Atheism as a religion

[Marblehead]

Hey, you dont need to say a word; I thought that you might find it interesting. I loved your info on "Wu" & "Yo", I didn't have time to mention this morning.

 

This is all new language for me, about similar ideas so it is quite fascinating; Are they perhaps similar to objective and subjective thought, or maybe closer to material non material; I am intrigued.

 

I do talk a lot about objective vs subjective. I'm always willing to talk more about it.

 

Material is easy to talk about. Non-material is very difficult.

[Marblehead]

If I just point out that you show mental confusion there, do you see what I'm hinting at?

I don't have mental confusion. You may not understand what I said or perhaps I did not express myself well.

 

Please don't hint around. I am very slow at those types of games.

[iain]

I do talk a lot about objective vs subjective. I'm always willing to talk more about it.

 

Material is easy to talk about. Non-material is very difficult.

 

How would you define Wu & Yo, in relation to Yin and Yang, are one pair contained within the other, or is there another way to see them?

[Owledge]

I don't have mental confusion. You may not understand what I said or perhaps I did not express myself well.

 

Please don't hint around. I am very slow at those types of games.

You said you don't believe in magic

and then defined "believe" as considering it valid due to having empirically confirmed its existence

and defined magic as either illusion trickery or self-manifesting suggestion.

[Rara]

 

I'm sorry that you did not understand my post; of course it makes good sense to me; would you perhaps like a more succinct explanation? I am sure that I can make one ...

 

Which part did you not understand?

Exactly, it makes good sense to you. You are stringing your "understanding" of science together with spirituality in some way that might sound like you've got this, but the links are far from concrete.

 

Though I do invite you to share references to this science.

[iain]

Ok first things first, which science are you referring?
I have drawn a parallel between the vedanga that I am being taught by my teacher (guru) and neuro science.

Which side were you feeling least comfortable with, The Vedanga Jyotish and yoga or was it the modern science, specifically neuro endocrinology , neuro science and neuro epigenetics.?.

here is a picture of the Sinoatrial Node; the bundle of neurons in the heart. They are why ECG machines work at a distance and we can start the heart with a current when stopped. (as an interesting side note; fractal mathematics are used to analyze the field produced by this node of neurons; to detect the onset of a heart attack)

http://hyperphysics.phy-astr.gsu.edu/hbase/biology/sanode.html

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electrical_conduction_system_of_the_heart

We will also need to understand the concept of Neuro epiginetics; are you familiar with this at all?

http://www.nature.com/neuro/journal/v13/n11/full/nn.2668.html

http://www.nature.com/neuro/journal/v13/n11/full/nn1110-1299.html

You will have to join the dots there yourself.


Now the doctrine that relates the mind to the heart, in Jyotish, is highly complex it involves a deep understanding of both Jyotish vedanga and tantra .

Edited October 21, 2014 by iain

[iain]

... Now the doctrine that relates the mind to the heart, in Jyotish, is highly complex it involves a deep understanding of both Jyotish vedanga and tantra .

The mathematics behind this are simply beautiful, you will need to read the bṛhatpārāśarahorāśāstra with a Guru; to really get the picture.

I can only hope this serves to remove any thought of credulity, that you may have felt whilst reading my posting.

Edited October 21, 2014 by iain

[Marblehead]

 

How would you define Wu & Yo, in relation to Yin and Yang, are one pair contained within the other, or is there another way to see them?

Yes, you are looking for the roots of Taoist philosophy.

 

It is my understanding, and therefore my opinion, that Yin/Yang and Wu/Yo are concepts at different levels.

 

As I understand it, Yin/Yang are the polarities, the energies, of Chi. Chi is the energy, Yin/Yang are the polarities. Yin is restful, dark, negative; Yang is active, light, positive. However, we should not view dark/light or negative/positive in dualistic terms. We need the one in order to know the other.

 

Wu/Yo speaks to states, or conditions, of the totality of the universe. I translate Wu as Mystery (or non-manifest) and Yo as Manifest (the physical universe). In the evolution of the universe first there was Wu and then Yo Manifested out of Wu.

 

Again, these are not to be viewed as dualistic concepts. We can view Yo as the known and Wu as the unknown. Or, if you will, Yo as the material universe and Wu as the spiritual universe. The reason Wu is the unknown is because it has not yet manifested and has the potential to be anything. One can put one's finger on Yo but there is nowhere to put one's finger on what does not yet exist.

[iain]

... but the links are far from concrete.

 

Good, concrete is disgusting stuff.

[iain]

Yes, you are looking for the roots of Taoist philosophy.

 

It is my understanding, and therefore my opinion, that Yin/Yang and Wu/Yo are concepts at different levels.

 

As I understand it, Yin/Yang are the polarities, the energies, of Chi. Chi is the energy, Yin/Yang are the polarities. Yin is restful, dark, negative; Yang is active, light, positive. However, we should not view dark/light or negative/positive in dualistic terms. We need the one in order to know the other.

 

Wu/Yo speaks to states, or conditions, of the totality of the universe. I translate Wu as Mystery (or non-manifest) and Yo as Manifest (the physical universe). In the evolution of the universe first there was Wu and then Yo Manifested out of Wu.

 

Again, these are not to be viewed as dualistic concepts. We can view Yo as the known and Wu as the unknown. Or, if you will, Yo as the material universe and Wu as the spiritual universe. The reason Wu is the unknown is because it has not yet manifested and has the potential to be anything. One can put one's finger on Yo but there is nowhere to put one's finger on what does not yet exist.

 

Thank you for the wonderful explanation, much appreciated; I think that I get the idea.

[Marblehead]

You said you don't believe in magic

and then defined "believe" as considering it valid due to having empirically confirmed its existence

and defined magic as either illusion trickery or self-manifesting suggestion.

Yep, I pretty much said that with very similar words.

 

Thing is, anything that one believes but cannot be seen by all other people is not a reality but rather an imaginary image. Yes, there are such things as group illusion and delusion.

 

So yes, the mental concept of magic exists. The illusion is thinking it is something not natural. Understanding the reality of what it is or what is happening makes it natural.

 

There really is a difference between my chair and the floor. If the chair exists my butt will hit the chair and stop when I sit down. If it is an illusion my ass will be on the floor.

 

Voodoo is a little different. If you believe you will be effected mentally and this change in mentality can actually cause physical changes. Now here I might have stepped into some stuff so I will explain. Healers do the same thing. Speaking crudely, they do Voodoo. But again, if you believe it might help there is a good chance it will help. If you believe it won't help the odds are very good that it won't help.

 

There is a great difference between believing in something that is true for everyone who has had the experience and believing in things that only those who have been taught to believe them without proof. And one can create all sorts of illusions and delusions to support the belief so that there no longer is no need for proof.

 

I believe that if I put my hand in a fire I will get a burned hand. To think that God will protect me and not allow my hand to be burned when I put it into the fire is, in my opinion, irresponsible. To believe in anything that no one can prove ever having seen, smelled, tasted, or touched would likewise be irresponsible.

[Marblehead]

 

Thank you for the wonderful explanation, much appreciated; I think that I get the idea.

But remember, I claim no authority. This is only my understanding and opinion.

[C T]

In SE Asia one need only search a little to get in touch with the world of black magic and its ill intents and purposes, such that its casually used to bring misfortune to some who actually have no inkling at all that they are being manipulated on the psychic level - often, black magicians are sought to wreak vengeance on love rivals, to ruin business rivals, to drive enemies to insanity, even to implant 'dirty' things into people's bodies, like maggots, needles, pus-like substances, and even to the extreme of making victims suffer leprosy-like skin lesions and other very real but very unfortunate events, like accidents, even deaths in some extreme circumstances.

 

I once apprenticed for an Indian healer/exorcist to 'deliver' a business tycoon from a lot of strange and dismal happenings in his life; turned out the person who paid a black magician to put a curse on him was none other than his own younger brother who got pissed off because the father, upon retiring, left the running of their family estate and factories which they owned to the first-born son who assumed the CEO position fresh from returning home after completing his uni studies in the States, whereas the brother was kind of hands-on all the time, very involved in the business operations and knew the business well, long before the father decided to retire even. He naturally assumed that he was the heir apparent, but it turned out otherwise. The irony was that the eldest son wasn't even keen in the family business, and was happy enough to step aside so that his younger bro, whom he felt was the right person for the job, take the CEO's chair.

 

I don't really scare easily having been a cop, but the events that unfolded which finally led to the exorcist discovering the damaging 'charm' responsible for the mess hidden deep underground in the garden of the older brother's house, and the subsequent disempowering of said charm really tested my resolve to quite an extent.

 

How the exorcist managed to locate where this charm was buried was thru fasting, prayers and trance, and if i remember correctly, when the cloth-wrapped bundle was extracted from a dug hole of about 3 foot, it was learnt that the cloth used was the older brother's handkerchief, and in it was found a partly-burnt passport-sized photo of his wife, some hair that was probably 'stolen' from the barbers or hair salon, a few needles, and a tie clip (later identified by the older brother to be his). The exorcist performed a ritualistic deliverance prayer over the found articles - confident that the spell was neutralised, we carefully put everything into a small metal container, bound it up with some blessed coloured strings, and proceeded to a river where more prayers were said before finally chucking the thing into the fast-flowing waters. We watched it sink after drifting for a short distance.

 

I would not be comfortable mentioning the exact ills that this person and his wife were suffering from, mentally, physically, financially, and in the business operations that he was managing being exposed to weird events like trucks catching fire, hijacking etc - suffice to say that after the exorcism was performed, things began to improve dramatically within a relatively short time.

 

This man & his wife did not even believe in hexes, bomohs, black magic and all what they termed 'superstitions'. Understandable, since both of them were university grads and were quite 'westernised', having spent more than 10

years in America, both studying and then working before returning home when the father was taken ill.

 

I know this is off-topic, but i am only recalling/sharing this after reading MH's post about voodoo not working on disbelievers.

 

The event above was not an isolated incident - in my country such happenings are pretty common, with varying degrees of severity in terms of harm being wrought on innocent or not-so- innocent individuals, and sometimes to whole families too.

 

Edited October 21, 2014 by C T

[Marblehead]

Hi CT,

 

Your post was on topic, I think.

 

But I won't speak to it as you know how I feel about these things.

[zerostao]

I can do it because I am very opinionated. And, I have seen nothing to cause me to think otherwise. Oh, sure, I've heard the stories. And I used to read Greek Mythology. And I used to believe in both because I needed something to believe in.

 

I no longer have that need. I believe in physical reality as my brain perceives it. More than enough there for me to believe in. And that physical reality is good enough for me. I don't need any super duper whatevers. All the fairy tales stayed at my birth place when I joined the Army. And although I have returned to my birthplace many time I never encountered any of the fairy tales creatures.

i wonder if you re-read the greek mythology and the ancient greek philosophy and ancient greek poetry now if your view and understanding would be different? i just read a faulkner piece with a entirely different view than when i read it 4 years ago. as a true bum on this forum recently said to me "we dont ever step in the same river twice" which of course is a reference to heraclitus, and for me it was insightfully profound on multiple levels. it isnt that we are looking to believe in anything is it?

some of these ideas and thoughts from the ancients still ring provoking and profound, to me anyways.

my recent university studies, an idea keeps recurring no matter which genre of study i am in. there is a common thing repeats. doesnt matter if it came from the mayan, the bible, the greeks, native americans, or from the east.

heraclitus was one heck of a great taoist thinker imo,, unity of opposites, ever present change in the universe, but what keeps repeating is

 

even those stoics considered logos as the divine animating principle pervading the universe.

i read some jung and he has things to say about it too. i think even nietzsche affirmed heraclitus in his remarks concerning shopenhauer

Edited October 21, 2014 by zerostao

[Marblehead]

Well, I did have to read some of it in the 1980s when I was going to uni.

 

Actually Greek Mythology isn't all that far from reality. Most of the stories are based in at least partial fact.

 

And I do watch documentaries on TV whenever they come around. Mostly I look for their views on morality and especially their use of logic and reason. Logic hasn't changed much from then til now but reason is rather different as man's conditions have changed much from then til now.

 

Yes, Greek logic is much like Taoist logic. For this reason I will continue to watch the documentaries whenever they are available. We don't see many Taoist documentaries on TV.

 

Back when I was a teenager reading that stuff for the first time I never really bought into the unnatural stuff but I think the reasoning and logic played an important part during my formative years.

 

And true, we can never step in the same river twice. And we can never change anything that has already happened.

[Owledge]

Marblehead, you contradicted yourself. You said you don't believe in magic but then your definition of magic is something you believe to be valid, provable.

[Marblehead]

Marblehead, you contradicted yourself.

I am quite sure that wasn't the first time. Nothing special.

[Marblehead]

You said you don't believe in magic but then your definition of magic is something you believe to be valid, provable.

Yep. I basically said that, didn't I?

 

"I" don't believe in magic. "You" believe in magic. It doesn't work for me. It works for you. Is it real or is it psychological?

 

What was that special term you used above? "self-manifesting suggestion"

[Owledge]

Yep. I basically said that, didn't I?

 

"I" don't believe in magic. "You" believe in magic. It doesn't work for me. It works for you. Is it real or is it psychological?

 

What was that special term you used above? "self-manifesting suggestion"

Looks like you still don't get it. ^^

[Marblehead]

Looks like you still don't get it. ^^

Apparently it looks that way to you. I have no idea what I am supposed to "get".

 

I'm too old to be getting a woman so that's not going to happen.

 

And if you think that I might "get" your understanding about Atheism it is likely that you are wasting your time.

 

I really do consider myself pretty observant but I still don't know what you think I should be getting.

[Marblehead]

Hey Owledge,

 

Remember, I am an Atheistic Taoist. I speak for myself only, I don't speak for other Atheists nor do I speak for other Taoists.

 

(I just felt I needed to say that.)

[Owledge]

You are getting so far off track now.

 

The point was mere language logic. You can only say you don't believe in magic if you define magic as something you don't believe exists, but you defined it as something that very much exists to you, so in turn you actually would believe in magic.

[zerostao]

Hey Owledge,

 

Remember, I am an Atheistic Taoist. I speak for myself only, I don't speak for other Atheists nor do I speak for other Taoists.

 

(I just felt I needed to say that.)

atheist taoist is common and anarchist too which is also common thread among a few of us here. atheists are the ones who relate well to XYP, as do scientists but i digress and will speak more to that on a XYP thread(at some point) my main XYP teacher is atheist,,

mh, do you think existentialism fits on this thread, or should i take that conversation to another thread?

i am pleased that you see similarity between ancient greeks and taoists, i think some of our chinese members here dont see that at all. i think existentialism fits well with taoism myself. i have a 1,000 word paper due tomorrow i havnt started on yet haha so i will check back tomorrow and see where we go from here.

[Rara]

Ok first things first, which science are you referring?

I have drawn a parallel between the vedanga that I am being taught by my teacher (guru) and neuro science.

 

Which side were you feeling least comfortable with, The Vedanga Jyotish and yoga or was it the modern science, specifically neuro endocrinology , neuro science and neuro epigenetics.?.

 

here is a picture of the Sinoatrial Node; the bundle of neurons in the heart. They are why ECG machines work at a distance and we can start the heart with a current when stopped. (as an interesting side note; fractal mathematics are used to analyze the field produced by this node of neurons; to detect the onset of a heart attack)

 

http://hyperphysics.phy-astr.gsu.edu/hbase/biology/sanode.html

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electrical_conduction_system_of_the_heart

 

We will also need to understand the concept of Neuro epiginetics; are you familiar with this at all?

 

http://www.nature.com/neuro/journal/v13/n11/full/nn.2668.html

 

http://www.nature.com/neuro/journal/v13/n11/full/nn1110-1299.html

 

You will have to join the dots there yourself.

 

 

Now the doctrine that relates the mind to the heart, in Jyotish, is highly complex it involves a deep understanding of both Jyotish vedanga and tantra .

Yes, neuroscience but as for the parallels, this is something I did a long long time ago myself. As much as I believed these parallels because they appeared to make sense, there was nothing "concrete" or measurable in which I could go on and class it as the answer, so to speak.

 

The links you provided - fine. I'm not in any disagreement with what neuroscience etc is offering here.

 

It's the linking with Vendanga/yoga that I'm not "comfortable" with and of course, short of learning everything on this side which I'm not prepared to do (and you have already spared me of any further reading of this - I guess you realise it opens up another can of worms in itself!) the debate becomes somewhat dismissed by me.

 

My reasoning is like I said before, exploring such a thing but with qi rather than prana/yoga. I view the ideas behind both to be of a similar school of thought - these are easier to draw parallels from.

 

But there is little measurable here, only a little that science can varify. Therefore dot joining is all well and good but proves useless as any form of answer, although I do appreciate that perhaps your angle is more of an exploration rather than to provide a definite answer. You did already say that "concrete" stuff was "disgusting". Interesting choice of words but if you mean in a sense of saying something is absolute when you and I both know it will never be (which is my point) then I guess we can agree. Although, I wouldn't use the word "disgusting".

 

That said, my use of "concrete", was more in relation to things that are proven, things we cannot argue against. It is extremely important to be clear when talking about yoga, buddhism or anything else from any ancient schools of thought for obvious reasons. The reasons are that despite similarities, they offer way too much in what can be disputed, or looked at from another perspective.

 

Science is like this too. There are countless numbers of experiments that amount to unsatisfactory conclusions and don't prove the hypothesis to be correct. However, one thing we do have is a universal "science" of which is "concrete" (and still developing - neuroscience is an example, we can name thousands) Science that is recognised and accepted globally.

 

In another post, I will highlight a couple of your earlier statements that I wish to challenge.

Edited October 22, 2014 by Rara