Search for reality .

[china]

Is God to be found by seeking him out? Can you search after the unknowable? To find, you must know what you are seeking. If you seek to find, what you find will be a self-projection; it will be what you desire, and the creation of desire is not truth. To seek truth is to deny it. Truth has no fixed abode; there is no path, no guide to it, and the word is not truth. Is truth to be found in a particular setting, in a special climate, among certain people? Is it here and not there? Is that one the guide to truth, and not another? Is there a guide at all? When truth is sought, what is found can only come out of ignorance, for the search itself is born of ignorance. You cannot search out reality; you must cease for reality to be.

 

[Gonzo]

What do you mean by "You cannot search out reality; you must cease for reality to be." Does that mean you have to be dead. Because then your reality is that you're really dead.

 

[talloola]

Is God to be found by seeking him out? Can you search after the unknowable? To find, you must know what you are seeking. If you seek to find, what you find will be a self-projection; it will be what you desire, and the creation of desire is not truth. To seek truth is to deny it.

I don't believe 'to seek the truth is to deny it', I think we should seek truth all through
our lives, and that just means be open to the truth , and you will recognize it, have an
open mind.

I'm not reading this as a religious post, (although I suppose it is), to me, it is a 'life'
post. Truths will come out of curiosity, wonderment, and interest.

 

[dancing-loon]

Is God to be found by seeking him out? Can you search after the unknowable? To find, you must know what you are seeking. If you seek to find, what you find will be a self-projection; it will be what you desire, and the creation of desire is not truth. To seek truth is to deny it. Truth has no fixed abode; there is no path, no guide to it, and the word is not truth. Is truth to be found in a particular setting, in a special climate, among certain people? Is it here and not there? Is that one the guide to truth, and not another? Is there a guide at all? When truth is sought, what is found can only come out of ignorance, for the search itself is born of ignorance. You cannot search out reality; you must cease for reality to be.

Interesting topic! Heavy stuff! Wouldn't mind to take a try at it.:smile:
I think there are truths on every level of evolution. As I mature and my conscience expands and develops, so my understanding of the truth will change. One's sense of truth as a teenager will be different from truth as a mid-lifer and so on.
Truth, it will seem to me, is very much a thing of belief. Personally, for myself, I have decided that the teachings of Christ are the truth and therefore I can not go wrong in following them, or try to follow them as I'm able to. The inner knowledge and reliance on that truth keeps me centered and makes me accept my fellowman as my companion along the road to the exit sign: I may want to leave, he may want to walk a little farther, it all depends on destiny.

Perhaps I will come back and ponder a bit more over the truth. I look forward to reading about the ponderings of my "companions"! ;-)

 

[Pangloss]

Oh, China.

You know that you don't believe what you just wrote - even if your theory is correct.

Let me make my point before you slam me.

This whole "truth is ambiguous" thing, that it is subjective, that seeking it means you lose it, that the negation of the self or of truth is the only path; all that Dancing Wu Li Masters B.S., is, in fact, exactly that - B.S.

If you have a hacking chest infection, you, China, will go to a doctor (if you're smart). That doctor was trained in the truth of the germ theory of disease, the truth of bacterial infections and the truth of antibiotic treatment of the same. The doctor was also taught the truth of double-blind medical studies that demonstrated which treatment protocol was most effective.

Those antibiotics were made in a plant where chemical and biochemical engineers were taught the truth of organic chemistry, of the valences of different molecules, and why thalidomide made one way creates horrible birth defects, but if it is made with the tiniest possible change to the way the molecule is shaped, it is rendered totally harmless, and now has great therapeutic value.

Your drive home relies on the truth of the heat energy of the fuel to produce an expansive force to move a piston, which, after transferring the energy through a great many mechanical devices, is turned into the rotational energy that propels you and the vehicle forward. You trust the truth of friction to steer and to stop.

You trust in the truth that the apples you bought yesterday, and look the same in the refrigerator today, are the same apples you bought. You would be a paranoid fool not to believe in the continuation of existence.

You believe strongly in the truth of free will, even though that might be an illusion.

You believe that if you let go of a ball, it will fall to the ground. And that it will do so tomorrow, as well. So you believe in the truth of gravity.

You believe in the truth of nutrition, and hydration and respiration. Otherwise you'd be dead.

You believe in the truth of language, of shared, and therefore objective, meaning. That's a big one, China - objective truth. Truth independent of any one individual's perceptions.

So perhaps, China, you do believe in common-sense definitions of truth, and what you write is more like a fashion, a pretty (if somewhat silly) jacket that you wear to amuse your friends.

Pangloss

 

[MikeyDB]

Pangloss

I believe that China identifies the focus of his contribution in the first line. While you might interpret his words to include friction, biology and chemistry etc. the seminal gist of China's postulations and queries is "god" belief. While friction expanding gasses, antibiotics and all those other things you've mentioned "exist" the truth of them isn't the focus of this post. The focus is on (as I interpret the meaning) projecting human assumptions about values and "truth" onto/into a conceptual construct that is then regarded by the believer as an absolute. Your perspective on language is interesting. Do you think that 'language'...given that some words and some meanings expressible in some languages don't exist in other languages can claim "truth" as a constituent element of that construct? Please expand on this notion if you would.

 

[darkbeaver]

Pangloss seems, a captive of delivered "western truth" which observations of say religion, economics and liesure practices reveal very little truth. But a lot of suggestion.

 

[Pangloss]

Like most spiritual seekers, neither China nor his defenders are very careful with terms.

Start with the question about "God," but in all the following sentences the word God is replaced by the word truth.

I'll go with majoritarian usage by the original poster.

As to the nature of this "God" thing, I haven't a clue. Well, not exactly true - the available evidence is that "gods" are a creation of human culture, and nothing more.

DB: You are so full of baloney. "A captive of "western truth" " - what does that even mean? You mean to say that you are paralyzed by fear and uncertainty every morning, not sure that the floor will hold your feet, that those walls to your house actually exist, that your body occupies space and has spatial extension?

In other words, are you sure of your existence? Even if you are not, do you act as if you are? If I try cut off your thumb, would you try to stop me?

If so, a great many things can be inferred about what you believe to be true. . .

God is a straw man here - the post is about the so-called subjective nature of reality.

If not, well, then, the original post is very badly written.

Pangloss

 

[darkbeaver]

Jeezus who peed in your cornflakes?:lol:

 

[Pangloss]

DB:

Jeebus, who prevents you from substantive answers?

Just so you know, I tend to take sophistry seriously, as it tends to corrupt so much of everyday life.

Pangloss

 

[Pangloss]

China:

Where'd you go? You start a thread and then vanish.

DB: What? As soon as I ask you for a substantive response, you evaporate? Unlike you, sir.

Pangloss

 

[Dexter Sinister]

Is God to be found by seeking him out?

No, god can't be found at all, in my not very humble opinion, because he's a fiction.

Can you search after the unknowable?

Sure, but if it's unknowable, by definition you won't find it. So why bother?

To find, you must know what you are seeking.

Nope, not true. The discovery of penicillin, for example, was pure serendipity. The history of scientific discovery is full of such happy accidents, of people finding things they weren't looking for.

I think you need to take a step back China, and specify what you mean when you talk about truth. What does it mean for something to be true? That's how I read the message of Pangloss's posts here, he's insisting that there is such a thing as truth, some things are known to be truths, and he offers some examples, while legitimately objecting to sophistry and fuzzy thinking. I'd vote with him, so far.

 

[MikeyDB]

I appreciate that folk like the tangible, the "meat" of science and the "predicatability" of scentific theory...I like it too, but that isn't what China is talking about! How would you know that your notion of "god" is "true"...where is the metric that can reliably inform you that your conclusion (s) regarding "god" are true?

Dexter doesn't believe in "god" and neither do I but I can entertain the mental exercise of conceptualizing what could or couldn't be reasonably regarded as evidence or verifiable...falsifiable "fact" that someone might accept as "proof" that their conclusion...ideas about "god" are "correct"....

Dexter's a pragmatist and so am I but gosh Dexter, correct me if I'm wrong here but didn't St. Thomas Aquinas and several other folk pose largely similar questions about the "nature" of god..? If god-belief is the touchstone for someone's concepts of "truth" how reliable can their evaluation of what's true or not true actually be...?

Penicillin and Champaign for that matter were accidents of discovery, but these things these elements as furniture of the universe haven't anything to do with the notion of "god"..... I may be wrong but I don't recall anyone celebrating penicillin or champaign as a gift from "god".... Now there certainly will be folk who believe that if a supernatural entity imbued mankind with the facility to question and hypothesize, theorize and experiment that this "divine gift" is the actualizing premise behind everything created by humankind...

I don't but I can see where that flavor of reasoning comes from....

Perhaps I'm having difficulty understanding why a question of philosophical dimension is being addressed as if it were an attack on logic or whatever...

Do you believe in the Easter Bunny....Do you believe in the toothfairy....Do you believe in Santa Claus..... these concepts have absolutely nothing to do with antibiotics, physics or the price of kumquats.... what's so confusing here?

 

[s_lone]

No, god can't be found at all, in my not very humble opinion, because he's a fiction.

That all depends on your conception of God. There are probably as many conceptions of God as there are thinking people on this planet. To me, ''God'' is the concept of unity, of oneness, of everythingness... In other words, God is all and everything. So according to my conception of God, God is very real and existing. But that's as far as I can go. I can't tell you what are the attributes of God.

I think you need to take a step back China, and specify what you mean when you talk about truth. What does it mean for something to be true? That's how I read the message of Pangloss's posts here, he's insisting that there is such a thing as truth, some things are known to be truths, and he offers some examples, while legitimately objecting to sophistry and fuzzy thinking. I'd vote with him, so far.

I'll add my vote to that too. While it would be foolish to deny the importance of subjectivity, it seems to me that denying the existence of an objective reality takes out any meaning and coherence to everything.

 

[Pangloss]

MickeyDB

Read the entire thread and you'll (I hope) realize how badly you missed the point.

Pangloss

 

[talloola]

Will China come back and explain anything about this, from his perspective, or, ?

 

[Pangloss]

s_lone & Dexter:

You guys make me blush.

God(s) bless you.

Pangloss

 

[karrie]

Will China come back and explain anything about this, from his perspective, or, ?

All the feedback from china's threads amounts essentially to a pitying pat on the head and a 'well, you just don't get it', if he ever comes back at all.

 

[talloola]

All the feedback from china's threads amounts essentially to a pitying pat on the head and a 'well, you just don't get it', if he ever comes back at all.

Yeah, with most of his threads I'm left scratching my head, sometimes wondering if I
am a little 'slow', but maybe he is just a little 'arrogant'.

 

[Pangloss]

Also, china's posts are written in such a confused and impenetrable manner, that if anyone disagrees with the general tone, it's taken as an attack.

It's not attacking to read a post (or entire thread) and take apart the logic of it - it's respecting the intelligence of the poster to expect them to be able to defend their views.

In school, it's why it's called a "thesis defense."

This is posted in the "Philosophy" section, after all. . .

Pangloss