Proven Western Logic VS. Flawed Eastern Logic

Cliffy

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Nov 19, 2008
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But I'm not saying I'm better than anyone else. I'm a sinner like everyone else. I only want others have what I have and to see what I see.

My boss is an atheist and yet I don't think I'm better than him. If fact God commands me to respect authority, not to mention the fact that he has more life experience and therefore I respect him.

There you go. I said you think you are right and everybody who doesn't believe the same is wrong. You respond by saying you don't think you are better than anyone else. It is a typical christian argument to change the words so as to look humble when in fact you were being arrogant.
 

SirJosephPorter

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But there is a difference between not knowing and not existing my friend. Look at what I asked you SJP:

Before we discover and honed electricity did it still exist?

But there is a difference between not knowing and not existing my friend.

Indeed there is. But I am not talking of ‘not knowing’; I am talking of ‘unknowable’. There is a big difference between ‘not knowing’ and ‘unknowable’. Thus we don’t know what causes cancer, but I think scientists are confident that some day we will, using the tools that are available today.

However, it is not just that we don’t know if after life exists, which (if any) is the true God etc. These things are unknowable, at least by the tools we have available today.

So what is the difference between unknowable and not existing? In my opinion, it is the same thing; it is a matter of semantics.

Before we discover and honed electricity did it still exist?

Electricity does not exist, in the sense that a rock exists. Electricity is simply flow of charged particles, which sometimes manifests itself as electricity. And the phenomenon has always existed, whether we knew it or not.

However, let us look at caveman or Stone Age. To them, electricity was unknowable, so as far as they were concerned, electricity did not exist. And they got along just fine without electricity. To them thunder (which is a manifestation of electricity) was caused by Gods and that explanation was satisfactory.

We are in the same position when it comes to God or afterlife. Using the techniques that we have available today, these things are unknowable, and so as good as nonexistent. If you are saying that some day we may have techniques available to discern these things, well, that itself is a matter of faith.

In the Stone Age if somebody had said that electricity exists and is caused by natural phenomena, that very much would have been an article of faith. It is no different with God and afterlife today.
 

Unforgiven

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May 28, 2007
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But there is a difference between not knowing and not existing my friend.

Indeed there is. But I am not talking of ‘not knowing’; I am talking of ‘unknowable’. There is a big difference between ‘not knowing’ and ‘unknowable’. Thus we don’t know what causes cancer, but I think scientists are confident that some day we will, using the tools that are available today.

However, it is not just that we don’t know if after life exists, which (if any) is the true God etc. These things are unknowable, at least by the tools we have available today.

So what is the difference between unknowable and not existing? In my opinion, it is the same thing; it is a matter of semantics.

Before we discover and honed electricity did it still exist?

Electricity does not exist, in the sense that a rock exists. Electricity is simply flow of charged particles, which sometimes manifests itself as electricity. And the phenomenon has always existed, whether we knew it or not.

However, let us look at caveman or Stone Age. To them, electricity was unknowable, so as far as they were concerned, electricity did not exist. And they got along just fine without electricity. To them thunder (which is a manifestation of electricity) was caused by Gods and that explanation was satisfactory.

We are in the same position when it comes to God or afterlife. Using the techniques that we have available today, these things are unknowable, and so as good as nonexistent. If you are saying that some day we may have techniques available to discern these things, well, that itself is a matter of faith.

In the Stone Age if somebody had said that electricity exists and is caused by natural phenomena, that very much would have been an article of faith. It is no different with God and afterlife today.

I disagree. I think we are well able to know it, but choose to lable it everything it isn't and refuse to see it for what it is. The part that really hurts is living for tomorrow at the expense of today.
 

SirJosephPorter

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I disagree. I think we are well able to know it, but choose to lable it everything it isn't and refuse to see it for what it is. The part that really hurts is living for tomorrow at the expense of today.

Really? And just how are we able to know that there is an after life, or that there is a God?
 

darkbeaver

the universe is electric
Jan 26, 2006
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After life, what a strange idea, life has no after, it is a continuation. Oh you meant your life. Well is it really yours or mine or common to all forms? We're not really individuals are we? Individuality is illusion isn't it? How can we individuate from the indivisable? More beer please.

My eastern Canadian logic may be flawed.
 
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Cannuck

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So ... how does one know whose logic is flawed?

I'm a goal focused individual so I would say that your logic is flawed if it fails to take you to your stated objectives. In DB's lawnmower analogy, if the goal is to get the lawn mowed, if it blows up and burns the logic was wrong if it cuts grass it was right. If the goal is to lay in your hammock and drink beer, the opposite would be true. I believe the biggest problem we have as individuals is that we don't take the time to fully understand what we are trying to do nor do we take the time to assess our actions to see if they are in line with our goals.
 

darkbeaver

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I'm a goal focused individual so I would say that your logic is flawed if it fails to take you to your stated objectives. In DB's lawnmower analogy, if the goal is to get the lawn mowed, if it blows up and burns the logic was wrong if it cuts grass it was right. If the goal is to lay in your hammock and drink beer, the opposite would be true. I believe the biggest problem we have as individuals is that we don't take the time to fully understand what we are trying to do nor do we take the time to assess our actions to see if they are in line with our goals.

Haven't you mixed two different logic streams there Cannuck? You cannot logicaly get to the hammock from my lawn mower analogy. Mowing the lawn and drinking beer are two distinct events that cannot be served by the same stream in my opinion. I did not mention beer at all I don't think. If the beer would have been the objective I would of course have set the lawnmower on fire as I passed it on the way to the hammock but from my original stream you could not have logically arrived there. I agree, we don't work things out fully before we act therefore we have to act again. Measure twice cut once, how long it took me to assimilate that, partially.:lol:
 

Cannuck

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The flawed logic I used was the christian one where only god is perfect.

Nice try. A few posts before that you said...

"Humans are flawed therefore their logic is flawed. If we weren't flawed we would be gods and goddesses and those that need an external deity to control their lives would not know what to do with themselves."

...and that is just on this thread. I'm pretty sure that, if I were to check other thread, I could find similar sentiments. Simply put, you have indicated we are not perfect. You obviously know what perfect is or you are stringing a line. Which is it?
 

Cliffy

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Nice try. A few posts before that you said...

"Humans are flawed therefore their logic is flawed. If we weren't flawed we would be gods and goddesses and those that need an external deity to control their lives would not know what to do with themselves."

...and that is just on this thread. I'm pretty sure that, if I were to check other thread, I could find similar sentiments. Simply put, you have indicated we are not perfect. You obviously know what perfect is or you are stringing a line. Which is it?

If you mean by stringing a line that I'm trolling, that would be left to the individual's definition of the word. In fact, I believe we are our own god: ie. we create ourselves. I don't believe in external gods. That is the Readers Digest version. The rest would take too much time and space for this forum.

The flaw in the ointment is that we live in a massive lie of universal proportions that includes hierarchies of political, religious and social constructs, physical and spiritual realities. We believe in the lie because it has been handed down from generation to generation for thousands of years. Our reality, religions and history are all fictions based on this lie.

None are so blind as those who will not see. It takes a trip outside our physical reality to see that is not what it has been presented to be (near death experience) or massive doses of mind altering drugs (peyote, LSD [Ergot], Jimsonweed, etc.) to break down the social conditioning that is constructed by the lie. In other words, one would have to step outside the box to actually see it for what it is.
 

Cannuck

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That's not answering the question. If we are our own god and creating ourselves and we are not perfect and you know this...then you must know what "perfect" is. So, without further ado, what is perfection?
 

Cliffy

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Nice try. A few posts before that you said...

"Humans are flawed therefore their logic is flawed. If we weren't flawed we would be gods and goddesses and those that need an external deity to control their lives would not know what to do with themselves."

...and that is just on this thread. I'm pretty sure that, if I were to check other thread, I could find similar sentiments. Simply put, you have indicated we are not perfect. You obviously know what perfect is or you are stringing a line. Which is it?

When one is trying to communicate with people who have a particular view of reality from a different point of view one must try to communicate in words the the other can comprehend. It is a flawed way of trying to communicate at best, kind of like going to China without knowing the language and trying to communicate with them in their language.

And before you ask if I think I am an alien, yes, to some degree in that because of circumstances in my life, I have had many occasions to be outside the box (ie: being hit by a logging truck at 60 miles an hour, wrapping a car around a power pole, two heart attacks, two poisonings, massive amounts of LSD and many out of body experiences with aboriginal medicine men and women.) Not too many people have been through that and lived to tell about it.

And, really, I don't care if you think that makes me a nut case.
 

Cannuck

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Your backtracking is duly noted.

BTW, I to believe we are our own gods and we create our own realities. Everything around us is just as we want it.
 

SirJosephPorter

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After life, what a strange idea, life has no after, it is a continuation. Oh you meant your life. Well is it really yours or mine or common to all forms? We're not really individuals are we? Individuality is illusion isn't it? How can we individuate from the indivisable? More beer please.

My eastern Canadian logic may be flawed.

I can see why the idea of an afterlife would be appealing to many people. Many people live drab, boring, humdrum lives. If they ‘know’ that a glorious, rapturous life awaits them after death, that makes their sorry little lives here that much more bearable. If they ‘know’ that only they will have this glorious life, that those who disagree with them will suffer the torments of Hell forever, why, that is the icing on the cake.

So it is hardly surprising that many people find the idea of afterlife (with them going to Heaven and those who disagree with them going to Hell, of course) attractive. But there is no evidence for it. It remains wishful thinking.