Rationalizing faith.

[steve_bank]

The Korn IMO is relatively coherent compared to the Holy Babble. My opinion.

As to faith. Religion and philosophy asellm has always been about finding some peace in a chaotic dangerous world.

If you get upset over a few words om your beliefs than you do not understand religion or philosophy. It is about a sense of well being.

If not then your beliefs are just an affectation, an external ornament for show. That is why I ask theists how does faith manifest in their daily life and never get a real answer.

Academic debate does not equate to understanding religion. I doubt most theists of any kind really understand it.

If we're talking bible and koran we're discussing translations of translations of translations. That amounts to hearsay at best.

From my reading of the JKoran the intent was to set up a framework for society, in this case a theocracy. In the day there were progressive elements. Not what we imagine today but rights for women and children. In contrast Torah books books were written by unconnected groups at different times and outside of Leviticus and 10 Commandments there was no real structure.

 

[DBT]

Memorized and passed down orally, actually. The collecting into a book part came much later.

You are oddly convinced of some mistruths as to its contents. Really, it's not that long a read.

Actually?....well, it seems that it's pretty much as I said;

Quote:
''The Prophet Muhammad disseminated the Koran in a piecemeal and gradual manner from AD610 to 632, the year in which he passed away.

The evidence indicates that he recited the text and scribes wrote down what they heard.

Some of the Prophet's associates set out to collect into single volumes all the "suras" (chapters) that had been disseminated in this fashion.

This endeavour yielded a number of versions of the scripture belonging to different "Companions" of the Prophet, versions which today we call "Companion codices".

Around AD650, the Caliph Uthman, who himself had been a close associate of the Prophet, had a committee establish an official version of the Koran based on the existing copies of the scripture and the knowledge of experts.

It is reasonable to conjecture that he worried about textual diversity and wanted to promote textual uniformity.

He sent this official version to different cities and people began copying it.

This Uthmanic textual tradition dwarfed and ultimately replaced the traditions of Ibn Masud and other Companion codices everywhere in the Muslim world, thus fulfilling Uthman's aim of greater textual uniformity from place to place.

Your source describes more less what I did. Oral traditions, that only became textual well after the Prophet's death (he died in 630 CE).

Are you really trying to claim the scholarly high ground here? With your entirely made-up "statistics" and dubiously translated ayat?

My made up statistics?

The article refers to and cites Islamic scholarship, how the Qur'an was compiled, ie, the companions of Mohammed wrote what they heard him say, which was collected decades later and compiled.

Your claim "memorized and passed down orally, actually" overlooks this detail. Which is why I responded.

Call it nitpicking if you like.

 

[T.G.G. Moogly]

The Korn IMO is relatively coherent compared to the Holy Babble. My opinion.

As to faith. Religion and philosophy asellm has always been about finding some peace in a chaotic dangerous world.

If you get upset over a few words om your beliefs than you do not understand religion or philosophy. It is about a sense of well being.

If not then your beliefs are just an affectation, an external ornament for show. That is why I ask theists how does faith manifest in their daily life and never get a real answer.

Academic debate does not equate to understanding religion. I doubt most theists of any kind really understand it.

If we're talking bible and koran we're discussing translations of translations of translations. That amounts to hearsay at best.

From my reading of the JKoran the intent was to set up a framework for society, in this case a theocracy. In the day there were progressive elements. Not what we imagine today but rights for women and children. In contrast Torah books books were written by unconnected groups at different times and outside of Leviticus and 10 Commandments there was no real structure.

Both books have the same intent.

 

[DBT]

It's just odd that they have persisted to the present day...that so many people still believe these things.

 

[T.G.G. Moogly]

It's just odd that they have persisted to the present day...that so many people still believe these things.

It's just tribalism and quick-stop shopping. 'These things' are there BECAUSE many people believe in such things, there's a demand. It's a turnkey identity, nothing proactive required in the way of thinking.

 

[steve_bank]

People think John Wayne was actually like the characters he played. He crafted his coboy image.

Houdini was so good in his day at illusion some people thought it was supernatural. He was actually charged with witchcraft somewhere in Europe.

People thought Nimoy WAS Spock.

The term for it is the willing suspension of disbelief.

 

[DBT]

Or some sort of a block in the ability to see things as they are? A certain inability to sort fact from fiction. That how something is presented, perceived and believed to be, must be how it is.

 

[T.G.G. Moogly]

It's just our emotions getting the better of us.

Maybe one day we will invent a pill that completely blocks our emotional system and allows us to exist rationally, intellectually. We know that from an evolutionary standpoint that's exactly how our brains have developed so it makes sense that we're still stuck in this twilight zone between rational thought and emotional impulse. Our brains suspend disbelief because it is enjoyable and must have at one time conferred survival value, at least to a point. The only reason such an arrangement persists is because so many of us are still primarily driven by emotional impulse - and don't realize it, we're on drugs and we enjoy it. How else to explain that we think invisible people live in the sky and are interested in our sex organs. That's pretty juvenile, primitive stuff.

We'll get there.

 

[steve_bank]

There was a movie called Librium about a culture that mandated daily meds that inhibited emotions, for the good of all.

 

[DBT]

Emotion is a motivator, for both good and bad reasons.

 

[DBT]

The Korn IMO is relatively coherent compared to the Holy Babble. My opinion.

As to faith. Religion and philosophy asellm has always been about finding some peace in a chaotic dangerous world.

If you get upset over a few words om your beliefs than you do not understand religion or philosophy. It is about a sense of well being.

If not then your beliefs are just an affectation, an external ornament for show. That is why I ask theists how does faith manifest in their daily life and never get a real answer.

Academic debate does not equate to understanding religion. I doubt most theists of any kind really understand it.

If we're talking bible and koran we're discussing translations of translations of translations. That amounts to hearsay at best.

From my reading of the JKoran the intent was to set up a framework for society, in this case a theocracy. In the day there were progressive elements. Not what we imagine today but rights for women and children. In contrast Torah books books were written by unconnected groups at different times and outside of Leviticus and 10 Commandments there was no real structure.

Mohommad's dream of establishing his new religion, and himself as a prophet of god. The ambition of power and position and a place in history.

 

[steve_bank]

From my reading of the JKoran the intent was to set up a framework for society, in this case a theocracy. In the day there were progressive elements. Not what we imagine today but rights for women and children. In contrast Torah books books were written by unconnected groups at different times and outside of Leviticus and 10 Commandments there was no real structure.

Mohommad's dream of establishing his new religion, and himself as a prophet of god. The ambition of power and position and a place in history.

Of course. That being said he unified disparate Arab groups by force when needed, the old fashioned way.

Moses would have been similar in united a group of nomads.

Positives and negatives.

I read two books on Mohamad. Its is good to get multiple versions.

Apparently he was illiterate and was around main trade routes and would have been around different cultures. The Hebrew bible was a foundation, he called them 'the people of the book'. He thought Jesus was a prophet and that the Hebrews had strayed form the true path.

 

[Treedbear]

It's just our emotions getting the better of us.

Maybe one day we will invent a pill that completely blocks our emotional system and allows us to exist rationally, intellectually. We know that from an evolutionary standpoint that's exactly how our brains have developed so it makes sense that we're still stuck in this twilight zone between rational thought and emotional impulse. Our brains suspend disbelief because it is enjoyable and must have at one time conferred survival value, at least to a point. The only reason such an arrangement persists is because so many of us are still primarily driven by emotional impulse - and don't realize it, we're on drugs and we enjoy it. How else to explain that we think invisible people live in the sky and are interested in our sex organs. That's pretty juvenile, primitive stuff.

We'll get there.

What you're describing is a state of being "comfortably numb". Personally, I enjoy discovering something that is intellectually cohesive with my world view. And it's uncomfortable to find out when I'm wrong. These are emotions and they serve as the motivation for further understanding. I believe they are the functional basis for how the brain organizes information about the world. It's the basis for intelligence and not the enemy of it. Even Einstein admitted that his happiest thought was the result of an intellectual inspiration.

The problem arises when the situation is too complex, or there is insufficient information to make a rational decision and there is a perceived need to do so. We get what Kuhn called a paradigm shift. People (including scientists) hang onto their theories and models longer than the evidence supports, until it causes so much internal conflict that a change in perspective is required. That's because this strategy tends to work even though it's based on a very primitive principle of survival. It's often better to make a wrong decision than to make no decision at all. But eliminating the emotional motivation to resolve intellectual conflicts won't get rid of the problem. All you'd get is a divide by zero error.

 

[steve_bank]

'comfortably numb', a good yerm, I'll remember it.

It is a good desription of how ee modern humans hide from reality religion being one way.

 

[Treedbear]

'comfortably numb', a good yerm, I'll remember it.

It is a good desription of how ee modern humans hide from reality religion being one way.

My favorite song by Pink Floyd. To me it's a comment on how society squelches independent thought. But it can be done with medication as well. It seems to me they interfere with the role serotonin normally plays in guiding the formation of neural networks.

 

[Politesse]

Pink Floyd I love.

But it never really occurred to me that being "comfortably numb' could be taken as an aspirational goal.

 

[Treedbear]

Pink Floyd I love.

But it never really occurred to me that being "comfortably numb' could be taken as an aspirational goal.

That's definitely not the message here. Unless I'm in the dentist chair or operating room that is.

 

[steve_bank]

On the secular side Hugh Hefner was an example.

By virtue of his wealth he retreated to a Ca estate surrounded by an endless stream of young women. He was constantly surrounded by attractive warm female bodies, and went about in a bathrobe. Insulated from reality outside his estate.

Religion is an insulation, psychologicaly. I'd say that is true of all belief systems. You feel like you are doing the right thing. Christianity, apologetics, has an endless stream of interruptions that provide comforting answers.

God knows you and has a pan for you, don't worry.

From the gospels bear your burdens and have hope, for you there is a wondaful eternal afterlife.

Buddhists can think themselves into a state of ecstasy and bliss divorced from reality. What do you think they are expering sitting cross legged with eyes closed?

Hiding in excessive sex.

It is abut expeince from belifs, not the beliefs themselves. Thast is why Christians get so defensive at any hint of limitations, it threatens their feeling of well being.

 

[DBT]

Pink Floyd I love.

But it never really occurred to me that being "comfortably numb' could be taken as an aspirational goal.

That's definitely not the message here. Unless I'm in the dentist chair or operating room that is.

Comfortable numbness may not be the aim, but it appears to be the result in many cases.

 

[abaddon]

On the secular side Hugh Hefner was an example.

By virtue of his wealth he retreated to a Ca estate surrounded by an endless stream of young women. He was constantly surrounded by attractive warm female bodies, and went about in a bathrobe. Insulated from reality outside his estate.

Religion is an insulation, psychologicaly. I'd say that is true of all belief systems. You feel like you are doing the right thing. Christianity, apologetics, has an endless stream of interruptions that provide comforting answers.

God knows you and has a pan for you, don't worry.

From the gospels bear your burdens and have hope, for you there is a wondaful eternal afterlife.

Buddhists can think themselves into a state of ecstasy and bliss divorced from reality. What do you think they are expering sitting cross legged with eyes closed?

Hiding in excessive sex.

It is abut expeince from belifs, not the beliefs themselves. Thast is why Christians get so defensive at any hint of limitations, it threatens their feeling of well being.

Speaking of aspirational goals...

⁃ constantly surrounded by attractive warm female bodies
⁃ insulated from reality outside his estate
⁃ feel like you are doing the right thing
⁃ don't worry
⁃ have hope
⁃ state of ecstasy and bliss divorced from reality
⁃ feeling of well being

I'm being mostly serious actually... these ideas are WAY better than the blocking emotions idea!


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I'd be ok with religion if it was about improving the quality of subjective experience. It's more blatant in the "contemplatives" that that IS what it's about, for them. If only the fundies, and everyone else as well, paid them more attention...