Answering the Big Questions of Life

http://www.leaderu.com/orgs/probe/docs/bigquest.html ^ | Sue Bohlin

[DittoJed2]

Answering the Big Questions of Life

Sue Bohlin

Sue Bohlin is an associate speaker with Probe Ministries. She attended the University of Illinois, and has been a Bible teacher and conference speaker for over 25 years. She serves as a Mentoring Mom for MOPS (Mothers of Pre-Schoolers), and on the board of Living Hope Ministries, a Christ-centered outreach to those wanting to leave homosexuality. She is also a professional calligrapher and the webservant for Probe Ministries; but most importantly, she is the wife of Dr. Ray Bohlin and the mother of their two college-age sons.

One of the most important aspects of Probe's "Mind Games" conference is teaching students to recognize the three major world views--Naturalism, Pantheism, and Theism--and the impact they have both on the surrounding culture as well as on the ideas the students will face at the university. Because we come from an unapologetically Christian world view, I will be presenting the ideas of Christian theism, even though Judaism and Islam are both theistic as well.
In this essay I'll be examining five of the biggest questions of life, and how each of the world views answers them:

Why is there something rather than nothing?
How do you explain human nature?
What happens to a person at death?
How do you determine right and wrong?
How do you know that you know?(1) Why Is There Something Rather than Nothing?

The most basic question of life may well be, Why is there something rather than nothing? Why am I here? Why is anything here at all?
 
Even Maria Von Trapp in the movie The Sound of Music knew the answer to this one. When she and the Captain are singing their love to each other in the gazebo, she croons, "Nothing comes from nothing, nothing ever could."
But naturalism, the belief that says there is no reality beyond the physical universe, offers two answers to this basic question. Until a few years ago, the hopeful wish of naturalism was that matter is eternal: the universe has always existed, and always will. There's no point to asking "why" because the universe simply is. End of discussion. Unfortunately for naturalism, the evidence that has come from our studies of astronomy makes it clear that the universe is unwinding, in a sense, and at one point it was tightly wound up. The evidence says that at some point in the past there was a beginning, and matter is most definitely not eternal. That's a major problem for a naturalist, who believes that everything that now is, came from nothing. First there was nothing, then there was something, but nothing caused the something to come into existence. Huh?
Pantheism is the belief that everything is part of one great "oneness." It comes from two Greek words, pan meaning "everything," and theos meaning "God." Pantheism says that all is one, all is god, and therefore we are one with the universe; we are god. We are part of that impersonal divinity that makes up the universe. In answering the question, Why is there something rather than nothing, pantheism says that everything had an impersonal beginning. The universe itself has an intelligence that brought itself into being. The "something" that exists is simply how energy expresses itself. If you've seen the Star Wars movies, you've seen the ideas of pantheism depicted in that impersonal energy field, "The Force." Since the beginning of the universe had an impersonal origin, the question of "why" gets sidestepped. Like naturalism, pantheism basically says, "We don't have a good answer to that question, so we won't think about it."
Christian Theism is the belief that God is a personal, transcendent Creator of the universe--and of us. This world view showed up on a T-shirt I saw recently:
"There are two things in life you can be sure of.
There is a God.
You are not Him." Christian Theism answers the question, Why is there something rather than nothing, by confidently asserting that first there was God and nothing else, then He created the universe by simply speaking it into existence. The Bible's opening sentence is an answer to this most basic of questions: "In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth." How Do You Explain Human Nature?


Another one of the big questions of life is, How do you explain human nature? Why do human beings act the way we do? What it really boils down to is, Why am I so good and you're so bad?
During World War II, a young Jewish teenager kept a journal during the years she and her family hid from the Nazis in a secret apartment in a house in Amsterdam. Anne Frank's diary poignantly explored the way she tried to decide if people were basically good or basically evil. Acts of kindness and blessing seemed to indicate people were basically good; but then the next day, Anne would learn of yet another barbarous act of depravity and torture, and she would think that perhaps people were basically bad after all. After reading her diary, I remember carrying on the quest for an answer in my own mind, and not finding it until I trusted Christ and learned what His Word had to say about it.

Naturalism says that humans are nothing more than evolved social animals. There is nothing that truly separates us from the other animals, so all our behavior can be explained in terms of doing what helps us to survive and reproduce. Your only purpose in life, naturalism says, is to make babies. And failing that, to help those who share your genes to make babies. Kind of makes you want to jump out of bed in the morning, doesn't it?

Another answer from naturalism is that we are born as blank slates, and we become whatever is written on those slates. You might mix in some genetic factors, in which case human nature is nothing more than a product of our genes and our environment.
Pantheism explains human nature by saying we're all a part of god, but our problem is that we forget we're god. We just need to be re- educated and start living like the god we are. Our human nature will be enhanced by attaining what pantheists call "cosmic consciousness." According to New Age thought, the problem with humans is that we suffer from a collective form of metaphysical amnesia. We just need to wake up and remember we're god. When people are bad, (which is one result of forgetting you're god), pantheism says that they'll pay for it in the next life when they are reincarnated as something less spiritually evolved than their present life. I had a Buddhist friend who refused to kill insects in her house because she said they had been bad in their previous lives and had to come back as bugs, and it wasn't her place to prematurely mess up their karma.

The Christian world view gives the most satisfying answer to the question, How do you explain human nature? The Bible teaches that God created us to be His image-bearers, which makes us distinct from the entire rest of creation. But when Adam and Eve chose to rebel in disobedience, their fall into sin distorted and marred the sacred Image. The fact that we are created in God's image explains the noble, creative, positive things we can do; the fact that we are sinners who love to disobey and rebel against God's rightful place as King of our lives explains our wicked, destructive, negative behavior. It makes sense that this biblical view of human nature reveals the reasons why mankind is capable of producing both Mother Teresa and the holocaust.What Happens after Death?

In the movie Flatliners, medical students took turns stopping each other's hearts to give them a chance to experience what happens after death. After a few minutes, they resuscitated the metaphysical traveller who told the others what he or she saw. The reason for pursuing such a dangerous experiment was explained by the med student who thought it up in the first place: "What happens after death? Mankind deserves an answer. Philosophy failed; religion failed. Now it's up to the physical sciences."
Well, maybe religion failed, but the Lord Jesus didn't. But first, let's address how naturalism answers this question.
Because this world view says that there is nothing outside of space, time and energy, naturalism insists that death brings the extinction of personality and the disorganization of matter. Things just stop living and start decomposing. Or, as my brother said when he was in his atheist phase, "When you die, you're like a dog by the side of the road. You're dead, and that's it." To the naturalist, there is no life after death. The body recycles back to the earth and the mental and emotional energies that comprised the person disintegrate forever.

Pantheism teaches reincarnation, the belief that all of life is an endless cycle of birth and death. After death, each person is reborn as someone, or something, else. Your reincarnated persona in the next life depends on how you live during this one. This is the concept of karma, which is the law of cause and effect in life. If you make evil or foolish choices, you will have to work off that bad karma by being reborn as something like a rat or a cow. If you're really bad, you might come back as a termite. But if you're good, you'll come back as someone who can be wonderful and powerful. New Age followers sometimes undergo something they call "past lives therapy," which regresses them back beyond this life, beyond birth, and into previous lives. I think it's interesting that people always seem to have been someone glamorous like Cleopatra and never someone like a garbage collector or an executioner!

Christian Theism handles the question, What happens to a person at death, with such a plain, no-nonsense answer that people have been stumbling over it for millenia. Death is a gateway that either whisks a person to eternal bliss with God or takes him straight to a horrible place of eternal separation from God. What determines whether one goes to heaven or hell is the way we respond to the light God gives us concerning His Son, Jesus Christ. When we confess that we are sinners in need of mercy we don't deserve, and trust the Lord Jesus to save us from not only our sin but the wrath that sin brings to us, He comes to live inside us and take us to heaven to be with Him forever when we die. When we remain in rebellion against God, either actively disobeying Him or passively ignoring Him, the consequences of our sin remain on us and God allows us to keep them for all eternity--but separated from Him and all life and hope. It is a dreadful thing to fall into the hands of the living God (Hebrews 10:31). But it is a delightful thing to fall into the arms of the Lover of your soul, Who has gone on ahead to prepare a place for you! Which will you choose?How Do You Determine Right and Wrong?

One of the big questions in life is, How do you determine right and wrong? Steven Covey, author of Seven Habits of Highly Effective People, appeared on the Oprah Winfrey show one day. He asked the studio audience to close their eyes and point north. When they opened their eyes, there were several hundred arms pointing in wildly different directions. Then Mr. Covey pulled out a compass and said, "This is how we know which way is north. You can't know from within yourself." He used a powerful object lesson to illustrate the way Christian theism answers this big question in life.

Naturalism says that there is no absolute outside of ourselves. There is no final authority because space, time and energy are all that is. There is no such thing as right and wrong because there is no right- and wrong-giver. So naturalism tries to deal with the question of ethics by providing several unsatisfying answers. One is the belief that there is no free choice, that all our behaviors and beliefs are driven by our genes. We are just as determined in our behavior as the smallest animals or insects. Another is the belief that moral values are determined from what is; the way things are is the way they ought to be. If you are being abused by your husband, that's the way things are, so that's the way they ought to be. Even worse is the concept of arbitrary ethics: might makes right. Bullies get to decide the way things ought to be because they're stronger and meaner than everybody else. That's what happens in totalitarian regimes; the people with the power decide what's right and what's wrong.

Pantheism says that there is no such thing as ultimate right and wrong because everything is part of a great undifferentiated whole where right and wrong, good and evil, are all part of the oneness of the universe. Remember "Star Wars"? The Force was both good and evil at the same time. Pantheism denies one of the basic rules of philosophy, which is that two opposite things cannot both be true at the same time. Because Pantheism denies that there are absolutes, things which are true all the time, it holds that all right and wrong is relative. Right and wrong are determined by cultures and situations. So murdering one's unborn baby might be right for one person and wrong for another.

Theism says that there is such a thing as absolute truth, and absolute right and wrong. We can know this because this information has come to us from a transcendent source outside of ourselves and outside of our world. Christian Theism says that the God who created us has also communicated certain truths to us. He communicated generally, through His creation, and He communicated specifically and understandably through His Word, the Bible. We call this revelation. Christian Theism says that absolute truth is rooted in God Himself, who is an Absolute; He is Truth. As Creator, He has the right to tell us the difference between right and wrong, and He has taken great care to communicate this to us.

That's why Steven Covey's illustration was so powerful. When he pulled out a compass, he showed that we need a transcendent source of information, something outside ourselves and which is fixed and constant, to show us the moral equivalent of "North." We are creatures created to be dependent on our Creator for the information we need to live life right. God has given us a compass in revelation.How Do You Know That You Know?

This question generally doesn't come up around the cafeteria lunch table at work, and even the most inquisitive toddler usually won't ask it, but it's an important question nonetheless: How do you know that you know?
There's a great scene in the movie Terminator 2 where the young boy that the cyborg terminator has been sent to protect, is threatened by a couple of hoodlums. The terminator is about to blow one away when the young boy cries out, "You can't do that!" The terminator--Arnold Schwarzenegger--asks, "Why not?" "You just can't go around killing people!" the boy protests. "Why not?" "Take my word for it," the boy says. "You just can't." He knew that it was wrong to kill another human being, but he didn't know how he knew. There are a lot of people in our culture like that!

Naturalism, believing that there is nothing beyond space, time and energy, would answer the question by pointing to the human mind. Rational thought--iguring things out deductively--is one prime way we gain knowledge. Human reason is a good enough method to find out what we need to know. The mind is the center of our source of knowledge. Another way to knowledge is by accumulating hard scientific data of observable and measurable experience. This view says that the source of our knowledge is found in the senses. We know what we can perceive through what we can measure. Since naturalism denies any supernaturalism (anything above or outside of the natural world), what the human mind can reason and measure is the only standard for gaining knowledge.

Pantheism would agree with this assessment of how we know that we know. Followers of pantheism tend to put a lot of value on personal experience. The rash of near- and after-death experiences in the past few years, for example, are extremely important to New Agers. These experiences usually validate the preconceptions of pantheistic thought, which denies absolutes such as the Christian tenet that Jesus is the only way to God. The experiences of past- lives therapy have persuaded even some Christians to believe in reincarnation, even though the Bible explicitly denies that doctrine, because personal experience is often considered the most valid way to know reality.

Christian Theism says that while human reason and perception are legitimate ways to gain knowledge, we cannot depend on these methods alone because they're not enough. Some information needs to be given to us from outside the system. An outside Revealer provides information we can't get any other way. Revelation--revealed truth from the One who knows everything--is another, not only legitimate but necessary way to know some important things. Revelation is how we know what happened when the earth, the universe and man were created. Revelation is how we know what God wants us to do and be. Revelation is how we can know how the world will end and what heaven is like. Revelation in the form of the Lord Jesus Christ is the only way we can experience "God with skin on."

Naturalism's answers are inadequate, depressing, and wrong; pantheism's answers are slippery, don't square with reality, and wrong; but Christian theism--the Christian world view--is full of hope, consistent with reality, and it resonates in our souls that it's very, very right.
Notes
1. These questions are taken from James W. Sire's book The Universe Next Door (Downers Grove, Ill.:InterVarsity Press), 1977.

[Tribune7]

I just asked a question. if Santa Claus was realitiy what would you do? How do you know Santa is not reality? (That's not a trick question. There is an easy answer. Think about it.)

[Tribune7]

Yet I see you laughing just above at a rationaly derived moral code.

No hypocrisy. The most famous "rationally derived moral code" -- which expressly rejected a Creator in lieu of what's best for the most -- was that of Marx and Engles. It objectively created a hell on earth.

[tpaine]

"How do you determine right and wrong? . . . By appealing to a rationally derived and objective moral code."
OWK


LOL
79 -tribune7-



Yet I see you laughing just above at a rationaly derived moral code..
How can you explain such unchristian hypocrisy?
93 -tpaine-


No hypocrisy. The most famous "rationally derived moral code" -- which expressly rejected a Creator in lieu of what's best for the most -- was that of Marx and Engles. It objectively created a hell on earth.
-t7-

Your attempt to tar baby OWK's line as being comparable to Marx, is just as unchristian & contemptable as your initial laughter.

Keep digging 'tribune'. You'll find your own hell.

[Tribune7]

Your attempt to tar baby OWK's line as being comparable to Marx . . .

theories ('Grand narratives') that seek to explain and predict individual behaviour and/or social formations on the basis of a set of incontravertible, rationally derived propositions. Examples of such theories would be Marxism, utilitarianism, and Freudianism.

[tpaine]

Meaningless 'quoted' opinion.

Try working up a rational argument some day in your own words.
Two bits you can't.

[OWK]

The most famous "rationally derived moral code" -- which expressly rejected a Creator in lieu of what's best for the most -- was that of Marx and Engles.

Far from being "rationally derived", Marx and Engels were an affront to reason.

Every bit as much so, as the world's various invisible super-power-laden giant cults are.

Often with similar results.

[betty boop]

Hello A-G! I did like your "little list" of ways people think about reality:
 

To a metaphysical naturalist, "reality" is all that exists in nature

To an autonomist "reality" is all that is, the way it is 

To an objectivist "reality" is that which exists 

To a mystic "reality" may include thought as substantive force and hence, a part of "reality" 

To Plato "reality" includes constructs such as redness, chairness, numbers, geometry and pi 

To Aristotle these constructs are not part of "reality" but merely language 

To some physicists, "reality" is the illusion of quantum mechanics 

To Christians "reality" is God's will and unknowable in its fullness. 

And I agree it would be worthwhile to flesh out the details of these several approaches, if people could be found to volunteer to step up to the plate and write one for their own particular favorite POV. (I'd be glad to take Plato, if he's not otherwise spoken for.)

The only reservation I have is the topic is perhaps too big and too amorphous. Maybe instead of asking "What is reality?" we should ask a question that, although much more specific, is only slightly less difficult: "What is man?"

Just a thought....

BTW, I want to thank you for the link to the excellent S-T-D site. I've had it bookmarked for a while, but only just downloaded three papers from there on Kalusa-Klein cosmology, which I read this weekend. Overduin and Wesson's "Kaluza-Klein Gravity" was so interesting, laying out the three main current approches to higher-dimensional cosmologies: compactified (supergravity and superstring theories), projective, and uncompactified. For simplicity and faithfulness to both Einstein and Newton, among other reasons, I'm "gravitating" to the 5D uncompactified model....

This is the model that holds that 4D matter and/or cosmological objects (e.g., photons, and more speculatively, solitons, neutrinos, even black holes) are induced from the "pure geometry" of the one extra dimension. This article, however, suggests that the extra dimension is responsible for dark matter -- not the dark energy you and I have been speculating about. Yet what if the fifth dimension is inducing dark matter? Could it be the medium of dark energy, so to speak -- effecting a causal relation in 5D's "time-like" vacuum?

One thing the authors do say is that, in most demonstrations of uncompactified 5D, whether or not the extra dimension is space- or time-like, it is empty: It contains no matter. (Unlike the compactification versions, which can stipulate matter for the extra dimensions, and need to, in order to make their theories work. Then they have the devil of a time of figuring out how to describe the generic properties of such matter for such dimensions, which have never been observed.... I guess that's why 11D superstring theory seems so "overwrought" to me. But then -- what do I know?)

The other thing that was really interesting was the authors are reluctant to identify the extra dimension as either "length-like" (i.e., space-like) or "time-like."

Yet from other parts of the discussion, the extra dimension does seem to have a "time-like" quality to it. But its time-likeness is a very strange one from our point of view (i.e., experience with 4D time). From the perspective of 4D, it "looks" like relative timelessness.

Perhaps the most fascinating thing about the discussion of non-compactified 5D was the author's discussion of the big bang -- which (to my mind at least) suggested something about the possible nature of the "time quality" in dimension #5.

From the standpoint of 4D, the big bang was a tremendous thermonuclear explosion. But from the standpoint of the fifth dimension, as one speculation goes, the big bang is an on-going "phase change." As the authors put it, "Rather than being a single event...the big bang [in this picture] resembles a sort of shock wave propagating along the fifth dimension" -- the resemblance it would presumably have were it "translated" into 4D spacetime, giving us the 5D picture in terms of our conventional 4D way of thinking/seeing. And yet, from the standpoint of the fifth dimension itself (untranslated into 4D terms), it seems the big bang may conceivably look like the specification of a perfect geometry, "frozen in time."

Perhaps the way we humans think about time may be a limiting factor in how we understand things going on in 4D+ dimensions. Time is "relative" within 4D. It may be "ultrarelative" in 5D WRT 4D time. That is, not just relative in the sense of 4D things being relative to each other, but the fifth dimension being time-relative to the entire 4D block, taken as a whole. Trying to represent this vast disparity of relative "time sense" in language is most difficult!

Just thinking aloud, and wondering if you have any thoughts about this. This is a most fascinating paper, and I'm sure I'll be thinking about it for some time to come. Thanks again, Alamo-Girl, for pointing me to it!!!

[Tribune7]

Try working up a rational argument some day in your own words.

OK,. God exists. He wants us to do unto others as we'd do unto ourselves. So do it.

[Tribune7]

Far from being "rationally derived", Marx and Engels were an affront to reason.

They didn't think so. Nor did their followers.

[tpaine]

Try working up a rational argument some day in your own words.
-tpaine-


OK,...
God exists. He wants us to do unto others as we'd do unto ourselves. So do it.
108 -trib7-



Trib.. - You give no rational evidence that god exists, or that he 'wants' us to do any particular thing.

The golden rule however, is very rational in itself, as it is self evident as a survival strategy.

Thus, we could conclude that upon seeing the golden rule as a good ploy, some cynical power mongers among us would use the golden rule as a basis for a religion that claims:

"God exists. He wants us to do unto others as we'd do unto ourselves."
--So do it, under my instructions as your high priest...

- Sound familiar, trib?

[Alamo-Girl]

Thank you so much for your reply and all your excellent musings! I'm absolutely thrilled that you are interested in higher dimensional dynamics!!!

And I agree it would be worthwhile to flesh out the details of these several approaches, if people could be found to volunteer to step up to the plate and write one for their own particular favorite POV. (I'd be glad to take Plato, if he's not otherwise spoken for.) The only reservation I have is the topic is perhaps too big and too amorphous. Maybe instead of asking "What is reality?" we should ask a question that, although much more specific, is only slightly less difficult: "What is man?"

I think the “What is man?” is a great place to start! And certainly, I would want you to represent the Platonist perspective. Sadly, I suspect it will be almost impossible to find volunteers here in the chat forum without inviting them. And the discussion wouldn’t get much exposure either.

It might work best to write up an article proposing the project and then post it to the News/Activism forum. If you’d care to do that, I will assist by bumping it to attract volunteers!

BTW, I want to thank you for the link to the excellent S-T-D site. I've had it bookmarked for a while, but only just downloaded three papers from there on Kalusa-Klein cosmology, which I read this weekend. Overduin and Wesson's "Kaluza-Klein Gravity" was so interesting, laying out the three main current approches to higher-dimensional cosmologies: compactified (supergravity and superstring theories), projective, and uncompactified. For simplicity and faithfulness to both Einstein and Newton, among other reasons, I'm "gravitating" to the 5D uncompactified model....

I’m so very glad you are enjoying their publications! I’ve been watching their progress for several years now, and I also gravitate to the 5D uncompactified model!

This is the model that holds that 4D matter and/or cosmological objects (e.g., photons, and more speculatively, solitons, neutrinos, even black holes) are induced from the "pure geometry" of the one extra dimension. This article, however, suggests that the extra dimension is responsible for dark matter -- not the dark energy you and I have been speculating about. Yet what if the fifth dimension is inducing dark matter? Could it be the medium of dark energy, so to speak -- effecting a causal relation in 5D's "time-like" vacuum?

To me, dark energy is the polar opposite of dark matter. Dark matter is characterized by positive gravity – black holes and massive nutrinos (if any.) Dark energy is characterized by negative gravity.

And because gravity has a “duality” with space/time – I believe they are both manifestations of higher dimensional dynamics. In the case of massive objects (earth, sun, black hole) – we can view them as an indentation in space/time, causing other objects to orbit and descend into them – and conversely, requiring an escape velocity to move outside the indentation.

In the case of dark energy, if we follow the same “duality”, the negative gravity would be an outdent of space/time which would cause astronomical acceleration which would not be detectable in local space (under positive gravity.) That is what we actually see happening!!!

Dark energy represents 73% of the mass of the universe. The universe is accelerating because of dark energy. And dark energy cannot be detected in laboratory conditions. It fits like a glove!

One thing the authors do say is that, in most demonstrations of uncompactified 5D, whether or not the extra dimension is space- or time-like, it is empty: It contains no matter. (Unlike the compactification versions, which can stipulate matter for the extra dimensions, and need to, in order to make their theories work. Then they have the devil of a time of figuring out how to describe the generic properties of such matter for such dimensions, which have never been observed.... I guess that's why 11D superstring theory seems so "overwrought" to me. But then -- what do I know?) The other thing that was really interesting was the authors are reluctant to identify the extra dimension as either "length-like" (i.e., space-like) or "time-like."

Yet from other parts of the discussion, the extra dimension does seem to have a "time-like" quality to it. But its time-likeness is a very strange one from our point of view (i.e., experience with 4D time). From the perspective of 4D, it "looks" like relative timelessness. Perhaps the most fascinating thing about the discussion of non-compactified 5D was the author's discussion of the big bang -- which (to my mind at least) suggested something about the possible nature of the "time quality" in dimension #5.

I strongly suspect these physicists are avoiding the attribution of “time-like” properties to the extra dimension for the same reason physicists have always avoided them. A time-like extra dimension means that time in our 4D is not a line but a plane, or brane. That messes up the casual order of things – A causes B causes C, etc. It also makes the entire plane accessible at once in 5D – future, past, current.

To me it makes perfect sense and clears up a mountain of enigmas: superposition (Schrodinger’s cat), non-locality, superluminal events, the earth/moon superposition paradox, precognition, retrocognition, etc.

With regard to the absence of matter in the higher dimensions - Max Tegmark suggests that the extra dimension(s) may contain mathematical structures. I would add that it may host consciousness. Neither of these consist of matter. Then again, being relegated to the 4D worldview how could we know of a certainty what all might exist in a higher dimension?

From the standpoint of 4D, the big bang was a tremendous thermonuclear explosion. But from the standpoint of the fifth dimension, as one speculation goes, the big bang is an on-going "phase change." As the authors put it, "Rather than being a single event...the big bang [in this picture] resembles a sort of shock wave propagating along the fifth dimension" -- the resemblance it would presumably have were it "translated" into 4D spacetime, giving us the 5D picture in terms of our conventional 4D way of thinking/seeing. And yet, from the standpoint of the fifth dimension itself (untranslated into 4D terms), it seems the big bang may conceivably look like the specification of a perfect geometry, "frozen in time."

Exactly!!! That is what is so exciting about this possibility. It answers so many questions and in the “pure marble” of geometry that Einstein sensed was the structure of all that there is.

Perhaps the way we humans think about time may be a limiting factor in how we understand things going on in 4D+ dimensions. Time is "relative" within 4D. It may be "ultrarelative" in 5D WRT 4D time. That is, not just relative in the sense of 4D things being relative to each other, but the fifth dimension being time-relative to the entire 4D block, taken as a whole. Trying to represent this vast disparity of relative "time sense" in language is most difficult!

Precisely! When I view the potential of the higher dimension having time-like properties – I see our 4D as a completed block of existence, the entire movie start to finish and accessible randomly. The natural realm characters within the story do not realize this and are acting out their parts as written. But the Writer can see the end and the beginning all at once, there is no difference. He can change the script at will, and the order of it.

All of that points to predestination or strong determinism. However, if the higher dimension hosts consciousness as I suspect, then that would be the agency of free will to suggest change in the script.

IMHO, the first evidence for a higher “time-like” dimension will be gathered from our research into dark energy.

[Tribune7]

The golden rule however, is very rational in itself, as it is self evident as a survival strategy.

Why don't most people follow it?

Thus, we could conclude that upon seeing the golden rule as a good ploy, some cynical power mongers among us would use the golden rule as a basis for a religion that claims: "God exists. He wants us to do unto others as we'd do unto ourselves." --So do it, under my instructions as your high priest.

That's the point I'm making.

You can do that with any tenet. You can rationalize anything.

If we make human wisdom the absolute authority we can justify killing babies because there are too many people. We can experiment on the socially marginal such as the Tuskeegee study or the Nazi death camps. We can justify ignoring the pain and suffering of others. And we can claim that the words in our Constitution didn't mean what the Founders said they meant.

We end up with a nightmare.

[OWK]

They didn't think so. Nor did their followers.

Nor do the followers of various magical-invisible-super-powered-benevolent creatures.

But alas...

[tpaine]

Thus, we could conclude that upon seeing the golden rule as a good ploy, some cynical power mongers among us would use the golden rule as a basis for a religion that claims:
"God exists. He wants us to do unto others as we'd do unto ourselves."
--So do it, under my instructions as your high priest.

That's the point I'm making. You can do that with any tenet. You can rationalize anything.

Funny indeed, -- as you just rationalized using my point as your own..

If we make human wisdom the absolute authority we can justify killing babies because there are too many people.

'We' do? - Maybe you see that as rational thinking, -- but I can't imagine why..

We can experiment on the socially marginal such as the Tuskeegee study or the Nazi death camps.

Again you say 'we'? I deny any connection to such irrational cultism.

We can justify ignoring the pain and suffering of others.

I don't, why do you?

And we can claim that the words in our Constitution didn't mean what the Founders said they meant.

Yep, you do that consistantly in your effort to control others beliefs/actions in a 'constitutional' fashion..

We end up with a nightmare.

Of course you do. - You profess a philosophy you aren't in actuality following. Must be hell to be so self-conflicted.

[Tribune7]

Maybe you see that as rational thinking, -- but I can't imagine why.

But can you explain why that isn't rational?

[OWK]

But can you explain why that isn't rational?

I can. (and have)

[tpaine]

If we make human wisdom the absolute authority we can justify killing babies because there are too many people.

'We' do? - Maybe you see that as rational thinking, -- but I can't imagine why.

But can you explain why that isn't rational?

You're thinking is irrational on different levels.
1)- No one here is justifing "killing babies".
2)- No one here is justifing "killing babies because there are too many people".
3)- No one here is claiming that human wisdom is absolute.
4) No one here is claiming that human wisdom ~must~ be the absolute authority. -- But, - we have no evidence of other authority.

[Tribune7]

A group of experts decide there are too many people taking up too many resources so they advocate killing a segment (babies, retarded, old people, unemployed, according to some logic-based formula) would be best for the whole.

How is this reasoning less rational than what you advocate?

[Tribune7]

1)- No one here is justifing "killing babies".

But people claiming that morality can be solely based on human reason have. In fact, every worldview that I can think that has made this claim has justified doing so.

4) No one here is claiming that human wisdom ~must~ be the absolute authority. -- But, - we have no evidence of other authority

Sure you do. You got the testimony of lots of people. Or you can weigh socities sincerely based that human rights are endowed by a creator with those that are not.

[Protagoras]

What if Santa Claus is reality?

He is. I have seen him and I have been him.