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Questions of religion

Road Warrior

Seeking the middle path..
And this may be embarrassing to admit, but my issue with Panentheism is that I'd rather worship a deity of Yin & Yang or Yin, while the Philosophical concept of God has a whole lot of Yang (in my opinion).
Isn't panentheism saying that "god" is integrated with the Universe but, unlike pantheism, also outside it?
 

Road Warrior

Seeking the middle path..
I do read their posts and more than a few get annoyed by the frequent attempts of people who have a belief in God to (apparently deliberately because the point has been explained many times) mischaracterize their lack of belief in deities as a positive statement about something they may not even have bothered to think deeply about let alone express an opinion on.
Being online arguing for or against god(s) is, in itself, can't be done without a certain amount of arrogance.
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siti

Well-Known Member
Being online arguing for or against god(s) is, in itself, can't be done without a certain amount of arrogance.
Is it can't? In itself I think it is can't, but if you think it cannot can I agree that maybe it isn't can. Anyway, I wasn't arguing for or against arguing for or against god - god (if there is one) can fight his (if he is a he) own battles as far as I am concerned - I was simply pointing out that it is not appropriate for a non-atheist to decide what an atheist may or may not believe - and especially about things that are clearly not dictated by the presumption or assumption of atheism - such as physicalism for example. Atheism is not about that, it is simply about not believing in god(s). I don't see what that, in itself, can or cannot, has to do with arrogance. Is it?
 
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Road Warrior

Seeking the middle path..
Is it can't? In itself I think it is can't, but if you think it cannot can I agree that maybe it isn't can.
Like anything, arrogance has its good points and bad. Most people think it's negative but what some people call arrogant others would call "confident". On forums, obviously many people here are set in their beliefs (arrogant, confident, potAto, potahto) otherwise they wouldn't discuss it with others.
 

siti

Well-Known Member
Like anything, arrogance has its good points and bad. Most people think it's negative but what some people call arrogant others would call "confident". On forums, obviously many people here are set in their beliefs (arrogant, confident, potAto, potahto) otherwise they wouldn't discuss it with others.
Dunno - are they? As far as beliefs are concerned, the only thing I'm confident about is that I don't know - and I especially don't know the motives/motivations of others - but I am pretty confident about the definition of the word "atheism" and it don't mean what you said...as Errol Brown sang "no-oh, no, no doubt about it..." it simply means "lacking belief in god(s)".
 

Road Warrior

Seeking the middle path..
Dunno - are they? As far as beliefs are concerned, the only thing I'm confident about is that I don't know - and I especially don't know the motives/motivations of others - but I am pretty confident about the definition of the word "atheism" and it don't mean what you said...as Errol Brown sang "no-oh, no, no doubt about it..." it simply means "lacking belief in god(s)".
Which makes you in the top 10% of intelligent people. :)

Feel free to define the various forms of atheism. FWIW, think it's silly for a person to declare themselves an atheist yet believe in the supernatural. I'm an agnostic, but I do think there is more to existence than eating, sleeping and screwing from cradle to grave.
 

dybmh

דניאל יוסף בן מאיר הירש
They assert there is no god(s) or anything beyond the physical

That is the majority opinion. But, if I understand ( big IF ) there are Atheists who are spiritual, but the god concept is a problem.

@viole , see I learned something from that massive pointless thread. :p
 

Road Warrior

Seeking the middle path..
That is the majority opinion. But, if I understand ( big IF ) there are Atheists who are spiritual, but the god concept is a problem.

@viole , see I learned something from that massive pointless thread. :p
Yes, there are, but that's equivocating of them. They don't believe in a "God" yet they believe in an afterlife, ghosts, reincarnation, blah, blah, blah.

Now, if they said they don't believe in the Christian God of the Bible, I'd be first in line to agree with them but that doesn't make either one of us atheists. It just means we don't accept the perception of God as written in the OT...or NT for that matter even though the NT was more about Jesus and, later, Paul.
 

Subduction Zone

Veteran Member
Yes, there are, but that's equivocating of them. They don't believe in a "God" yet they believe in an afterlife, ghosts, reincarnation, blah, blah, blah.

Now, if they said they don't believe in the Christian God of the Bible, I'd be first in line to agree with them but that doesn't make either one of us atheists. It just means we don't accept the perception of God as written in the OT...or NT for that matter even though the NT was more about Jesus and, later, Paul.
"Spiritual" is a rather nebulous term and does not necessarily involve a belief in the after life.
 

lewisnotmiller

Grand Hat
Staff member
Premium Member
Yes, there are, but that's equivocating of them. They don't believe in a "God" yet they believe in an afterlife, ghosts, reincarnation, blah, blah, blah.

Now, if they said they don't believe in the Christian God of the Bible, I'd be first in line to agree with them but that doesn't make either one of us atheists. It just means we don't accept the perception of God as written in the OT...or NT for that matter even though the NT was more about Jesus and, later, Paul.

I'd self describe as an agnostic atheist. I don't know there is no higher power, but I'm pretty sure if there is one it doesn't fit the dogmatic beliefs of some humans.
And I see no evidence of God. But given how amorphous that term is, it's a little hard to be definitive.
 

blü 2

Veteran Member
Premium Member
1. What are the positives and pitfalls of Panentheism?
Panentheism is the notion that 'the divine' permeates the universe. For positives, one version of the god of the Stoics was said to do this, and thereby imbue it with (and so explain) motion, warmth, order and 'reason'.

Pitfalls? The absence of a definition of 'divine' appropriate to a real quality, such that we could tell whether any person, thing or phenomenon was 'divine' or not. 'God' and 'the supernatural' have the same problem.
2. What are the positives and pitfalls of Atheism?
There are a number of potential positives. In Christian societies they may include freedom from a doctrine that you're innately sinful, freedom from tithes, and freedom from arbitrary moral views like homophobia ─ though equivalents of those things can be found in certain versions of Christianity.

Pitfalls? Some people benefit from a sense of community through church membership, though others can find it outside of churches, and others don't feel a great need to formalize it.

And it's my view that I can't be an atheist unless and until I find out what real thing it is that I don't believe exists. As I said, there's no meaningful / useful definition of a real god. So I wish there was a more euphonious name than igtheism for that point of view.
3. What are the positives and pitfalls of Spiritualism?
The positives seem to be that if you do it right, you can make steady bucks out of the gullible. It's claimed that it provides many people with consolation and reassurance, even though the techniques of the Doris Stokeses and John Edwards of the world have long been a matter of public record.

The pitfalls are that on the other side you can waste steady bucks on it. I've never attended a Spiritualist church, so I don't know what's involved, but from the outside it seems an essentially sad, retrospective viewpoint. (At one time I took up the offer of someone on a net site like this to give me a reading, and we settled on her describing my paternal grandfather. It fell apart when I pointed out that she was asking me for warmer-colder responses to her statements / guesses, which I thought would be entirely inappropriate for the experiment. On the other hand, I had no reason to doubt her sincerity.)
 
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dingdao

The eternal Tao cannot be told - Tao Te Ching
1. What are the positives and pitfalls of Panentheism?

2. What are the positives and pitfalls of Atheism?

3. What are the positives and pitfalls of Spiritualism?
1. Panentheism - God is being tortued by knowing everything that is going on.

2. Atheism - The Deist God does not exist

3. Spiritalism - no positives or pitfalls - it doesn't work.

a drunken master
 

Subduction Zone

Veteran Member
Correct and, usually, both are equally right and equally wrong.
Personal experience. I have had one somewhat "spiritual event" in my life. I do not regard it as strong evidence for the spiritual, but when I ran into a person that did believe in the so called spiritual he merely scoffed. Which is the reaction everyone else had to his claims. Personally I think that we attach to much importance to some events in our lifetimes just because they are not understood. I won't say that the spiritual does not exist. Just that the evidence for it is very very poor.
 

dybmh

דניאל יוסף בן מאיר הירש
1. What are the positives and pitfalls of Panentheism?

2. What are the positives and pitfalls of Atheism?

3. What are the positives and pitfalls of Spiritualism?
All three have the same pitfall. In fact all beliefs and non-beliefs have the same pitfall. All of them need to be coupled with simple "do no harm" morality.

All three have positives, I suppose. Atheism seems to be the most practical. Panentheism is the most open minded of the three, I think. Spiritualism validates the practitioners uniqueness and value.

Does anyone have any opinions on whether Panentheism and Spiritualism are compatible?

Spiritualism, can include a belief in "others" and multiple gods. These "Others" are operating in opposition to god(s). In Panentheism, if these "others" exist they are also part of God and cannot operate in opposition to God. And there is only 1 God because ALL is God.

When Spiritualism does not include others, and only includes 1 God, it is for all practical purposes a form Panentheism or Pantheism.
 
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siti

Well-Known Member
Which makes you in the top 10% of intelligent people.
Whoopee! I had no idea that not knowing was a sign of intelligence (actually that's not true - I knew it all along - which is why I have determined to remain as ignorant as I can about as many subjects as I can not know anything about for as long as possible) - I am also going to use the phrase "I have no bloody idea" much more frequently in conversation - no doubt I'll soon be declared a genius.

Feel free to define the various forms of atheism. FWIW, think it's silly for a person to declare themselves an atheist yet believe in the supernatural.
There are no "various forms of atheism" - atheism is simply a word that denotes a lack of belief in god(s) - is this interminable conversation turning into an obsessive-compulsive disorder for me I wonder - or is it just too difficult a concept to grasp? There is nothing in the definition of atheism that prevents someone who doesn't believe in god from believing in (for example) idealism or mind/body dualism of some kind...and it doesn't have to be 'supernatural' to be non-physical - someone might believe that 'ideas' or 'consciousness' or 'mind' are non-physical realities and still not believe in the existence of deities...a physicalist would declare them to be realities that 'emerge from' or 'supervene upon' fundamental physical realities, whilst an idealist would say that it is the other way round - that the real world is fundamentally immaterial and that the physical emerges from a fundamentally non-physical reality. Indeed that view has enjoyed a resurgence among prominent scientists in recent decades - partly as a result of the extraordinary success of mathematics and quantum mechanics in explaining how the underlying levels of physical reality seem to work. You don't have to believe in God to accept that the world is fundamentally mathematical rather than material. Either view (materialism or idealism) or even both (dualism) is compatible with atheism because atheism says nothing about whether the fundamental reality is physical or immaterial. I don't think it is 'silly' to hold such a view at all - whether or not I happen to agree.
 
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