Does "materialism false" imply "intentional deception"?

[ChuckieR]

The Buddhist ideal of Nirvana is total one-ness with everything. The deception we are all under is that we are individual beings, which causes strife - the reality is that we are all one and that life and death are illusions.

So Buddhism side-steps the problem of having something else doing the deceiving - you're the one deceiving yourself.

Each different viewpoint on Buddhism helps me get a little bit clearer picture. As I understand it, people spend their whole lives trying to understand it (and trying to get closer to Nirvana?).

I get your point about us deceiving ourselves. So there is some part of our "selves" that we are not aware of (that we can never be directly aware of? That only some are aware of?). I wonder why this part of our "self" keeps itself hidden? And why it chooses to present this physical world to us?

And if that doens't clear it up, it's obviously all your fault.

 

[ChuckieR]

ChuckieR,

Well said!

The universe certainly appears to be material (for the sake of Ian, lets just say "material = an existence independant of, and not requiring, 'consciousness'").

If this is *not* true, then why do we (consciousnesses) appear to :
(a) have no contact with or information about the "true" reality (whatever it is) that we exist in;
(b) construct such an elaborate illusion?

That seems to be exactly what I'm trying to get at, stated very succinctly.

I think this must be inherent in any non-materialist belief system.

 

[ChuckieR]

Re: Re: Does "materialism false" imply "intentional deception"?

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And so I believe that this material world, as we now see it, is the end result of that process; it is a world which both sides are willing to agree upon as fair. It is a world in which atheism and materialism are, for the time being, plausible; at the same time, it is a world in which people of faith can hold to the revealed word of the living God.
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Thanks for the summary. As I mentioned in my first post, I think it's clear in most forms of Christianity that God is responsible for making us perceive this material world. And that, being "all powerful", he could choose to do otherwise, but doesn't. If he can't choose to do otherwise, then he's not "all powerful"... but that's a very old argument.

 

[Dancing David]

Chuckie:
As far as the buddha and rebirth, Siddartha Gautama vehemently denied there was any sort of rebirth, the closest he came was to say that our actions may live beyond us in thier consequences, but in Mhahyana, anything that leads to the buddha is considered to be useful and so there is the idea of reincarnation in some forms of buddhism.

The thing about atomism is very true as well, the buddha described the five skanhas which translatesa as 'heaps', so you can pile as many things that are not self on them that you want.

Peace

 

[ChuckieR]

Chuckie:
As far as the buddha and rebirth, Siddartha Gautama vehemently denied there was any sort of rebirth, the closest he came was to say that our actions may live beyond us in thier consequences, but in Mhahyana, anything that leads to the buddha is considered to be useful and so there is the idea of reincarnation in some forms of buddhism.

The thing about atomism is very true as well, the buddha described the five skanhas which translatesa as 'heaps', so you can pile as many things that are not self on them that you want.
Peace

Thanks for explaining that.

It seems that there are some forms of Buddhism that don't differ too much from materialism! In this sense, Buddhism seems to be simply suggestions as to how to live your life, and avoids any sort of theological doctrines.

Do these "pure" forms of Buddhism make any claims that differentiate them from materialism?

As an aside, do you know if buddhanet is a good place to go for the curious to get an overview of Buddhism? It seems to me to be fairly levelheaded, but I don't know enough about Buddhism to detect whether it is coming from a particular angle or is slanted towards a particular version of Buddhism.

 

[Dancing David]

As I recall they are cool, there are two main schools of buddhism, the Teravada and the Mahayana. There is no right or wrong buddism, just personal opinions, I like to read Thich Haht Hanh.

 

[ehbowen]

ehbowen,

There are between 1.5 and 2 billion 'christians' on the planet at the moment. We have a 2,000 year history of christianity. All up, that's...well... a lot of christians in total!

"Do you not know that those who run in a race all run, but one receives the prize? Run in such a way that you may obtain it." (1 Cor. 9:24)

Doesn't it ever worry you that you (and only you) seem to be the one christian to have fully discovered the "reality" in the nature of god, the devil, the universe, and the battle between good and evil?

Well, in the first place I don't claim to have "fully" discovered the nature of God, etc. There is much more about God, the universe, and so on to learn. I only claim that I have come to an understanding of these subjects which is logically consistent, which does not conflict with any known facts, and which is compatible with our best understanding of the previously revealed nature and character of God.

In the second place you must understand that I have devoted my entire adult life to seeking to know and understand God. Had I devoted that same measure of energy and dedication to physics, I might very well at this point be the one person to have ever "fully" discovered the reality of quantum gravity. Were that to have happened, should my response have been to shrink back and say, "No, there's no possible way I could be first; best to give this all up as a waste of time?" Or should I be seeking to publish my results and search for experimental confirmation of them?

I realise that you believe that god has chosen you to be a "special participant" in his plan, but doesn't it seem just slightly more likely that you've misinterpreted some signal along the way, and are reading a little more into things than might be there?

Simple answer: No.

More complete answer: Is it possible that I have misinterpreted some signal and am reading more into things than might be there? Yes, absolutely, it is possible, and I try to keep that possibility well in mind. But at the same time, as I mentioned above, I have spent my entire adult life seeking to know God and to know the truth about spiritual things. So I am not surprised that, in recent years, I have been receiving results. I still seek, and will continue to seek, the grand prize: an open revelation of God in this world and in this age. This is something which I am convinced God is willing to do, and so this is what I seek. And, while continuing to seek, I continue to believe the words of Jesus: "Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you...."

I have seen enough answered prayer that I am not easily discouraged when the initial answer seems to be not to my liking. I am convinced that seeking to know God and to know the truth about God is in accordance with his will, and so his answer to my prayer will never be, "No," but will either be, "Yes," or, "Wait for it." And so I continue to persist and wait, and, while waiting, to come to an even better understanding of the previously revealed nature and character of God. I fully expect an answer to my prayer, and I am convinced that that answer will come at exactly the right time and place and in the right way.

If finding God was easy, everyone could do it. And where would be the reward in that? But in a world which is dominated by Satan, "the god of this world," breaking through to know the true God requires supreme effort and unswerving dedication. And the reward will be commensurate.

 

[Loki]

ehbowen,

I only claim that I have come to an understanding of these subjects which is logically consistent, which does not conflict with any known facts, and which is compatible with our best understanding of the previously revealed nature and character of God.

Credit where credit is due...you have a *very* logically consistent worldview! (Edited to add - based upon your chosen axioms, I mean!)

In the second place you must understand that I have devoted my entire adult life to seeking to know and understand God.

A pity really, because you seem to have an intellect capable of achieving a great deal. A pity it's been wasted...

I might very well at this point be the one person to have ever "fully" discovered the reality of quantum gravity. ... should my response have been to shrink back and say, "No, there's no possible way I could be first; best to give this all up as a waste of time?" Or should I be seeking to publish my results and search for experimental confirmation of them?

A nice analogy, but fatally flawed on 2 grounds. First, the difference is that the pool of "thinking christians of the past 2,000 years" is considerably bigger than the the pool of "physicists of the past 2,000 years" - making it orders of magnitude less likely that you could be that "one special person". Second, (and more importantly) physics builds upon the previous works, each step a refinement of the previous - your work essentially builds on a 2,000 year old source (the bible), and directly contradicts the predominant (ie, catholic) christian teachings that have developed in that time.

So I am not surprised that, in recent years, I have been receiving results. I still seek, and will continue to seek, the grand prize: an open revelation of God in this world and in this age. This is something which I am convinced God is willing to do, and so this is what I seek.

Okay, now you're scaring me! Seriously, I'm glad you are open to reviewing your position, and that you consider "error" to be a possibility. Keep exploring that idea!!!

And the reward will be commensurate.

What reward do you hope for? What would you hope to recieve that would be denied to someone who simply lived a 'moral' live, and was a force for good instead of evil?

 

[ehbowen]

Credit where credit is due...you have a *very* logically consistent worldview! (Edited to add - based upon your chosen axioms, I mean!)

Disclaimer noted. Thank you anyway.

A pity really, because you seem to have an intellect capable of achieving a great deal. A pity it's been wasted...

The only way that it may have been "wasted" is if, in every point in which your world view differs from mine, you are correct. If there is even one particular in which I hold a more correct view of this world and this universe than you do, then my efforts have not been totally wasted. And if, as I believe, my world view proves to have been the correct one, then there has been no waste at all; indeed, I cannot think of a higher and better pursuit upon which to have spent my life.

A nice analogy, but fatally flawed on 2 grounds. First, the difference is that the pool of "thinking christians of the past 2,000 years" is considerably bigger than the the pool of "physicists of the past 2,000 years" - making it orders of magnitude less likely that you could be that "one special person".

Someone still has to win the prize.

Second, (and more importantly) physics builds upon the previous works, each step a refinement of the previous - your work essentially builds on a 2,000 year old source (the bible), and directly contradicts the predominant (ie, catholic) christian teachings that have developed in that time.

While I do not claim to be bound by (or to have studied) the teachings of the Roman church, I have not come to my views in total isolation. Aside from my upbringing in a Baptist church, I have been greatly influenced by writers such as Hal Lindsey and C.S. Lewis. Not that I hold dogmatically to their works, either--Mr. Lindsey in particular would likely have a cow were he to hear me state that I currently do not believe that there will be a "rapture" of the church.

I do feel that God has been leading me to some of my current ideas; more often, though, I have come to them by thinking through some knotty problems and by being willing to consider the limiting case. An example for your edification and amusement: Consider the problem of open conflict--warfare, even--between two entities (whether individuals or organizations) which are (a) immortal and (b) possess the ability to alter history and travel through time. What is the most probable final outcome of such a case?

Okay, now you're scaring me! Seriously, I'm glad you are open to reviewing your position, and that you consider "error" to be a possibility. Keep exploring that idea!!!

Scaring you? Isn't that what atheists in general demand; that God present himself openly and publicly with cameras, spectrometers, and a proctologist standing by? One might be tempted to say, "Be careful what you ask for. You may get it." As regards the other, though, yes, I will try to keep the possibility of error in mind. I do ask that you do the same, and that you keep in mind the possibility that the predjudices inherent in your worldview may slant how you view and respond to events. I think I may follow this up with another thread. How does, "The 'Need To Believe'--It Cuts Both Ways" sound to you?

What reward do you hope for? What would you hope to recieve that would be denied to someone who simply lived a 'moral' live, and was a force for good instead of evil?

Now if I were to give you a straight answer to that, you would think that I truly had lost it. And you might be right. So I'll just say, "Wait and see...."

 

[c4ts]

The denial of materialism is more of a different way of looking at things than a deception, unless it's coming from Ian or UCE.

 

[ChuckieR]

The denial of materialism is more of a different way of looking at things than a deception, unless it's coming from Ian or UCE.

C4ts,

I can't tell if you are being or not... so I'll assume not (please feel free to chastise me if I have guessed wrongly).

Anyway, I agree that in most cases, people who believe in something "beyond" materialism are not being deceptive (exceptions noted? though I think they are sincere in their beliefs, if sometimes frustratingly argumentative).

I was trying to argue that inherent in any non-materialist belief system, there must be some "agent" (for lack of a better word) that is intentionally deceiving us into perceiving this material world, and hiding the "real" non-material world from us.

 

[Interesting Ian]

Contravene the physical laws of nature? How so? How would esp or "life after death" do that? Which physical laws are being broken precisely?
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I suppose ESP is too general a term. I guess I'd have to observe and study a real case of ESP before I could venture an explanation of exactly what rules are being broken.

Life after death would seem to imply that there is something more to "you" than the physical body. That "something" must interact with the physical body in some way, else there is no point in positing it. That interaction/influence must occur outside the rules of the material world, otherwise it would be "part of" the material world, and hence would die with the physical body.

I think you mean contravenes naturalism rather than physical laws.

 

[Interesting Ian]

Re: Re: Re: Does "materialism false" imply "intentional deception"?

But that is the point of my question. If you believe that your perceptions are creating reality,

My perceptions don't create reality, they are reality.

then don't you have to believe that there is some deeper layer of "reality" that is hidden from you (or at least hidden from those who don't understand reality in the way you do)?

No, on the contrary, that's the position the materialist is forced into since qualia does not constitute the external world.

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With what reason are you saying that phenomenal consciousness/qualia are material? Can you give any justification for supposing they are? Can you explain what the word "material" means?
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Well, I surely can't "prove" that consciousness is material, I can only say that I haven't yet seen any reason to believe otherwise. In other words, I can't come up with any strong reason for supposing that it isn't.

But what meaning does it have to say my actual taste of coffee is material? The neural correlates of taste are yes. But you need to state that the taste is logically entailed by the neural correlates. But nobody can demonstrate this.

The "material" world is what seems to be around us

I don't know what you mean. What is a material world?

 

[Interesting Ian]

I know it's bad form to reply to yourself, but I realized that I didn't give a very good answer here.

I think that it is not really possible to just violate "one rule". The rules of nature are all intertwined. If you violate nature, you violate nature. If you can do it at all, even just a little bit, then the whole set of rules comes crashing down.

For instance, let's say you can "violate gravity", you can float. But then you could use that to generate energy. In fact, you could use it to propel a "perpetual motion" machine and generate infinite energy from nowhere. Then, you see, the whole thing stops making sense and we might as well just give up.

That's why if your belief system allows any violation at all, then you must accept that the whole thing is a deception, a fake set of rules that is put up just for your/our entertainment.

If you reject the belief that you are being intentionally deceived, and that things "are as they appear", then materialism follows, no?

Well, let's suppose that libertarian free will exists (ie my self is not the same as any physical events and my self has the capability to initiate events in the world). I suppose this would be a form of psychokinesis wouldn't it? I mean presumable at some stage neurons would start firing which could not be wholly explained by the totality of physical facts, but which are mentally caused. The energy used to initiate these events could taken from the body. So how would this contradict physical laws? I'm not sure if I understand the overwhelming difficulties here.

 

[Interesting Ian]

[No, that's a non sequitur. You could simply say you don't know how they interact, or that they don't interact(Parallelism, Occasionalism).

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I looked those two up here (first Google hit - not very deep, I know), since I'm not familiar with them:

Never heard of occasionalism and parallelism? Shame on you!

 

[Interesting Ian]

Once you have the notion that we consist of something beyond the physical, there must be some mechanism or agent that coordinates the spiritual and the physical (even if the belief system does not give specific details, it must exist).

Why?

 

[ChuckieR]

Re: Re: Re: Re: Does "materialism false" imply "intentional deception"?

Originally posted by Interesting Ian
My perceptions don't create reality, they are reality.

Thanks, I stand corrected.

then don't you have to believe that there is some deeper layer of "reality" that is hidden from you (or at least hidden from those who don't understand reality in the way you do)?

No, on the contrary, that's the position the materialist is forced into since qualia does not constitute the external world.
...
But what meaning does it have to say my actual taste of coffee is material? The neural correlates of taste are yes. But you need to state that the taste is logically entailed by the neural correlates. But nobody can demonstrate this.

I don't know what you mean. What is a material world?

This "realm of interaction" where all of the minds interact is what I call the material world. As you say above, your "neural correlates" occur in this material world.

If the mind is reality, why do we bother with this farce of restrictive, inviolate natural laws and feeble, temporary bodies?

Why does it appear that the Earth and the universe predate any minds (or at least predate any humans)? Why would we bother to construct these fake fossils? Just to trick and confuse people and cause this debate?

Why isn't it obvious to everyone that there is no material world. Why isn't it at least obvious enough, so that more people believe what you believe? Why bother making it seem (to most people) as if there is a material world.

It seems there is some intentional deception occuring here.

 

[ChuckieR]

Well, let's suppose that libertarian free will exists (ie my self is not the same as any physical events and my self has the capability to initiate events in the world). I suppose this would be a form of psychokinesis wouldn't it? I mean presumable at some stage neurons would start firing which could not be wholly explained by the totality of physical facts, but which are mentally caused. The energy used to initiate these events could taken from the body. So how would this contradict physical laws? I'm not sure if I understand the overwhelming difficulties here.

If neurons fired w/out any physically understandable cause, and this was repeatably detectable "above the noise", then materialism would be in big trouble. It would be amazing to observe, because a lot of things have to be "in place" for a neuron to fire. So would the neuron just fire w/out those things being in place? If so, then, as you say, there must be some energy being injected that would "push" the neuron to fire even though physical conditions were not sufficient to cause the firing.

Of course, nothing close to this has been observed. I am fairly confident that nothing like this will ever be observed. So it's difficult to argue the specifics and mechanisms.

Of course, if perceptions are reality, then this "minor" violation is not a problem, since nature is not "real" anyway, right? If that's the case, if nature can be violated "just a little bit", then materialism is just a big delusion, a deception.

 

[ChuckieR]

Why?

I should have been more explicit...

Once you have the notion that something nonphysical interacts with the physical, then there must be some mechanism that coordinates or allows the interaction.

Of course, with some forms of idealism, there is nothing physical. Which begs all of the standard questions. If we are all separate minds, why do we all perceive the same physical limitations? Who/what coordinates this "realm of interaction" we perceive as the physical world. If we are all the same mind, why isn't this obvious? Why bother with this farce of all these non-physical yet physical appearing people running around "remote controlled" by this big mind? Why is the fact that we are all "one mind" not obvious (to most of us)?