object to a subject. Therefore God is not immanent.

So, to refer back to our other discussion it is not a matter of "immanentizing the eschaton"; the eschaton is inherently immanent, and how could it be intelligibly otherwise? — John

The end of history is immanent? Where is it? I don't see an end anywhere. That's precisely what is meant by transcendence. The "end" that you speak of never occurs - not in this immanent sense. There will never be an "end of history" or "end of the world" in this sense. The transcendent end - that is a different story, and Voegelin does agree with a largely Augustinian historiography which separates the City of Man from the City of God.

Voegelin, if I remember right, believes that the transcendent God cannot be known, which is contra the Gnostics and the whole Hermetic and Theosophical traditions — John

You have to be careful here. There is a tradition of mysticism in Christianity and this is different than Gnosticism. Voegelin is very sympathetic with this tradition - as he is with many of the Platonists, and their direct experience of spiritual realities. Even people like St. Thomas Aquinas were mystics in the end - St. Thomas Aquinas reputedly said towards the end of his life after having a religious experience that everything he has written is like straw - that's why he left his Summa unfinished. But yes - knowledge of the transcendent - Voegelin would be against that. He wouldn't be against experience of the transcendent. But man must not forget his creatureliness - he cannot KNOW the transcendent - surely he can experience it, but to claim knowledge (and hence mastery) of it is absurd. Because the transcendent is always transcendent - to know it, would mean to make it object. And that is just what is impossible, and the same mistake I believe Hegel makes via the absolute knowledge. This obviously leads to disorder - if I claim I know the transcendent, soon I will claim that whatever I want is right and truthful because I know and you don't - because you don't have the same experience I do. Voegelin was against this - he was against this sort of dangerous dogmatism which is immune from rational criticism and hides behind "secret knowledge" that only it has access to.

He wants to adhere to the Orthodoxy of the religious institutions, which would keep God well away from the reach of man. — John

The same Voegelin who frequently expressed the opinion that the Book of Revelation shouldn't be part of the Bible, and who thought that St. Paul may have been a gnostic? :P There is something different Voegelin wants. He wants to adhere to order - not to Orthodoxy or dogma. Order both in society and in the soul, and he rightfully notes that this requires adherence to certain structures and practices. Mysticism and experience of the transcendent is very good - but order is also necessary. The problem with the Gnostics is that their vision and their pursuit of it would tear society apart - the centre would not hold. It's not that they wanted to experience the spiritual directly - that wasn't the problem.

Voegelin transcends the label of conservative. Yes he would agree with conservative ideals by and large. But he is also critical of many conservative practices and dogmatisms. That's why he could never understand why Russell Kirk liked him so much.

But, in any case, this is not the sort of thing that can be properly argued for or against; you either see it, and are thus convinced, or you don't. For me the same goes for God, and the spiritual dimension. — John

See this I believe is what Voegelin attempts to criticise, because at this point I can't contradict you. We cannot engage in rational conversation to find out the truth at this point, because there is no ground for it left. I can say you're wrong, but it will be my opinion against yours. We can't be engaged in dialogue which would be conducive to resolving this and getting closer to truth because the ground of your opinion is something which is inaccessible to some people.

No worries :)

OK. You're saying there are things which exist, but which have no location. Right? — Mongrel

Which aren't physical, so in-so-far as this entails not having a location, yes.

I don't agree with his characterization of Hegel and the Gnostics — John

Ok can you unpack this? Along what lines don't you agree with his characterisation of Hegel and the Gnostics?

I don't see the modern change in consciousness as necessarily a loss; in fact it should be a gain. It would be a gain if it incorporated, instead of rejecting, the previous shapes of consciousness. This is Hegel's point, and the point that much of modern philosophy has neglected. — John

This only holds if Hegel is right and history has direction. But what if, as Voegelin outlines especially in his late Ecumenical Age, history has neither direction nor finality? Then we're back to Plato and what he thought - identifying patterns that emerge, appear, disappear, and re-emerge in human consciousness. Possibilities in consciousness which always exist.

How is that different from saying that non-physical things exist? — Mongrel

It isn't. But they certainly don't exist "in" the universe. For to exist "in" something is to be physical. They existence "in" only by analogy.

Could you expand on this? I'm not quite understanding. — Mongrel

Existence contains non-physical elements (which are objective - they really do exist - contrary to what some are inclined to think) - meaning, love, hope, value, etc (as well as the universe). The universe contains physical objects - chairs, atoms, houses, bodies, etc.

You and I may not agree on the details; but I think we would agree that much (or even most) of modern philosophy is seriously one-sided and lacking real significance for human life. I'm coming more and more to think that Hegel has been misappropriated by the Post moderns and that much of their own more or less arbitrary fossicking in the tradition seems to, on the basis of nothing more than merely fashionable 'modern' prejudices ' throw the baby out with the bathwater'. — John

I largely agree with that. For me I found Barfield's book as a convincing argument that (1) there are things in the world not amenable to being reduced to physics, (2) that consciousness changes and evolves - it governs the way we feel and perceive the world, (3) primitive people are not our inferiors, they just had a different consciousness, (4) our consciousness plays an active role in creating the world we experience. These insights were further refined for me by writers such as Mircea Eliade, or Eric Voegelin who unveil how much we have lost through this "modern" change in consciousness that has occurred.

Cool, thanks! This question might seem to be coming out of left field, but it's related to stuff I've been pondering lately. Does God or divinity play a role in your thinking about the universe? — Mongrel

No. The universe, for me, consists of physics, and stuff amenable to physical investigation. Existence is larger than just this however. Nothing - no scientific conclusion - has anything to do with religion. All that it has to do with is the physical world. Regardless of what the physical world is like, the other realms of experience are left unchanged - hence meta-physics - valid for all physics.

And what about research whose conclusion defies what makes the most sense to you? — Mongrel

Depends on the particular situation, I don't have a set of rules which would always apply, simply because there are too many variables involved. Generally if I disagree with a certain research and its conclusions, I will either disagree in its interpretation, or I will pinpoint some defects that have to do with its methodology. It is quite easy to engineer a result if you need it through your research method.

Could you accept a scientific theory whose conclusions can't be verified experimentally, but which is satisfying by virtue of the number of loose ends it ties up? — Mongrel

Well no scientific conclusion can be verified - they can just be falsified. I believe reality is rational - thus the scientific conclusion in question has to fit in with everything else we know, just like a specific piece fits in a puzzle. So that is at minimum a condition I expect all scientific hypotheses to meet. If someone brings up the hypothesis that eating grass cures testicular cancer - well then I will dismiss it out of hand, because (1) a mechanism through which such a cure is achieved isn't provided, and (2) it disagrees with all the background knowledge we do have.

Both - we can clearly know both through reason, and through experience.

Perhaps we mean different things by "transcendent." — Ciceronianus the White

Probably.

For me, what is in and takes place in the universe is not transcendent. — Ciceronianus the White

My only problem with that is that the Universe generally has the connotation of being the sum of everything that physics can account for - and I don't think this includes the whole of existence.

We can have no idea of the truly transcendent because we can have no idea which doesn't arise from living in the world, as part of the world. — Ciceronianus the White

If you define "world" as the whole of existence sure.

Very well - I fail to see how this can account for the vast variety of content of the world, which escapes the physical. For me, the transcendent is clearly part of our experience. We experience the transcendent. Meaning is transcendent for example - nowhere in the purely physical will you find any meaning.