Is there a moral position without God?:
"Morals are not beliefs they are behavior patterns bred into us over millions of years of being dependent on our social group for survival. Doing what we must for the good of the social group is the beginning and the end of moral behavior. If the social group is religious, doing what the mediator says God wants is part of the package. Many of us have a more cosmopolitan social group see Appiah, Cosmopolitanism - Ethics in a World of Strangers and the insular and usually xenophobic morality of religious groups just does not work for us."
Getting Iraq right
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2 comments:
Imagination and fiction make up more than three quarters of our real life.
Simone Weil
J'C: The real question is where does the validation for the truth we find in imagination and fiction come from. Simone would argue that this is the result of "Grace." God acting directly on the human mind to validate the truths not only of imagination and fiction but of experience. This seems to be an indoctrinated need, as I have never experienced a life long atheist with this need.
The second source is of course the group validation of a religious group with all the social bonding rituals, liturgy and creeds. This may or may not be focused on "Grace" although it may be focused on God. Generally an externally imposed "soul" is posited as the source of this validation. When for one reason or another the group becomes dysfunctional, the search for "Grace" that is a direct relationship with God is the usual substitute.
The third alternative is validation from selected respected mentors normally starting with parents and family, but non-religious surrogates can be found to serve that purpose. If one grows without "Grace" or religion the selection of mentors living and dead, the fiction you are talking about, perhaps including religious fiction. This can be considered non-grace spirituality where the validation comes from the accumulated, and integrated wisdom of those mentors. I can identify most of the validation sources from the Uncle that taught me that the family does not steal. Whether it is a penny or a song. If it belongs to someone else they must approve the taking.
It is difficult to remember the human condition but the more we can, the more this all makes sense.
"The millions are awake enough for physical labor; but only one in a million is awake enough for effective intellectual exertion, only one in a hundred millions to a poetic or divine life. To be awake is to be alive. I have never yet met a man who was quite awake. How could I have looked him in the face?" - Thoreau, Walden
This is not flattering but IMO essentially true. If true what can the average person discriminate conscious reality from imagination other than superficially? If a person is sleeping in bed at night, are they capable of the awareness they have when walking around? It is the same with the imagination that motivates our daily lives. We are incapable of the awareness of conscious man and objective human meaning and purpose
The validation, second source, and third alternatives are meaningless in relation to the human condition governed by imagination. The question is really if a person is asleep in imagination or striving to awaken.
Sometimes for one reason or another a person temporarily experiences awakening. Then all of this has meaning. Before that it is usually concepts people argue about from the selective imaginations of the cave perspective.
We can only validate consciousness consciously. But this requires first being attracted to it and by experiment, coming to see how consciously limited we are.
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