can spirituality replace religion?

by make yourself 61 Replies latest watchtower beliefs

• 

  misocup

  Etude

  Great post. I agree.

  There are those like Joseph Smith who would be institutionalized if he were alive today.

  My question is, why are some scientists, atheists, and others, so bound to the notion that it matters.

  Let me give you an example. My brother is a biologist who researched for many years. He is what I would call a atheistic dogmatist. To him it matters a lot that others, like my priest uncle, or my psychic aunt, have the beliefs they do.

  What I don't understand is why he and 98% of the worlds scientists & others cling (dare I say religiously) to, in the light of their convictions, what can only be called a lifestyle*. Why is it so important to them, that they be perceived as the rational ones, the ones who depend only upon empirical data? Is the social mentality in the scientific community itself a kind of pathology? To date, and to my knowledge, that data tends to be used to prove the non-existence of God, and the debunking of all things mystical or super-terrestrial to the point that those in the scientific field who would like to study those non-traditional areas do not do so for fear of losing credibility and standing in the scientific community.

  So, in their world God definitely does not exist, mysticism and non-physical perception are based wholly in a persons brain. Again I ask, from their perspective, why does it matter that people wish to pursue mysticism and super-terrestrial concerns? Are they trying to push "the truth" on us? Or is it mainly to inflate their self identity. To give them a feeling of superiority. To what ends will they go in order to maintain that feeling of superiority?

  *I call their way of thought a lifestyle for these reasons:

  Their pattern of behavior within the scientific community creates a strictly regulated social organization. A box in which to think and act accordingly.

  Their perception of others who do not "act accordingly" as weak minded, or mentally ill.

  They actively condemn others for having beliefs other than theirs

  Even Hawking rewrites his theories

  Even mathematical calculations have to be taken on faith by others who aren't equipped to check the work

  I'm not trying to down science. Science is very important in my world. All I'm saying is that scientists are just people with the same foibles as religionists. It's important to think outside the box, I don't see it in the traditional scientific community.
• 

  misocup

  Also, after years of seeking. I have come to the conclusion that there is no way of knowing about other dimensions at this time. No way of proving God's existence and no way of disproving it.

  I still like experimenting, even though I have no beliefs.
• 

  Etude

  Mindmelda:
  
  Somehow I had missed your earlier comments in this thread. I hope you’re still reading because I think what you wrote smacks of a well-crafted essay on a very elusive subject. You got game! So, I noticed a few things that I need clarification on and would also like to make a few observations.
  
  I take it that by “transcendence” you mean an experience that could be termed "spiritual", while the manifestation of that experience (or many of them) is codified in what we may term as “religion” or ritual. I also understand that the “transcendence” a person experiences is unique to that individual (and therefore subjective) and can’t actually be shared. So, you can only share a ritual or practice that emanates from a transcendent experience. Is that about right? If this is correct, I agree with you 100%.
  
  Still, this leaves a lot of room to explore the nature of transcendence. The research I mentioned about the “G” spot is demonstrating that although experiences are unique, they manage to have some commonalities in some fundamental ways. For example: Most people experience déjà vu. I can’t imagine that there are or have ever been two individuals who have experience having been in the same place before. I mean that both were in the same spot the other was in, in the same mall, at the same time of the day. That would make it a shared experience that would not be unique or transcendental. The commonality is the “déjà vu” itself; the very ability to have such experiences. So, I’m inclined to think that the state achieved during deep meditation or “spiritual communion” by a shaman, yogi, priest or nun, or a worshiper of Sacred Poles (although I think they partied more than anything), or anyone who can profoundly contemplate is individual but has a commonality in that it results in similar feelings and reactions. In addition, what the clinical examinations reveal is that in those cases there is a stimulus of a particular region of the brain. I won’t insinuate that anyone (as far as I know) fully understands the range of such feelings and how they influence us to act. But there is something concrete that is happening and we already know what can happen when it’s out of whack.
  
  So, the discoveries in neurology are suggesting clear pathways in the brain that are responsible for our actions and ideas, and yes sensations of wonderment and “otherness”; something that Psychology could only guess through the interpretation of behavior. Therefore, I personally need to allow room for spirituality, however nebulous it seems, and allow it to be an entity. If we call it by another term, say “the ability to transcend”, I still think that it is a quantifiable, measurable (in descriptive terms) and a reproducible effect that involves a particular part of our brain and is not simply a behavioral anomaly.
  
  Etude.
• 

  Etude

  Misocup:
  
  Let me start by saying that you make some significant observations, many of which I have grappled with for some time and which have given me a good deal of difficulty to explain. Secondly, let me say that the picture on your profile is quite disturbing. The guy really creeps me out. It is a bit painful and unnerving. I’m envious. I wish I’d thought of it.
  
  Now let’s see; you bring up the question of why there are scientists who in spite of the scientific theories to the contrary still believe in God while the majority is rabid in its pursuit to convince the rest who still “believe” that they are wrong, almost to the point of ridicule. You question why they don’t just live and let live if people’s delusions don’t hurt anybody.
  
  OK. I have observed that very thing, but mostly in the field of Evolution. There are natural sciences that don’t present such controversies, except perhaps in one particular way that relates to Quantum Mechanics. Since scientists are pretty convinced that the Universe had a beginning, being scientists can only force them to ask not “what was there before?” but why it is the way it is; how did the universe end up being this way (being able to support life, our type of life) and did not end up differently. It’s too exhausting to get into it, but they have come up with a theory for that and it’s called the “Anthropic Principle”. There are a few variations of it (the weak and strong) and a lot of controversy about it. In comes a physicist name Paul Davies who suggests that such a theory reveals that scientist must accept certain things about Science with the same faith that a religious person accepts God. Well that sort of thing pisses of people like Richard Dawkins. It irritates him enough to mention it in his books but he doesn’t have the balls to formally refute Davies. Davies is well versed in the Anthropic Principle and is a very respected scientist
  
  If you put Dawkins and others like him in one camp (the pissed off atheists) and people like J. P. Moreland (an apologist and scientist) and other religious fundamentalist in another, there is still room for people like Paul Davies and Clancy Martin (all world-class scientists) to fit somewhere else. It seems to me that they are in a camp that neither criticizes nor defends. They do not abandon their beliefs but are not so quick to label others as lunatics either, especially Clancy Martin. Although a self-declared agnostic, he believes that religion is fine because it serves a purpose to provide hope and comfort to the people who have it. He wouldn’t want people to lose that or have to give it up. He simply feels that they should at least consider that what they hold close may not be the reality they think it is.
  
  Presently I’m reading a book called “Patience With God” by Frank Schaeffer. He was a fundamentalist Christian who abandoned that to flirt with Atheism but is now neither. He suggests that the New Atheists (the radicals) agenda is to get rid of religion altogether without taking into account that, whether they like it or not, the majority of people are spiritual beings. In their quest, they have set themselves up as a quasi-religion equipped with prophets and gurus with the goal to return to ideas before postmodernists (to Modernism) and form theories to eradicate our current perception of religion. In other words, they want to explain away and interpret everything in terms that do not include any mention of God. This makes sense since two of the most significant figures during the era of Modernism were Charles Darwin and Karl Marx (not that I’m suggesting that Darwin set out to do that). On the other hand I don’t recall a time when religious fundamentalism has been as rampant as today. Hell, it got George Bush elected. So, I think it cuts both ways.
  
  My impression is that at this time in our history both religious and atheistic camps are on the rise. Yes, there are more people in the world. But what I think is happening is that more people are taking sides because they are being polarized. The rise even puzzles Richard Dawkins in light of the fact that people are increasingly acting to the influence of certain “memes” for which there appear to be no evolutionary mechanisms or even a necessity for, in terms of Natural Selection. I do see that people will be whatever they will be whether their opinion points to one pole or another. I can understand if there’s a perception that the scientists are more forceful in their message. But if you really think about it, so have the evangelicals for a very long time. Perhaps the situation is that scientists have the more prominent pulpit right now.
  
  One last thing: I do believe that we are the sum of our parts. This was clearly the thinking in the Bible in the book of Ecclesiastes. That idea does not have to exclude other possibilities that accommodate some of the precepts of religion or even cast in doubt on the idea of God. One of the problems I observe with individuals like Richard Dawkins is that, in his book “The God Delusion”, he uses a lot of bad acts and inconsistencies on the part of religion in order to indict the idea of God. His book should have been called “The Religion Delusion” instead. He fails to see that religion and God have effectively very little to do with one another. This is why a person can be spiritual without having a religion.
  
  Etude.
• 

  streets76

  In my case, spirituality appears to me to be a sensation that can give one a sense of wonder that fixates on things greater than everyday life.

  But why would you have to label that sensation as "spirituality" ? Why not just pure "wonderment" or "awe" or "wow" ?

  I don't think there is anything greater than everyday life. When I read a good book, or hear a great piece of music, or drink a fine glass of wine, or see a beautiful woman, I just think, "Wow, this has made my life today more enjoyable than it could have been."
• 

  maputo95

  Spirituality- AA's 12 Steps; sectarianist religion- WTBTS!!
• 

  Etude

  Hi streets:

  But why would you have to label that sensation as "spirituality" ? Why not just pure "wonderment" or "awe" or "wow" ?

  I don’t. But I suppose that we have to call it something. I can only summarize what I found while looking up the definition (not just a dictionary definition but also a current vernacular understanding of the term). From the word itself we can infer that it has something to do with “spirit”. This suggests an intangibility or etherealness of what it deals with. The term is usually applied to things that are non material or are beyond the ordinary. For example: We don’t term feelings of love for parents or even for children as spiritual. We don’t say that an awesome rock concert was a spiritual experience (unless there’s some sort of illegal substance involved). We don’t think of country music as spiritual, although we know that some music can evoke spiritual feelings or can help us achieve a higher state of “spirituality”. No, the meaning is reserved for things that are “of the spirit” and are out of our usual everyday experience; the type of sensation or experience that has a particular sense of “wow” for us. This doesn’t have to be an extreme experience but it is usually one described as very personal and introspective. Perhaps it has to do with the profundity of the experience for the individual, even if it’s triggered by something ordinary. I have personally never experienced it, but I’ve heard people talk about a sexual experience in the same terms, the “Earth moved” for them. That’s quite extraordinary. Is that why some people call: “Oh God!” during sex? Is that why there have been sex-based religions in the past? There’s something to that. Sex for me is pretty good on a regular basis but it doesn’t quite rise to that level. I would rather concentrate on the type of spirituality that deals with the most unanswerable feelings and realizations that I can experience. You could say that “spirituality” is an umbrella word that covers a more or less similar range of sensations (awe, wow, wonderment, etc) of a particular order, the experience of which are very subjective and individual.
  
  Etude.
• 

  Terry

  On the other hand I don’t recall a time when religious fundamentalism has been as rampant as today. Hell, it got George Bush elected.

  I believe it was the Supreme Court that got Bush elected (thanks to Florida chads) and fear of Terrorism got him re-elected (that and the feckless John Kerry.)
• 

  Etude

  Terry:

  You make a good point. Still I think he (GW) would not have made it that far into the race if it hadn't been for the "born again" contingent.

  Etude.
• 

  misocup

  Etude, I hate the way you write, it makes me so jealous!

  The rise even puzzles Richard Dawkins in light of the fact that people are increasingly acting to the influence of certain “memes” for which there appear to be no evolutionary mechanisms or even a necessity for, in terms of Natural Selection.

  I think they over-think the problem. The "memes" they act on are simply a result of the same social pressures and consensus trances humans have always acted on. What has changed dramatically is the context. Modern society, information overload, breakdown of extended family structure, these induce fear which may be leading to the polarization you mentioned. Turbulence in the "waters".

  Here's some humor

  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YqC73omSk4o

  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xfqht0LEOWQ&feature=related

  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-T5snc_LYSY&feature=fvst