Reason vs. Religion

The Recent Nightclub Bombings in Bali Illustrate Just What the "War on Terror" Is Really About

On the night of Saturday, October 12--the second anniversary of the suicide bombing of the USS Cole, a year, month, and day after the destruction of the World Trade Center, and mere days after terrorist attacks in Yemen, Kuwait, and the Philippines--two car bombs detonated outside neighboring nightclubs on the island of Bali, triggering a third explosive planted inside, and killing nearly 200 people (the majority of whom were Australian tourists), injuring several others, and redirecting the focus of the war against terror to Indonesia.

Also on the night of Saturday, October 12, the following bands and DJs were playing and spinning at several of Seattle's rock and dance clubs from Re-bar to Rock Bottom: FCS North, Sing-Sing, DJ Greasy, Michiko, Super Furry Animals, Bill Frisell Quintet, the Vells, the Capillaries, the Swains, DJ Che, Redneck Girlfriend, Grunge, Violent Femmes, the Bangs, Better Than Ezra, the Briefs, Tami Hart, the Spitfires, Tullycraft, B-Mello, Cobra High, Randy Schlager, Bobby O, Venus Hum, MC Queen Lucky, Evan Blackstone, and the RC5, among many, many others.

This short list, taken semi-randomly from the pages of The Stranger's music calendar, is designed to illustrate a point that is both facile and essential to reckoning the effects of the Bali bombings. Many of you were at these shows, dancing, smoking, drinking, talking, flirting, kissing, groping, and presumably enjoying yourselves, much like the 180-plus tourists and revelers killed at the Sari Club and Paddy's Irish Pub in Bali. Though no group has come forward to claim responsibility for the bombings, they were almost certainly the work of Muslim radicals launching the latest volley in the war against apostasy.

Whether the attacks turn out to have been the work of al Qaeda or one of the like-purposed, loosely connected, multicellular organizations that function in the region--groups like the Jemaah Islamiyah (an umbrella network that seeks a single Islamic state comprising Malaysia, Indonesia, and Singapore), the Indonesian Mujahedeen Council (led by the nefarious Abu Bakar Bashir), Laskar Jihad (which waged holy war on Christians in the Spice Islands before mysteriously disbanding two weeks ago), or the Islam Defenders Front (which makes frequent "sweeps" of bars and nightclubs, attacking non-Muslims, and violently guarding against "prostitution and other bad things")--will ultimately prove to be of little consequence. What matters is that the forces of Islamic fascism have struck again, in a characteristically cowardly, murderous, and yes, blasphemous fashion that must register as an affront to every living human with even a passing interest in freedom.

The facile part: It could have happened here, at any club in Seattle. It's a ludicrous thought, of course--at least as ludicrous as the thought of shutting the Space Needle down on New Year's Eve because some crazy terrorist was arrested at the Canadian border--but that doesn't make it any less true. That doesn't mean we should be looking over our shoulders and under our chairs every time we go to a show. It simply means that it could happen anywhere, because anywhere is exactly where rabid Islamists can find evidence of blasphemy against their precious, imaginary god.

Which brings us to the essential part: The Bali bombings were not an attack against Bali; they were an attack against humankind. In all the jawflap about the whys and wherefores of the multiple conflicts currently dotting our collective radar screen--the war against terror, the war on Iraq, the coming holy war, et al.--it seems worth restating (at the risk of sounding pious) that the war against basic human liberty, waged not by us but on us, is at the heart of the matter. Discourse has justifiably, necessarily turned to complexities of strategy, diplomacy, and consequences. The moral truth, however, remains agonizingly basic. We are still dealing with a small but indefatigable contingent of radicalized, militant absolutists who believe that every living being is accountable to the stricture of Shari'a, under penalty of death. As Salman Rushdie wrote, in an oft-cited Washington Post editorial, the fundamentalist faction is against, "to offer a brief list, freedom of speech, a multi-party political system, universal adult suffrage, accountable government, Jews, homosexuals, women's rights, pluralism, secularism, short skirts, dancing, beardlessness, evolution theory, sex." If these were fictional villains, you'd call them hyperbolic, not believable. But they aren't fictional. Their code would be laughable if it weren't so aggressively despicable.

As headlines about Bali cross-fade into news of North Korean nukes, and there are further debates about the finer points of Iraqi de- and restabilization, it's crucial to remember that there is, in fact, a very real enemy, with a very real will, and the very real power of delusional self-righteousness. How to remember? Consider the scene of the attacks (as reported by various Australian and European news sources):

It's a typical hot, sweaty, drunken, lascivious Saturday night. People, primarily young Aussie tourists from Melbourne, Geelong, Perth, and Adelaide, are crammed into the clubs, mixing it up, spilling out into the street. Rock band noises mix with techno music and innumerable voices as latecomers clamor to squeeze inside. Just after 11:00 p.m., a car bomb explodes outside of Paddy's, followed a few seconds later by a second blast that smashes the façade of the Sari Club and leaves a hole in the street a meter deep and 10 meters across. The second bomb is strong enough to damage buildings miles away. All at once, everything's on fire. People are incinerated. Cars go up in flames. Televisions explode. Ceilings collapse, trapping those still inside. Screams. Blistered, charred flesh. Disembodied limbs. Mangled bodies. Victims covered in blood. Inferno.

Now transpose this horrible, fiery mass murder from the seedy, alien lushness of Bali to, say, Pioneer Square, where clubs and bars are lined up in the same teeming proximity as the Sari and Paddy's in the "raunchy" Jalan Legian district, the busiest strip of nightlife in Kuta Beach. Imagine a car blowing up outside the Central Saloon and another, across the street at the New Orleans. Again, it seems too simple an equation, but the fact remains that the victims were not targeted at random, or for merely political purposes. They were doing exactly what any of us might be doing on any night of the week: exercising a liberty so deeply offensive to religious believers as to constitute blasphemy. And the punishment for blasphemy is death.

There is an ongoing lie in the official governmental position on the war against terror, which bends over backwards to assure us that, in the words of our president, "we don't view this as a war of religion in any way, shape, or form." Clearly, in every sense, this is a war of religion, whether it's declared as such or not. And if it isn't, then it certainly should be. Not a war of one religion against another, but of reason against religion--against any belief system that takes its mandate from an invisible spiritual entity and endows its followers with the right to murder or subjugate anyone who fails to come to the same conclusion. This is the war our enemies are fighting. To pretend we're fighting any other--or worse, that this war is somehow not worth fighting, on all fronts--is to dishonor the innocent dead.

Yes, but is it an axiom, or a deduction? This was discussed here. Please, follow the conversation (it's not long at all) before responding. Then offer an explaination of how you can obtain knowledge from the axiom of the validity of the senses, without smuggling in some other axiom.

I read as much as I could stomach. Either way, axiom or deduction, how will you verify it? You either see it or you don't. I mean, even the way you put it here, 'obtain knowledge from the axiom of the validity of the senses', shows that you aren't placing 'axiom' in the proper context.

If it is axiomatic you see nothing else is needed, if it is deductive then you must trace it to something prior. What can you point to that's prior to sensory experience? And don't give me that 'Sriptures say' stuff because anything you know from the Scriptures came to you by way of sensory exerience. You can have sensory experience without the Scriptures, without spiritual insight, without language even. But you cannot have any of these without FIRST having sensory experience. Everything everyone knows is predicated upon First, prior to any of it, having sensory experience.

It's funny because I went and looked up a review of Without a Prayer because I thought it sounded familar. I'd seen it before. The part that interested me, where the first error was was very close to this point. Robbins said that Rand's view was faulty because there must be something in the 'tabula rasa' mind of a newborn to structure the sensory experience or it could never be organized as concepts in the first place. Pure Kantianism, nothing new at all. The 'a priori' knowlegde without ever calling it as such. As a Kant critique I read noted, Kant attempted to logically prove that logic was invalid, thereby depriving him of the very reasoning he was using to make his case. This results in the deepest form of subjectivism.

The second thing was that Robbins said that Rand's view resulting in her having 'faith' in the validity of the senses. I am so tired of this lame argument. Anyone who says this is a fool.

If one can't see that we don't place 'faith' in sensory experience, don't place 'faith' in scientific inquiry (although some may) don't place 'faith' in the existence of reality, then there isn't anything further to say. This word ceases to have any meaning. A concept is only as valuable as that which it represents, it denotes, and if a concept's definition becomes so muddy that it can mean anything anybody wants it to, then it means nothing. And no communication is possible.

Go watch the Miracle Worker, or watch it again, and ask yourself why Helen Keller, with any 'a priori' knowledge she may have had, will all the sensory experience she had, with all the prayers in the world, with whatever you think is an a prior axiom to sensory experience, she remained an animal until she got that first concept stuffed in her head that represented a sensory experience. And she could only get that concept through sensory experience. It only took one, but once she had that, she could gain all the others. Refutes Kant, refutes Robbins, refutes you.

I’m baaack! Due to friendly persuasion.

The meaning of experience? When did that get on the table? That is a whole other subject.

You put “the meaning of experience” on the table when you brought up the issue of “my worldview.” A worldview is primarily concerned with the meaning of experience, of existence. On the other hand, a person could say experience, existence is meaningless. But that would constitute a worldview, too. The two are so intimately related that, although they can be individually distinguished, one does not have the one without the other. This isn’t a change of subject.

When I asked whether you thought valid evidence cannot include oral testimony from the lived experience of actual human beings, you replied: “Only to the degree that that 'evidence' can be verified by our own experience today.”

The “evidence” we seem to be speaking of here seems to be of intangible (I’ll hold off on using the “S” word) experience. Although we are contemporaries, you cannot “verify” my experience of this kind. And I can’t “verify” yours. But because I am conscious that I have an “inner life,” I assume that you do, also. This is not an operation in logic, it is simple common sense. Although common sense doesn’t gives us absolute certainty about anything, many times it’s all we’ve got to go on.

Moreover, do you suggest that because you cannot personally verify that a particular event took place in the past that it certainly didn’t happen? Notwithstanding the testimony of witnesses, and the fact that the event powerfully affected -- one could reasonably say transformed -- the course of human history down to our own time?

Socrates apparently didn’t write anything – he “left no evidence” that we might consult in deciding whether this was a real person or a fictional character. But Plato and Xenophon and Aristophanes seem to have believed Socrates existed. Still, these men are presently unavailable for “cross-examination” on this point. How do you “verify” the facticity of Socrates – or that of Plato et al. for that matter? (Maybe somebody else wrote their stuff after all….)

In regard to my observation that choices we human beings make in our most personal, intimate life may well have public consequences, you accused me of “selective reasoning…[of] only choosing those factors that conform to [my own] view and ignoring those that don’t.”

Leaving aside an objection that you perhaps infer too much with respect to the choices that get loaded into my “selective reasoning,” I have merely to mention that our present little “dust-up” perfectly illustrates my point. (E.g., people writing to me via private mail wondering why I’m being so “mean” to you! :^) )

Seriously, I can’t think of too many decisions (large or small) that I have ever made – or not made as the case may be -- that did not affect other people within the circle of my “influence” – family, friends, coworkers, etc., etc., for good or ill in some degree or other.

WRT your joke that you are a “corrupt old logician,” you said I “seemed to take it seriously!” I can laugh at a joke, yet at the same time see its serious side. Jokes wouldn’t be funny if they lacked one. I took you up on your self-description because it offered the perfect foil for a point that I was making in regard to your comment that I ought to be a Sunday school teacher. (That’s pretty funny, too – and also has a “serious” side.) The point being, mainly, that little children have the great gift of curiosity – before it has been “educated out of them,” before they have been “indoctrinated” into whatever reigning ideologies are currently in fashion. Materialism and atheism have become very popular today, as I’m sure you may have noticed.

You wrote: “Gee, you sure seem to be a Christian and it is my understanding that according to that worldview, one is either ‘Redeemed’ by believing that Jesus died on the cross as a sacrificial payment for all sin or one is not Redeemed and, therefore, still corrupt. Am I wrong on either of these counts?”

You are correct that I am a Christian. I believe that Jesus is the Son of God, who was incarnated as a man, who suffered as a man, and willingly sacrificed Himself that mankind would be redeemed and the “lost” restored to the Father. That redemption is intended for all men, though a man may refuse it. As for such a refusal, that, to me, is up to God to judge. I could say that living in such a refusal is a corrupt way to live, in the sense that it is a deliberate falling away from truth, and so disorders the personality. (Sorry I have no proof of the kind you require to help my argument here.) But that’s not to say that I think it is my place to have much of an opinion of what transpires between you and God, let alone to consider myself in a position to judge it.

You continue: “You raise two points, first you say ‘between which human conscious experience normally takes place and unfolds’ which implies that it isn’t ‘out there’ but is part of my ‘human conscious experience’ which is here-now. This isn’t what you said before and this creates the dichotomy, not me. It was your assertion that the ’source’ was ’out there’ but now you seem to be saying it is also part of the normal human consciousness, so it isn’t ’out there’ after all. Which is it?”

You seem to want to treat this issue as if I were speaking of some spatially-located site where the process of conscious reflection takes place. There is no such spatially located site! But that doesn’t mean that Eric Voegelin was wrong when he observed that the psyche (soul) is both the site and sensorium of the consciousness of divine things.

I hate to infer too much, but I gather that, for you, lack of spatial location would plainly constitute evidence of the absence of any real thing. That in order for things to be “real,” they must have position in space-time. For if they do not, then there’s no way they can be “tested,” falsified, proven, disproven, in the manner you require.

But what do you do with a conscious experience that has the character of “not-me” speaking, of a kind of “incoming!” from a source sensed as being outside one’s self – in that no conscious will or desire or anything else other than pure receptivity is all one had to do with it?

Prescribe Thorazine?

I must close pretty soon. Much good stuff remains, but I have to go make dinner.

But first, one last point. You said, “I was thinking about how the Chinese Communists complain about the ‘spiritual pollution’ from our culture as we come into increasing contact. What is ‘spiritual pollution’ to an atheistic communist? What could they possibly be thinking of? The precise meaning of words is so very important. This is such a glaring example. It certainly doesn’t mean what we think it means, of that I can be sure.”

Not that I want to establish any “moral equivalency” between you and the Chicoms here; but I think it may be safe to say that, like you, they think matters “spiritual” are wholly bogus cultural artifacts left over from times when men were “primitive” (i.e., “lesser evolved” and thus inferior to what we are today). And now men aren’t primitive anymore, because they have logic, and reason, and science; so having all those good, solid things, these superstitions should just die away….

However, these “superstitions” do not just die away. It may be that, somehow, such “superstitions” are part of the nature and substance of the human condition. In any case, they not only do not die away; they keep on getting “rearticulated” in different forms over time. The “divine symbol” is always there; interpretations of it vary in times and places….

So the Chicoms have apparently made a “utilitarian” decision to appropriate the symbol and try to harness it for their own purposes: If you can’t “make it go away,” well then, try to “make it serve."

Chinese communist "doxology" is made to stand in for “legitimate” (you’ll doubtless quibble about that usage) expressions of the spirit, which are then absolutely “forbidden” (and criminalized). Even “home-gown” spiritualists such as Falun-Gong, not to mention assorted American and European priests and pastors, and American “values” more generally, are all anathema….

You make the claim that the Gospels of John and Matthew are responsible for persecution of the Jews, yet can't point to one verse that calls for that calls for their persecution.. . . I can and I have.

You didn't. You referred to verses which put Jews in a bad light (as does many in the Old Testament) but not one of the verses you cited calls for harming Jews or anyone. Further, you ignored the verses in the Gospels, (and the New Testament) that puts the Jews in a good light, as does the Old Testament overall.

Those who know of jesus and do not accept him, are the unsaved.

At what point, according to scripture, are we to judge one as unsaved? Here's something for you to chew on.

28"What do you think? There was a man who had two sons. He went to the first and said, 'Son, go and work today in the vineyard.' 29" 'I will not,' he answered, but later he changed his mind and went. 30"Then the father went to the other son and said the same thing. He answered, 'I will, sir,' but he did not go. 31"Which of the two did what his father wanted?" "The first," they answered. 32Jesus said to them, "I tell you the truth, the tax collectors and the prostitutes are entering the kingdom of God ahead of you. For John came to you to show you the way of righteousness, and you did not believe him, but the tax collectors and the prostitutes did.

Therefore jews, who consider worship of Jesus to be violations of two the ten commandments, are, if they want to adhere to the holy beliefs of their fathers and tribe, unsaved, unclean, "children of vipers", as per the Bible.

That's not what I took from the Bible. Here's somthing else for you to consider. Matthew7, Luke 16

If you pointed out that you are a good parent, and a loving husband, do think that should prevent you from being prosecuted as a serial killer?

That's why I can't treat you seriously Don. You say that good parents and loving husbands should be persecuted as serial killers, not because they are guilty but because you don't like them.

The Naxi's were overwhelmingly dues-paying christians. A poll of Germany, about 1939 revealed about 90% of the country was christian, and about 43% were Catholic.

Of course you can reproduce this poll. At least you can tell me what percent of the German people belonged to the Nazi Party, and what percent of the Nazis were Christians.

I merely suggested that the point of the nazi effort was cheap elimination,

You're a really font of compassion.

rather than to save souls through weeks of intensive torture, as was the case with the inquision's punishments.

The Nazis sought to eliminate the Jews race -- fanatically, not cheaply -- through months of torture.

I did a quick search on Spanish Inquistion. This is from the Associated Press.

In Latin America and Europe nearly 100,000 people were subjected to secret trials, 9,000 were tortured to make them confess their sins and 1,000 were killed, Mr. Ayllon said.
Most of that occurred in Europe. Just 32 people were executed in Peru, 30 in Mexico and 5 in Cartagena, he said.
Most historians now put the death toll around 3,000, said Edward Malefakis, a history professor at Columbia University in New York.
Mr. Ayllon says that while the Inquisition's interrogations by torture were Draconian they were less so than the punishments meted out in public jails, where victims often died.
Torture sessions were limited to 75 minutes. A doctor and Inquisition judge usually were present to ensure the torturer didn't inflict damage to victims' organs, make them bleed or kill them, he said.

Cheap theatrics here. You know perfectly well I meant the showers outside the ovens. I've researched this since we last talked. The ovens are overwhelmingly the principal operating tools of the holocaust. One camp's ovens, not the worst, is credited with 1,300,000 jewish deaths.

OK, you accuse me of "cheap theatrics." You then say you meant the "showers" -- probably a better phrase might be gas chambers --outside the ovens . You then say one camp's ovens is credited with 1.3 million Jewish deaths.

You understand that the ovens were used -- not to kill -- but to dispose of bodies. Including those that died of disease, starvation, beatings -- and yes -- torture.

This is why I can't take you seriously. You are so filled with hatred against Christianity, you can't think logically or face truth.

I’m baaack! Due to friendly persuasion.

and I’m glad, sorry if i offended you.

Actually you were responding to PH, not me, on that particular post, but ok.

The “evidence” we seem to be speaking of here seems to be of intangible (I’ll hold off on using the “S” word) experience. Although we are contemporaries, you cannot “verify” my experience of this kind. And I can’t “verify” yours. But because I am conscious that I have an “inner life,” I assume that you do, also. This is not an operation in logic, it is simple common sense. Although common sense doesn’t gives us absolute certainty about anything, many times it’s all we’ve got to go on.

I agree with everything you said here. With maybe one exception, I would say common sense is an ‘implicit’ operation in logic. If you were to analyze this ‘common sense’ construction ‘- if as a human being I have an inner life and you also are a human being therefore you also have an inner life like mine - it can be logically parsed. The only thing any of us know with ’absolute certainty’ is something exists.

No, but there is a scale here. Do the records of the Chinese building the great wall of China seem reasonable. Yes. There are still remnants of a wall there. Is the ‘record’ of Noah loading a pair of every creature on earth into a wooden ark reasonable? That’s a little further down the scale, well a lot further. On another thread I was stunned at the idea that we have recorded 1.7 million different species (i think i have this number right, somebody will beat me up if it is off) and this is still just a fraction. Did he get all these creatures on the ark? Do I have to take everything literally?

Socrates apparently didn’t write anything – he “left no evidence” that we might consult in deciding whether this was a real person or a fictional character. But Plato and Xenophon and Aristophanes seem to have believed Socrates existed. Still, these men are presently unavailable for “cross-examination” on this point. How do you “verify” the facticity of Socrates – or that of Plato et al. for that matter? (Maybe somebody else wrote their stuff after all….)

I don’t. I take it just as it is. Maybe he did exist, maybe he didn’t. But in either case it has no affect on my life other than the information transmitted. It was part of the endless groping to understand what it means to be human. I stand on their shoulders, just as you do, just as we all do. Civilization moved just that much higher for what they contributed. That is the lot of being human. The existential truth, one way or another, is useless.

I thought you were casting a net that was far to wide to include support for your position in all cases, without some qualification (concerning all the people you roped in to support your position, not the idea itself). This was again part of your post to PH that I got pinged on and probably shouldn’t have responded to. I don’t see anything that happens here as part of my ’intimate’ choices since this is a public forum, so I don’t know how this relates. We are mixing a whole bunch of meanings here, and it is far too muddy to mean anything. However, you weren’t being ’mean’ to me. There was a misunderstanding. I have a vigorous and, at times, offensive writing style. I admit to this. Sometimes I don’t understand why people see it this way, but I recognize they do. If you look back at my posts you will find I always apologize when someone complains. I don’t let the fact that I worded something poorly to get in the way of the communication. As a writer, there is a truism. The burden is always upon the writer to make the reader understand, not for the reader to ’have to’ understand the writer. That’s why my posts are so long, I’m so incredibly verbose. I’m trying to make sure I’ve made the point as clear as possible so the reader cannot possibly misunderstand. Then again, people still do.

But is that the issue? Is it a ‘public’ consequence that you marry a man your mother disapproves, so she is unhappy with the choice that makes you happy for the rest of your life, or is this still ‘private?’

I am trying to dance around this ‘private and intimate life’ choice thing and still remain ‘public.’ Who decides what’s right for me, but me? How can anyone else know what’s right for me, but me? If I can find a single ’private intimate’ choice that affects no one else, doesn’t this violate the rule and invalidate it?

Your response gave no indication you understood it was a joke, so I thought I had to point it out. The Sunday school teacher comment was because I really don’t think I should be debating with you. You are a person with high optimism and ideals and morality and I am not here to try to shatter that. Yet, debating you I end up in exactly that position. I am here to question the philosophical underpinnings that support a whole realm of world views, not just yours. I have put just as much time as I have put in here debating followers of Aleister Crowley, chaoism and Daoists (and I used to be one, so I can) as I have you. I would rather debate the smug self righteous ones, but they all run away so quickly. They are mostly men, and they find a single point upon which to disagree, and run away. You don’t, so I still converse with you. But I’d rather you went off and taught Sunday school.

The point being, mainly, that little children have the great gift of curiosity – before it has been “educated out of them,” before they have been “indoctrinated” into whatever reigning ideologies are currently in fashion.

But I’d rather you went off and taught Sunday school. How is this different?

Materialism and atheism have become very popular today, as I’m sure you may have noticed.

And we are back to basics again. First of all, materialism as opposed to what? This term has no meaning anymore, doesn’t anyone get it ??? E = mc2..... There is no ‘material.’ It is ALL energy. It is all just different forms of energy. Can we call it energyism? What happens if we call it ‘energyism?’ What happens to this idea when the paradigm changes? What happened to all the horse buggy whip manufacturers when the auto came along? When everybody jumps in the stock market it is time to get out !!! Atheism is less than 5 % of the national population according any pole I ever saw. Atheism is a logical fallacy. (Bet you never thought you’d see me write that! Now, after all I’ve written, can you tell me why I would say that, considering all I have written? {this is a test, this is only a test, should you attempt to adjust your tv . . .)

You are correct that I am a Christian. . .

So I was correct about the world view, ‘saved or corrupt.’

But that’s not to say that I think it is my place to have much of an opinion of what transpires between you and God, let alone to consider myself in a position to judge it.

Thank you. Who is to say what part any of us really plays? And who really knows what?

You seem to want to treat this issue as if I were speaking of some spatially-located site where the process of conscious reflection takes place. There is no such spatially located site! But that doesn’t mean that Eric Voegelin was wrong when he observed that the psyche (soul) is both the site and sensorium of the consciousness of divine things.

Yes, but it doesn’t mean he was right, either. I cannot say he is wrong because I cannot assert a negative, but, by the same token you cannot say, ‘There is no such spatially located site!’ No one can assert a negative. I am being totally consistent here. Anybody can hypothesize a negative anything and nobody can prove it wrong. That doesn’t prove anything, doesn’t demonstrate anything, doesn’t verify anything. And, (oh, i don’t want to even have to say this) it begs the question that there are ‘divine things.’

I appreciate your carefully worded question here. This is the second time you have surpassed anyone else that I can ever recall. If I ever offend you again keep in mind, I admire your intellect, you are quite brilliant. If you take the current view, the space-time continuum, then space and time are not separate things. If tomorrow somebody else comes along with a better theory then all this goes out the window and I have to start over from there. But, as we understand it now, a location in space is a location in time. (and I kan’t help adding this is why Kant was wrong because space and time were not simply constructs of the ’a priori’ mind but turned out to properties that actually existed and could be proven so, therefore they were valid ‘a posteriori’ concepts) But none of this disproves the existence of something that exists in all space times equally. What is the implication of something that exists in all ’here and nows?’ Do we even have a definition for this?

The second part of your question concerns something that has no location in space or time. Since you are bound to space time, how could you ever know? It would never exist in your space time, so how would you ever to know? By definition, since you are in space time, you would never occupy the same space time. Your paths would never cross.

Don’t assume you know the source, go with known data. It isn’t coming from some source ‘outside’ space time but is part of all space time, it IS all space time. You aren’t the whole universe, but the Whole Universe is part of You. It is part of me. It is here, now. Forever and Always.

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