Of course. But who taught them?
Question is..Why are people looking forward to being dead? Surely it makes more sense to focus on the one thing we can rely on 'knowing'..that we are currently living?When asked if he feared death, Mark Twain replied "I was dead for billions of years before I was born and it didn't cause me the slightest discomfort."
Most world religions/spiritualities and philosophies have long since moved on many thousands of years ago from all of this. There is only one religion which claims to be a "religion of peace", but up to at least 25-35% of people worldwide, in this religion which is forced upon them-the people who leave the religion or become another completely different religion or if they become atheist/agnostic risk being killed by the government of their countries, family, peers, honor killings happen in the Western world as well, etc. that has never had a reformation or many multiple reformations or joined the modern world, the way all other religions and spiritual beliefs have. It is not Christianity, Judaism, Hinduism, Sikhism, Jainism, the off-shoot of Hinduism known as Buddhism, and many so called "moderate" members of this religion completely support the extremism, hate all people who are not this religion, and really hate bisexual and gay men.
there is no such thing as right or wrong. People are confused because they entertain an illusion or narrative that was given to them by religion and hero stories.
This is a thread about Theism, religion or spirituality in general. It is not only about Christianity or Judaism.
I'd insist that certain things are definitely wrong. Like raping a 5-yr-old, for instance.
It is well-documented that there have been incredibly well-developed civilizations (and intelligent people) throughout ancient history. These societies all came into existence after the establishment of agriculture-- long after the hunter/gatherer stage of human development. Nobody is "refusing to acknowledge" any of this.
Of course the pyramids were built by slaves under orders from those in power. And nobody thinks they "woke up one day and decided" to build them. It required thousands of laborers and decades of work-- and a very strong belief system involving deities and an afterlife.
Again, there have been intelligent people around for a very long time. Smarter than "our best experts" of modern times? That's a stretch. They were clueless about microorganisms, for instance. Their most sophisticated computer was an abacus.
Scientists explain the physical world.
And yet they are both Abrahamic religions, as is Judaism-- which was the original.
I was referring to objective morality being non existent when you get down to the most fundamental layers of reality. If you look at the world materialistically and has no spiritual quality to it, you have to acknowledge that. We as humans create this idea of right and wrong to differentiate between different behaviors that are subjective from individual to individual.
They are refusing to acknowledge the civilizations who were here before agriculture. The ones with the blueprint of the pyramids and all the other monuments and such scattered around the world. They refuse to acknowledge the apocalyptic writings of our ancestors. They just pass it off as myth or legend. But the truth is that these civilizations are the reason that we developed so quickly after lengthy stagnation in the species timeline. They are the reason agriculture was introduced to us in the first place. It did not just arise from spontaneous knowledge of the human species.
But who is running the top of the pyramid??(so to speak). Its not just those in power who had the knowledge to create the metaphysical structures. They were being guided by higher intelligence that surpassed peoples ability to comprehend in general. What makes you think that it was just those in power who had this metaphysical capability??
And yet they were still able to create sacred monument that can’t be replicated by any modern scientific means. Technologically or otherwise. That just shows how intelligence could be measured differently and there are different ways of perceiving reality. The modern industrialization of things has just made it more difficult for human beings to live peaceful spiritual lives and has disconnected us from the divine. Technological innovation has just made things more complicated and causes many disruptions to humans metaphysically and neurologically.
That’s not exactly true. How and why are synonymous. Scientists explain both but they have to abide by procedure and rules. And they need to have controlled experiments that are testable and falsifiable. Therefore anything that is unfalsifiable can ultimately never be discovered even if it is true and has the potential to harm us.
From where are you getting your information?
It really depends. Scientifically speaking we are more advanced, philosophically speaking I personally think (and i m not the only one) that the ancient and medieval philosophers were way better than the modern-contemporary ones , the only thing we " do better" is probably formal logic. People hear "Middle Ages" and think about witches and Inquisition and shit but their works on Ethics Metaphysics etc were probably way more rigorous than ours, that s why Aristotelian- Thomistic Philosophy is still a living option ( and I m glad to see that it s an increasingly popular one)
I agree that we cannot find concepts like good or bad in nature "generally speaking", but still don t you think that is possible to reflect on the kind of animal we are and discover what is objectively good or bad for us? For instance we are social animals, hence killing each others randomly and lying to each other constantly would be objectively bad for us etc.? That s another reason why I prefer the ancient and the medieval philosophers, morality for them was about human flourishing and trying to live the best life possible for an human being, not about abstract concepts like "duty" or "utility"...
The most we can say is that any given action or decision we make has a particular consequence or reaction. And we use our free will to decide how we will react to those things. Once you classify those things as good or bad, it is automatically subjective. Because you are assuming that all humans believe that preservation of the species is a good thing. There’s many people who believe that it’s not. And since they are a part of the human species, their perspective is just as much a part of the universe as ours and so it causes a split within the human consciousness collectively. It makes no sense to say that one side is the right side and the other side is the wrong delusional side. It’s just a split in human consciousness. This is the same reason people change political ideologies and join cults and stuff like that.
Information reveals itself through various means once you are honest about whatever you want revealed to you. The answers find you in a way. We were brainwashed to think it is the other way around.
I pretty much agree with that.
Hi, thanks for your reply, loyts of food for thought. I m not assuming that all humans believe that preservation of the specie is a good thing ( there are flat earthers and people convinced that the theory of evolution is a satanic lie, imagine if there can be a general consensus on ethical issues ). I m just saying that the account of humans= rational and political (social) animal amf of morality= human phenomenon aimed at human flourishing are pretty sound and convincing, one can always come up with a better account but so far and in the last ...2300 years the alternatives were and are way less convincing. If we agree on the account of humanity and of morality I have sketched supra than some actions are objectively wrong, even if they are widespread. Of course this is really roughly put and presupposes a number of metaphysical commitments ( personally I m convinced that....everything in philosophy presupposes a certain metaphysic, implicitly or explicitly) but metaphysics ethics etc can and should be the result of rational inquiry not of a more or less arbitrary choice ( i.e. is not my choice that humans have cognitive abilities that make them different from other animals or that they are social beings etc). Does it make any sense?
