Laws of the Universe

Originally posted by widget
Unlikely that feckless fussing about the fringes of ecstasy with your fuzzy puzzle of numinous buzzwords can serve as any reprimand, bb 🙄 Whether deliberately or simply out of fear, you're missing the point.

I believe grace is our natural state, our birthright, something we are weaned from by our cultures - bent like mindless slaves to promulgate their ...[text shortened]... t. Inhabit it. I like Kerouac's: "Cats yawn because they know there's nothing to do." 😴

Blah, blah, blah. 😴

Claiming that grace is our natural state is to commit what Ken Wilber calls the "pre/trans fallacy". You mistake the innocence of the young for grace (or the innocence of nature for grace, take your pick). Experiencing the world as though one was undifferentiated from it doesn't constitute such knowledge. Ego formation and acculturation are necessary preliminaries (though they are ultimately left behind). That one should "become like a child" is one of the most pernicious pieces of advice, because people don't realize it is merely a relatively poor metaphor.

Originally posted by bbarr
Blah, blah, blah. 😴

Claiming that grace is our natural state is to commit what Ken Wilber calls the "pre/trans fallacy". You mistake the innocence of the young for grace (or the innocence of nature for grace, take your pick). Experiencing the world as though one was undifferentiated from it doesn't constitute such knowledge. Ego formation and accultura ...[text shortened]... us pieces of advice, because people don't realize it is merely a relatively poor metaphor.

I'm not convinved at all that you are listening, never mind hearing me, bb 😉 I'm not Ken Wilber and neither are you - leave him ponceing about shabhala.com, buying ads in UTNE to flog his pre-packaged tours of enlightenment. Have you shaved your head to hide your bald spot?

Walk the talk 😀 You don't need a map to find grace. Just stop worrying it to death with words. 😞

If I deliberately commit anything, I can only pray that it is a random act of kindness 😕 Like this.

True knowledge is not "constituted". It is experienced as love & joy & loneliness & pain. Ultimately, when you have left your ego behind, you'll find you are breathing the rare and heady air of at-one-ment.

🙄 Dig your ego a hole. Bury it with the rest of your delusions. Maybe it will eventually grow and bear fruit. Maybe it won't. I insist on your right to choose your own albatross. Just try not to spread the dis-ease.

...and lest you think I'm not paying attention to your attempted obfuscation: blah-blah-blah 😴

Originally posted by bbarr
Blah, blah, blah. 😴

That one should "become like a child" is one of the most pernicious pieces of advice, because people don't realize it is merely a relatively poor metaphor.
Harmful or deadly? Sure. That makes sense.

Originally posted by Metamorphosis
That might be so if the "petty little self" actually had absolute existence. But if it is nothing but a temporary appearance, a blip in space and time that arises and falls away, then the dilemma dissolves.

Exactly so 😀 What dilemma? 😕 Hide your soul or sell your hide 😉 We are indeed starstuff 😵😲😵

Originally posted by widget
I'm not convinved at all that you are listening, never mind hearing me, bb 😉 I'm not Ken Wilber and neither are you - leave him ponceing about shabhala.com, buying ads in UTNE to flog his pre-packaged tours of enlightenment. Have [b]you shaved your head to hide your bald spot?

Walk the talk 😀 You don't need a map to find grace. Just stop ...[text shortened]... lest you think I'm not paying attention to your attempted obfuscation: blah-blah-blah 😴[/b]

What does Wilber's personal life have to do with the point he makes about the 'pre/trans fallacy'? Answer: nothing at all.

Take your own advice. Before you can walk the talk you have to understand the talk, else you'll just emulate children (pace your equation of grace and innocence).

Do you know what 'constituted' means? Because after you deny that it is constituted by anything at all, you go on to claim just the opposite (by providing identity conditions). Eep!

Originally posted by bbarr
What does Wilber's personal life have to do with the point he makes about the 'pre/trans fallacy'? Answer: nothing at all.

Take your own advice. Before you can walk the talk you have to understand the talk, else you'll just emulate children (pace your equation of grace and innocence).

Do you know what 'constituted' means? Because after you deny that i ...[text shortened]... hing at all, you go on to claim just the opposite (by providing identity conditions). Eep!

😳 Wilber's personal life has everything to do with what he thinks. Regardless of how he sells it.

Although you've built a wall of words around yourself, bb, the real world still exists without - at least as much as within. Many claim the universe is vaster than our cloistered imaginations. Imagine that!

The trick is to continue to explore with the intense and infinite curiosity of a child while embracing mortality - despite the wisdom experience can sometimes, rarely, bring. And it is a trick. One like a pony!

Of course I know what constituted means. I vacillate between "constipated" overtones and those horrible eggs that just need water added to become real again. Lay me better traps than that. 😉 Urp!

Originally posted by widget
😳 Wilber's personal life has everything to do with what he thinks. Regardless of how he sells it.

Although you've built a wall of words around yourself, bb, the real world still exists without - at least as much as within. Many claim the universe is vaster than our cloistered imaginations. Imagine that!

The trick is to continue to explore with the ...[text shortened]... gs that just need water added to become real again. Lay me better traps than that. 😉 Urp!

Alas, there are no traps where hinges seek.

Originally posted by bbarr
You don't know what omnipresent means. It certainly does not mean 'occupies all space'. The only stuff that occupies space is physical stuff. God is non-physical.

Quantum theory does not entail that the future is indeterminate. This is simply a mistake on your part. If any hidden variable theory (local or stochastic) is correct, then there is no argume ...[text shortened]... iculties, like the measurement problem.

You're right about the third point, however. 😳

It seems to me like you're saying God might know the future (so long as this and that theory are correct and indetermincay is wrong). Theres a big 'if' in your argument.

[edit] Almost forgot. How is God present if he's not physical?

Originally posted by Conrau K
It seems to me like you're saying God might know the future (so long as this and that theory are correct and indetermincay is wrong). Theres a big 'if' in your argument.

[edit] Almost forgot. How is God present if he's not physical?

I don't know why being a non-physical substance would preclude being omnipresent, or why being omnipresent would necessitate existing in space. I've never heard an argument for either of those claims. Do you have one?

Originally posted by bbarr
I don't know why being a non-physical substance would preclude being omnipresent, or why being omnipresent would necessitate existing in space. I've never heard an argument for either of those claims. Do you have one?

Well, firstly what exactly is a non- physical substance? (I can't actually identify any such thing)
And what does it mean to be present but not to exist in that space? (perhaps I took it for granted that to be present, I had to actually be physically present)
[EDIT] could you suggest some other way in which I can be present (or any substance for that matter)?

The physical approximates all types of spiritual realities. For instance, we are all 'present' in an electronic-sense via the internet (thanks, Al Gore!).

Originally posted by Conrau K
It seems to me like you're saying God might know the future (so long as this and that theory are correct and indetermincay is wrong). Theres a big 'if' in your argument.

[edit] Almost forgot. How is God present if he's not physical?


I don't know why being a non-physical substance would preclude being omnipresent, or why being omnipresent would necessitate existing in space. I've never heard an argument for either of those claims. Do you have one?


😕 This is exactly the kind of obfuscation, passing itself off as intellectual discourse, that balms the brows of timid minds. Meanwhile The Third Reich and Vietnam beget Iraq, Kraft Foods and Afghanistan.

If bangles and baubles won't work (... and they've fallen for the beads already) bring out the stale bread and circuses. Great glittering chains of words work just as well on some. Such massive opiates! A pity really...

Originally posted by FreakyKBH
Alas, there are no traps where hinges seek.

Didn't you mean 'squeak'? 😛 It seems a mouse-lier kind of comment, though no less opaque.

Originally posted by widget
Didn't you mean 'squeak'? 😛 It seems a mouse-lier kind of comment, though no less opaque.

Seams it has know wait, either weigh.

Originally posted by widget
Originally posted by Conrau K
It seems to me like you're saying God might know the future (so long as this and that theory are correct and indetermincay is wrong). Theres a big 'if' in your argument.

[edit] Almost forgot. How is God present if he's not physical?


I don't know why being a non-physical substance would preclude being o ring chains of words work just as well on some. Such massive opiates! A pity really...

The question I'm asking above is simple. First, Theists often claim that God is non-physical. What they mean by this is that God is comprised of a non-physical substance (not merely that he is, say, a non-physical property of the physical world). That is, most theists are substance dualists. So, the question is whether something that is comprised of a non-physical substance could still be in space or outside but causally linked with space. Just because you don't understand a question doesn't mean it is an attempt at obfuscation.

Cheers!