I'm pretty sure "The Way I See It #n" is copyrighted by SBUX, but I'm going to go out on a limb and say that a blog is not a commercial venue, or anything of the like.
The way I see it, no god (or God, or Allah, or YHWH, or whatever) exists. There is no god. There is no need for religion. I do not think religion is inherently a bad thing; rather, I think the positives can easily outweigh the negatives. However, I believe religion is an accessory thing, and if one is seeking a simplified, "true" life, then they must do without it, or no, they must simply recognize this fact.
The way I see it, our universe is at hand. And on the macrocosm, we, as known humanity, are a wholly insignificant fraction of a greater whole, an immeasurable whole. Fact of the matter is, we don't live on the macrocosm. The "universe" we inhabit is just as relatively insignificant as we are. But around here? We're kind of a big deal.
I've never really understood people who feel the need to stress the insignificance of humanity and life with everything they say. It has always sounded to me like each is merely trying to rationalize their lack of care...about anything. That's fine by me, it's not my prerogative to try and turn your life into something it isn't. But I am of the opinion that since humanity is a pretty self encompassing entity, and since we are pretty much the top dogs (aside from the occasional tiger, alligator, sting ray, snake, spider, or tiny virus) around, we deserve to be contemplated, to be valued, to be bet against the rest of the universe.
The way I see it, Darwin hit the jackpot. Everything I see around me, every thought about life, about the universe, about our purpose - I believe it can be examined very thoroughly and appropriately against the backdrops of evolution and natural selection. This is why the universe (or at least our universe) exists as it does now (perhaps finally). This is why there is no need to create some man in the sky to be a creator. The existence of everything we know, as we know it, to me just makes sense.
The way I see it, what might exist in the universe that transcends our own existence, what is unreachable, what lies in the dust of nebulae just the same as the strings in our hearts is no god, is no inexplicable entity. It is merely a force, a body, an ether even, if you will, that we have yet to appropriately classify. It may well be the very nature of this substance or value to remain unclassifiable. I say substance to expose a commonality to all things. I say value because this tentative truth might like closer to the solution of the grand unified theory than even I might expect.
The way I see it, what exists instead of any god is this matter, this force. This force makes the planets orbit in anything near circles. It makes all bodies approach "perfection" in the form of spheres. It made this "random" world around us. It accounts for our cognition, limited might it be.
The way I see it, there is obviously something profoundly impossible to comprehend about our cognition, our consciousness as human beings. I would approach considering it via solipsism, being unable to comprehend the means of our very comprehension being paradoxical, but I feel it unnecessary. Rather, our bodies, our complex nervous systems are the end product of evolution towards life able to tap "directly" into this force, this substance, this reason.
Now you might see. The very reason we achieve comes from this "gods" nature as pure reason, as sense, as order. As humans, homo sapien sapiens I should say, we have evolved to this point and are now able to connect with this "force" at a most open level. No longer are we the fruit of a gardener's hidden labor, we are the end result of a construction with the blueprints fueling our thoughts even now.
The way I see it, we see all that we need or ever will need to see. Gravity is invisible to us itself, yet we embrace its existence to vast and necessary end. So to is our "god," the universe's essence, yet every thought we ponder is but a manifestation of this reason, ever searching, driving to take the next step forward.
THE MARRIAGE TRAP
5 years ago
9 comments:
I think boiling down God into something we can relate to, like ourselves, is a natural tendency for humans to do and that's probably why every religion has some form of a god or gods in that way. However, with something as infinitely complex as our universe I think that there has to be something...anything greater than chance that started it all.
I don't think I believe there is a God that has a plan for everyone's life and knows what you do before you do it (where would the excitement be in that?) But surly there is something, some force as you call it, a kind of mediator that governs right and wrong, up and down--all the rules and concepts, which without, our universe wouldn't be able to exist.
But anyway, I don't like to think about this kind of stuff very often. It makes my head hurt.
I couldn't agree with you more. The way I see it (forgive me for returning to the gimmick), religion is a by-product of all the attempts to give this force a role, an identity, when really it deserves no "body" in the first place. It is difficult, nay, impossible to fathom that our universe would have come into existence by chance, and that is not what the absence of a creator/presence of an underlying force of reason and order entails. Rather, it chocks up one more for the universe, or our universe at least, and says that this existence, through the forces of inherent molecular or genetic determination, has achieved some state of harmony between creation and the force behind creation, that same thing I compared to gravity. It's a facet of the universe that exists for its own sake, and in my opinion, its existence would deserve little more than recognition and appreciation as a pretty nifty thing.
But as I hoped to hint on myself, were this idea to be truth, I don't think any of it really deserves that much contemplation in the big scheme of things. Were this idea to somehow, someday be discovered true, it would do nothing more than give each "enlightened" being more reason to put everything they had into what they did each day, and (hopefully) drive them to meet the potential of their connection to this great central universe-force of order.
Mine hurts too. I think it's why I wanted to write (type) it all down (out) somewhere.
even after being a part of our short conversation friday night, seeing this in front of me gives me pause.
not bad pause, really, but pause nonetheless. i don't think you would have put this out there if you didn't feel like it had legs to stand on, which obviously it does.
the fact of my matter is that your "force" sounds an awful lot like my "god" and, again, i know that's part of your point, however small a part it may be.
i think it makes me sad in a way. because a "force", no matter how subtle and clever and powerful the "force" is, doesn't compel any person to do anything for anyone else as you hope that it might. the idea of a "force" only makes it ok and rational to live selfishly if one chooses with no considerable consequences or accountability.
obviously, i am not suggesting that your life will not be spent making other's lives better. what i've seen so far suggests that you are at least somewhat interested in doing that. but the "force" subscription doesn't jive with complete selflessness, which my "force", in an ideal and possibly unrealistic way, at the very least asks me to strive for.
it would be quite self-righteous of me to wish that your "ever searching drive" somehow leads you closer to my "god", but that is still my wish. and i am ok with that.
then again, me and my god put everything we had into our day today. how did you do? ;)
later bro-in-law. keep the faith, or whatever it is that "the force"-fearers call it.
love you.
kevin
Really, I think the commonality between this idea and what or who everyone in a religious situation chooses to worship or believe in deserved more attention than I gave it. Really, if I were ever to go out into the world and try and use my ideas to raise the consciousnesses of others, it would be largely in the sake of first evidencing how close this idea is to what a lot of what is in the world's mind in the first place, just broken down to a necessary essence. But I digress.
I agree with your sentiment, that for all intensive purposes an underlying force in the universe, a body of reason, a natural drive that orders things would have no bearing on our actions, and its existence would instill no values in its creation. However, my thought about humanity's connection to this "force" goes much, much further, and the bits concerning our cognition might account for this discrepancy.
Though the points you hinted at cannot be contained entirely under the umbrella of morality, I sense it (or an absence thereof) is much of what composes the tumult you see in the absence of a god and the presence instead of merely a natural "force." That said, I have long since found a basis for morality entirely outside of the idea of consequence, and regardless of the existence/nonexistence of a god or god-figure. Yet again, I have yet to expound upon that here, but I really hope you'll remain a patron of my ramblings and respond in kind if anything ever strikes a chord with you.
If it gives any insight, the non-god-fearing equivalent of "keep the faith" would probably be "keep it real," and not in the Dave Chappelle way.
Take it easy, kevmo.
yeah.
keep it real.
no insight was necessary. thanks. i knew that was coming. ;)
of course there is a basis for morality outside of the ideas of consequence and a "god" but that doesn't get to the root of my issue.
you keep jotting down your science-non-fiction and i'll keep reading.
and maybe someday we can actually talk about it and not write about it on the internet.
bark to the masses, dude. not the moles.
In response to your first reply...
I don't know man, I think that this force (which for simplicity sake I'm going to call "God") is very deserving of a role and identity. I think it (which for sexism sake I'm going to call "He") is not as much connected with our physical being as much as with our soul/consciousness. I think He is what compels us to act selflessly. And I think when we die that our soul, our mind, the non physical part of us that we know is there, but can't see (like God!) joins Him.
Or, at the very least, that is my hope.
Again, it's funny, but I really couldn't be closer to believing in what you say, hoping for the same thing. If I type for too long I'm going to end up typing out my whole next post or two in comments here, but your idea of this "God" being intimately connected with our souls/consciousnesses is something I believe in very importantly, or at least, as you said, it is far more intimately connected to this than it is our physical being. In short, if you could ever embody this "God force thing," it would be, in effect, the consciousness of the universe itself. We, as constituents of humanity, have evolved to the level that our brains, on the molecular and/or chemical level, are able to tap into the consciousness and break off a portion of it for our own use. When we die, "we" (if we consider our identities to be contained within these consciousnesses) do return to our source. This is what I believe. As far as if our personalities would be maintained, our memories stored in some large Bank of the Universe, that is something I cannot even approach with reason..at least not yet.
When I mentioned this force not deserving a role or identity, I think I really meant only to stress that if one recognizes this as a natural force of the universe alone, then it need not be praised more than the wind is every time it blows, or an object is every time it falls towards the earth. It need not be seen as a man in a cloud waiting to greet us, or a fat Asian man sitting under a tree, or a six-armed elephant tossing each of the whims of the world out one at a time...I dunno.
It is a good hope.
Ashes to ashes, dust to dust.
I have a feeling we could go back and forth like this forever, but I'll end with this for the sake of you having the chance to post a new entry at some point.
Our soul/consciousness as far as I know is not something that can be defined by science or nature. There is not a chapter in a text book about it. Therefore, how could God be defined by science or nature? Considering we are in agreement that He is the reason/cause of our souls and why we think and act like we do.
The wind doesn't make a person feel a certain way or do something for the good of others. I think there's something else that makes us tick.
And for getting me where I am today, which I attribute to the good souls of those around me, I think I owe some praise.
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