Faith vs. Hope

Originally posted by Bosse de Nage
Spelling mistake. Mimamsa.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mim%C4%81%E1%B9%83s%C4%81

(Don't know if the article does it justice ... )

Ah. No. More Zen, Taoist, and Advaita Vedanta—though the Spanda school of Kashmiri Shaivism (which, despite its theistic Shiva language, is thoroughly non-dualist) interests me.

Name and form hide Reality: This is the Teaching.
Giving name and form is an obstacle to freedom
because then the substratum, Consciousness,
cannot be seen.

—H.W.L Poonja in This: Prose and Poetry of Dancing Emptiness (Poonja started as a Vaishnavite, ended as an Advaita Vedantist).

When waves rise the ocean loses nothing
and when waves fall the ocean gains nothing.

As waves play so the ocean plays.
I am ocean, I am water, I am wave;
separation between water and ocean
and wave cannot exist! . . .

Giving rise to an “I”, or any other thought,
is giving rise to a wave.

—H.W.L Poonja

The divine reality you seek
is your own mind.

—Wolfgang Kopp-roshi (Zen)

The Self [atman] is theSatguru,
you will get help from within.
Here your true guide is,
here all wisdom and knowledge is,
but due to your preoccupations you do not see it.

The Satguru is within,
meditate only on That.

—Poonja, again

I am that which gives rise
even to the thought “I am”;
I am that which give rise
even to the thought
“I am that which gives rise
even to the thought ‘I am’”. . .

--vistesd 🙂

_________________________________________________

Sorry that took so long: I lost my internet connection.

Originally posted by vistesd


I am that which gives rise
even to the thought “I am”;
I am that which give rise
even to the thought
“I am that which gives rise
even to the thought ‘I am’”. . .

--vistesd 🙂

That is very Mimamsaic, at least according to the potted view I have got from M. Hiriyanna ('Essentials of Indian Philosophy'😉. I am object and subject ...

Originally posted by Bosse de Nage
That is very Mimamsaic, at least according to the potted view I have got from M. Hiriyanna ('Essentials of Indian Philosophy'😉. I am object and subject ...

Well, all I know is what was in the link you gave. It seemed to indicate that that Mimasaka is ultimately theistic, and follows an orthopraxy based on the Vedas. I am pretty non-ortho as well as nonaligned, and all those other “nons”…

The I-langauge is always difficult. I was aiming for that substratum that is essentially ineffable because it is what does all the “effing”—even in terms of the self-reflective loop.

I know who I am,
but even that “who I am”
is an expression expressed
by that who I am . . .

But that who I am
can never get lost—never at all!—
in those soap operas played
by the “who I am” who plays
at forgetting who I am!

Ah the maya make-up Shiva puts on
to hide himself from himself!

But now, at least, I know . . . 🙂

Originally posted by vistesd
Well, all I know is what was in the link you gave. It seemed to indicate that that Mimasaka is ultimately theistic, and follows an orthopraxy based on the Vedas. I am pretty non-ortho as well as nonaligned, and all those other “nons”…

Must be a lousy Wiki.

But Advaita Vedanta subsumes the good bits of Mimasa. To think that Shamkara was only 32 when he died. Makes Spinoza seem geriatric at 45.

What is a positive definition of 'non dualist'?

Originally posted by Bosse de Nage
Must be a lousy Wiki.

But Advaita Vedanta subsumes the good bits of Mimasa. To think that Shamkara was only 32 when he died. Makes Spinoza seem geriatric at 45.

What is a positive definition of 'non dualist'?

Ultimately everything is an interrelated part of one Whole. (For example, there is not the cosmos and then a separate creator, as in dualistic theism.) By definition the Whole is boundless.

My version now: The Whole consists of figures (phenomena) and ground. Only the figures are ever perceived, but they can only be perceived vis-à-vis a ground. The figures can be perceived singularly (a tree vis-à-vis a meadow or even a forest), or collectively (a forest vis-à-vis the mountain, or an extending plain, etc.). The ground is implicate. This is my gestaltic formulation. The ultimate ground is just—the Whole, which itself cannot be perceived as such because there is no “view from nowhere”. The forms are not really separate from the ground, just as the gulfstream is not separable from the ocean.

If the ground were essentially inert, static, passive, then some exogenous force would have to be posited for the arising of the figures/phenomena—and that would be dualism again. Therefore, it makes sense to posit that the Whole is dynamic (e.g., the Tao), and that the figures/forms are expressions/manifestations in, from and of the Whole (or the ground). This does not mean that there is any “leftover” that is unexpressed (my line about no part of Shiva uninvolved in the dance, on page 5 here—a poetic rendering of just this). Therefore, I call it the implicate expressive ground (or Tao, or Brahman, or Shiva&hellip😉.

Got to go: a storm is approaching, and don’t want to lose another computer! Check my post on page 5 of this thread…

Be well!

Originally posted by Agerg
You seem to be implicitly making the statement there is only one type of atheist: the type that affirms the non-existence of gods. Without getting drawn into a long debate over semantics let's say I'm an agnostic that operates under the assumption god doesn't exist (so as to avoid using "atheist" ) since I have precisely no reason to believe otherwise.

Simi ...[text shortened]... raise 2 to the power of the largest prime found so far and subtract 1 we get another prime.

I think there is a reason why people end up arguing about definitions of terms like 'atheism' in such a dogged way. It reminds me of chess openings, because I think the dialogues between atheists and theists can be stylised and ritualistic, with each jockeying for initial advantage.

This can lead to some odd middlegame positions in debates. Why else would an atheist say with a straight face something like 'I don't believe that there isn't a unicorn in the forest, I just lack a belief that there is a unicorn in the forest.'

If people are prepared to listen to each other then the labels are not so important.

I thought your prime number analogy was interesting and wonder whether there are some parallels with atheism and agnosticism. If we raise 2 to the power of the largest prime found so far and subtract 1, then we get a Mersenne Number. Then I can ask, is it prime? Well, I don't know, but can I think about how likely it is to be prime? Since it is not known whether the set of Mersenne primes is infinite and we also don't know whether the set of composite Mersenne numbers with prime exponents is infinite, what odds should I accept that 2^p-1 is prime if p is the largest known prime?

There are some conjectures about primes that suggest that both the sets mentioned above are infinite. Given the fiddly nature of transfinite arithmetic, what does it mean to say you have 'precisely no reason to believe' we get another prime?

Originally posted by Lord Shark
I think there is a reason why people end up arguing about definitions of terms like 'atheism' in such a dogged way. It reminds me of chess openings, because I think the dialogues between atheists and theists can be stylised and ritualistic, with each jockeying for initial advantage.

This can lead to some odd middlegame positions in debates. Why else wo at does it mean to say you have 'precisely no reason to believe' we get another prime?

Hmm...I responded to Bbarr on this a few posts later with the following:
- The 40th Mersenne prime is 2^20996011-1 ~= 10^6320429
- There are roughly 10^(6320429-17.3) primes less than M_40 (40th Mersenne prime)
- Before we hit M_40, 20995971 positive integer choices of n we exponentiate 2 by (then subtracting 1) would not yield a prime. (running out of edit time but I can also show that of these n that are prime there are sufficiently many to bear out my claim 2^p-1 is prime if p prime is unlikely)

Given this, if we then exponentiate 2 by the largest prime so far (it's Mersenne) and subtract 1 then it is far more likely the result we get will be composite; so much so that my reasons for believing otherwise are negligible. Maybe "precisely" was a poor choice of word, "practically" would have been better perhaps. That there are infinitely many primes (and conjectured infinitely many that are Mersenne) shouldn't affect the behaviour of 2^n -1 for n 'large'.


Responding to the first part of your post, if truth be told though, the notion of 'God' is entirely meaningless to me. Not buying into popular assumptions about this supernatural entity (or entities) I have little basis to talk about it's properties/abilities (or it's supernatural dwellings) with any degree of confidence. By definition, "supernatural" rules out my capacity to ever have sufficient insight as to whether there is or is not such an entity (so long as I am not supernatural or can do supernatural things); and so an assertion of existence either way is unjustified. Thus it's safer to state that I simply do not believe.

Originally posted by 667joe
Theists say they have faith, but in reality, what they really have is merely hope!

faith ends in sight, hope ends in fruition

Originally posted by Agerg
Hmm...I responded to Bbarr on this a few posts later with the following:
- The 40th Mersenne prime is 2^20996011-1 ~= 10^6320429
- There are roughly 10^(6320429-17.3) primes less than M_40 (40th Mersenne prime)
- Before we hit M_40, 20995971 positive integer choices of n we exponentiate 2 by (then subtracting 1) would not yield a prime. (running out of edi ...[text shortened]... either way is unjustified. Thus it's safer to state that I simply do not believe.

Yes I saw the response to bbarr and I was a bit puzzled by that exchange.

Initially, you seemed to be making the point that from this remove, we have no reason to suspect that 2^p-1 is prime if p is the largest known prime. It does seem that it would be an extreme fluke if it were prime, so we probably agree on the substance of your point.

Bbarr seemed to respond with a separate point, which was something like given p is prime and amongst the largest known, p is very likely to be Mersenne. This seems right too.

Your response seemed to establish that the density of Mersenne primes amongst primes is very low, which is fair enough but as you accepted, not relevant to the proportion of very large known primes that are Mersenne.

I see you have now accounted for the fact that only a proportion of the 20995971 positive integer choices of n are themselves prime, so that deals with a minor quibble.

Now, at least in this scenario we do have ways of thinking about what it would be rational to believe about 2^p-1. I agree with you that when it comes to god, it is difficult to fix a meaning for the term such that, in turn, we can talk meaningfully about the existence or not of its referent.

My point was that haggling over the definition of 'atheist' is symptomatic of well rehearsed arguments with people seeing the lines in advance. The theist wants to crudely equate atheism with a faith position and the atheist seeks to preempt this by denying that they would assent to propositions expressing that god does not exist.

So I agree with your position I think. Either we are attempting to talk about things formally beyond the bounds of possible human knowledge, which is futile, or one side or other needs to make as clear what they mean by 'god' so we can see whether it is sensible to talk of existence or not.

Originally posted by 667joe
The bible has been proven wrong about so many things we do know about, how can it be trusted about things we don't know about?

Not to my satisfaction, it hasn't.