Yes, exactly.
An “intendable” object is something that can be held or “possessed” in consciousness long enough and "solidly" enough that the operations of reason and logic have something that can be cognitively "worked on." But what finite, mortal consciousness can comprehend St. Anselm’s “incomprehensible” so as to be able to intend it?
Yes, exactly. It cannot be.
From our own lived experience, we know – or ought to know – that certain “things” (for lack of a better word) can only be seen in their effects. Examples would include such “things” as goodness, justice, beauty – even truth itself. Because we never get the opportunity to say “howdy-do” to such “things” walking down the street on any given day, does that mean that we really believe they are superstitious fictions?
I disagree with you here. If you want me to I will drag you through the cognitive process by which we epistemologically come to define such abstractions such as truth, beauty and goodness. Just because they are abstractions doesn't mean they aren't ultimately rooted in experience.
This is central to this discussion. If people don't understand the process of abstraction, and how higher levels of abstraction encompass lower level abstractions, and that the process can go on indefinitely, then they quickly get lost. Just as you have here. Justice is a fairly high level abstract concept but that doesn't mean the word isn't ultimately rooted in actions taken, or to be taken by men, that we know about because we experience those actions.
Because they are rooted in experience, they aren't superstitions.
And if you think they do not have a common Source, then I’d be very glad to entertain your speculation as to why they do not; and assuming God is not the common source, if you could please designate any other source.
The 'source' is the human mind. Such abstractions are products of the process of the mind, which is why 'beauty is in the eye of the beholder.' If it had one source all would agree on what was beautiful and what was not. This is where you are a Platonist and I am not. The source isn't 'out there.'
If you were to say that all these “things” – goodness, justice, beauty, truth – can be explained purely on the basis of, say, natural evolution, then I need to see your evidence in order to understand your position.
I could probably make an argument based on evolution but I'm not big on evolution either so I'm not going to. When you say something like 'explained' you are using a word that means very little to me in that context.
Human beings have lived without 'justice' for so much of existence that to come up with how we think we have it now would be a long, long post. I will undertake it if you wish, but not now. Suffice to say I think we would disagree on the ultimate definition.
Truth is when concepts and thoughts are coherent with reality. A glass of water is beautiful to a person dying of thirst, beauty is that which furthers or enhances one's life. Goodness is taking those actions that will result in enhancing one's life. This will bring howls of protest, but at root this is true. The element that has been lacking, has always been lacking, is the logical extension of the rights I naturally want for myself, in 'my own best interest' I had better recognize apply to everyone else as individuals for exactly the same reason. 'Goodness' is a concept that requires far more thought than most people are willing to undertake, which it is why it is an ideal that has yet never really been practiced. I'm getting into another offshoot here but the 'source' isn't some mystical 'thing' but a very practical issue.
It seems to me that God has been extraordinarily generous with the “effects” made available to us by which to understand Him, not to mention the spiritual and intellectual “equipment” vested in us by virtue of our (created) humanity. I can name three basic classes of such “effects”: Holy scripture, the natural world (creation), and the responsiveness of the soul to its divine source and ground.
You are simply making an assumption, for which you have no evidence, and simply attributing it to that assumption. Your 'effects' are only 'effects' because you think they are, in reality they aren't 'effects' for the most part they are floating abstractions.
'Holy' scripture Begs the Question that there is such a thing as 'holy.' Circular reasoning.
The natural isn't proof of anything but itself. Calling it 'Creation' is, once again, Begging the Question it was 'created' and not, simply is.
The idea you have a soul, that it is responsive to anything other than suggestion and that there is a such a thing as 'divine' source is just more of the same. They are only 'effects' because you view them so. In reality, you haven't said anything here, these are just words running around in circles, each chasing each others tails. God is Holy, so the Scriptures are Holy because they come from God, which proves that God exists because the Scriptures are Holy.
There used to be an old saying in Japan:
Japan is the divine country because if another country were then divine country, then Japan couldn't be the divine country, therefore Japan is the divine country.
All these assertions have just this flavor.
You wrote that I implied “there is something other than ‘natural reasoning’ but I see no reason to think this.” I do more than imply. On this question, I assert.
On what basis?
When it comes to divine things, to the most essential things of the human spirit, natural reasoning doesn’t have very much to do at all.
Exactly my point. There is no 'reason' to this sentence! And everything you say after this point is most pointedly outside reason, so on what basis do you make your argument? Upon irrationality? Upon insanity? No, faith.
Which puts us at loggerheads, LogicWings. (Well, I already knew that!!!) For you put your faith in “natural reasoning,” and I put my faith in God. A God who, from the purely human perspective of intramundane existence, may appear both unreasonable and illogical. (Just goes to show how useless these tools really are in grappling with putative “cognitive objects” which are not truly “cognitive objects,” and for which the tools are therefore totally unsuited.)
And this is exactly the point. What is the purpose of reason? To help us survive in reality. What is the opposite of reason? That which opposes life. You are saying God is beyond logic, but you got here by reasoning that must be the case since God doesn't stand to logic. But logic and reason are the very means to our survival in life, (which you call the intramundane!) so we must reject the tools that support our very lives to believe in this irrationality! I see no 'reason' to believe any of this.
You make another mistake here. I do not put my 'faith' in 'natural reasoning.' There is no 'unnatural reasoning' that's a contradiction in terms. There is no faith involved. It has been a long hard journey to understand just how these tools work and why, as a human being, I must use them in the pursuit it living. Faith involves believing in things for which there is no evidence.
What you are saying here is you have no 'reasons' you just believe anyway. Ok, loggerheads. But I don't have to take your assertions seriously, anymore than I have to believe in Unicorns. You have just admitted that those assertions don't make sense. I agree.
But it seems you place your faith in what you can “see.” And that is the lot of all of us humans. But there is seeing, and then there is seeing. The principal difference consists in whether the seeing is being done through the eye, or through the soul.
I don't place 'faith' in what I can see, and it is wrong to characterize it as such. Reality is that which you cannot evade. You cannot evade breathing. You cannot evade eating. You cannot evade what will happen if you sit on the railroad tracks when the train comes. This is not faith.
What you see when you look through the eyes of your 'soul' is whatever you want it to be, since it isn't based upon anything other than what you believe. At the risk of sounding redundundundant saying you see through the 'soul' Begs the Question you have one. More floating abstractions with no ultimate referents.
In putting the allurements of purely human knowledge before what you owe to God, possibly you repeat the same “mistake” that Adam made.
The very language here is prejudicial. The 'allurements of purely human knowledge' are what have given humanity every advance that has lifted us from savagery to modern civilization. See, this is where the opposition to reason goes beyond merely irrational. If it were up to the church we would still be living in feudal Europe, slaves to kings and church, thinking the sun went around the earth. If only those people who rejected the fruits of the 'allurement of purely human knowledge' had to live without those same benefits.
I am making no mistake. I am only thinking. I am only being consistent with what reality has demanded I be consistent with if I want to go on living. To equate knowledge with 'mistake' is to wish to go back to being an unthinking animal. No thank you.
I gather you think Adam was “scum” – though God has let us know He was pleased with His Creation. But Adam chose possession of knowledge over fidelity to his God. (He apparently did this to please his wife. But Satan got the whole benefit from the transaction.)
I don't think Adam existed so I don't think he was scum. Adam didn't 'chose' anything, even within the contexts of the Myth. This is another of those contradictions inherent in the scenario. Adam couldn't have known it was wrong to disobey God because he had no knowledge of right or wrong, obeying or disobeying. That only came 'after' he had eaten the fruit, and he had no 'freewill' up until that point because he couldn't know there was such a thing as a 'choice' without the knowledge gained. God punished Adam for something God knew Adam had no way of knowing was wrong, was going to do 'before' He created him, yet tempted him anyway. If God didn't want there to be evil in the world He could have prevented it at any point. Or, as I said before, He could have created Adam with the character to withstand the temptation in the first place. This whole thing is a pack of absurdities that one can only embrace by rejecting reason, rejecting thought, and just believing. Don't think, don't reason, just obey.
Worse, you have made this choice – and it is fundamentally a choice that can only be made in faith – even though a divine blood price has already been paid in the fullest to redeem and atone for Adam’s “error.”
And now to the other half of the equation. I made no such choice. I wasn't responsible for Original Sin and now I'm not responsible for the atonement either. No choice in any of this. No choice for sin, and no choice for how the Redemption comes about. Just believe this and do this or else!!
Bottom line, I think it’s probably a fairly perilous enterprise in terms of our deepest well-being to consider human knowledge as superior to divine wisdom.
There isn't one thing you have said that demonstrates there IS divine wisdom. All you have are unsupported opinions, beliefs, none of which 'makes sense.' You have given no 'reason' to think there is anything other than 'natural reason' available to human beings. The rest is all fantasy.
I can smell the sulphur of Satan’s “non serviam” in his construction of the choice that faces human free will at every time, place, and juncture: “It is better to reign in Hell than to serve in Heaven.”
See, now I not only have to believe in Jehovah, I have to believe in this guy too!!! So, you can smell with your soul as well as see?
All frivolity aside, the serving here isn't designed for the afterlife. This is a means of keeping you, here and now, a willing slave. This is the greatest con game ever devised. Every time I see some smug little TV preacher or other self appointed expert ever-so-condescendingly explaining to the enraptured multitudes the minute details of what they should think, what they should believe, how they should live, what their 'world view' should be, all with the aim of, 'and please pass the collection plate' it just makes the point. This is about power in the here and now, not eternity. I don't think so poorly of God that I think He would create this racket.
IMHO, this is the situation most to be avoided: You really don’t want to go there.
And in the final analysis all we have is this ancient Voodoo curse. If you don't believe, 'Everlasting Torment!' And I'm supposed to worship this guy? He creates this horrible scenario, provides man with reason as the only means to survive and then requires that man reject that very reason as the basis of an eternal choice. This is so irrational it hurts. I reject the very concept that a 'loving God' could create such a warped movie. Which is what I said at the beginning, I reject the concept, not the Being, if He exists.
To do so is not only to cut yourself off from God; but also to cut yourself off from yourself. At some deeply mysterious level, God and Man are One.
Once again, Christian Apologetics says that an 'unredeemed' person is cut off from God. So at that point, man and God are not one. But it is true, at some deeply Mysterious level, Man and God are one. But not in the way you mean.
You self-characterize as “a corrupt old logician.” Well, I don’t find any problem with your logic. And I don’t see any evidence that could convict you of being “corrupt” – or even old for that matter.
This is where you are a Platonist and I am not. The source isn't 'out there.'
And this constitutes evidence, let alone proof – why??? What is the ground for your belief that the “source isn’t ‘out there?’” Do you argue that human insight is useless to human existence?
You write: “Human beings have lived without 'justice' for so much of existence that to come up with how we think we have it now would be a long, long post. I will undertake it if you wish, but not now. Suffice to say I think we would disagree on the ultimate definition.”
Why do you say that we would disagree, LogicWings? What evidence do you have in support of that allegation?
You continue: “Truth is when concepts and thoughts are coherent with reality.... Goodness is taking those actions that will result in enhancing one's life. This will bring howls of protest, but at root this is true.”
No howls of protest from me, LogicWings; for you have basically defined the entire idea of goodness – as divinely intended – in the foregoing statement.
Then you say another thing I agree with, at least in part: Truth “is an ideal that has yet never really been practiced. I'm getting into another offshoot here but the 'source' isn't some mystical 'thing' but a very practical issue.”
Have you ever considered the possibility that the reason that truth is a “practical issue” is because it has a divine (or “mystical,” in your words) source? If this is not so, then why would innumerable generations of human beings by now continue to be interested in problems of truth? Do you suppose this is something “captured” by “Darwinian memory?” Or could the source be “located” somewhere outside the materialist explanation?
You say: “'Holy' scripture Begs the Question that there is such a thing as 'holy.' Circular reasoning.”
Circular reasoning???? Yegads, man! If you want circular reasoning, go check out Georg Hegel. God’s “reasoning” – made manifest in the world through the incarnation and sacrifice of His Son – was designed to be the very prescription for release from the “circularity” of purely human, purely earthly, experience. This is probably the hardest part for a skeptical secularist like yourself to entertain, let alone credit as to having any good purpose. Yet it is precisely this point that I would invite you to try in your meditations.
The natural isn't proof of anything but itself. Calling it 'Creation' is, once again, Begging the Question it was 'created' and not, simply is.
Well, if something “simply is,” that suggests to me it didn’t get there “out of its own powers.” It seems that most of the things that man can do by himself cost him seriously in terms of time, effort, and confusion. So if man was the creator, then the resulting creation probably wouldn't be "simple."
Then again, I think Aristotle was right when he said effects have causes; thus creatures have creators. Just stands to reason, I say.
Snipping a bit, you continue thusly: “And this is exactly the point. What is the purpose of reason? To help us survive in reality. What is the opposite of reason? That which opposes life. You are saying God is beyond logic, but you got here by reasoning that must be the case since God doesn't stand to logic. But logic and reason are the very means to our survival in life, (which you call the intramundane!) so we must reject the tools that support our very lives to believe in this irrationality! I see no 'reason' to believe any of this.”
God is “beyond logic” in the precise sense that He is the Source and Standard of logic. Also Source and Standard of such a thing as “natural reason,” not to mention human free will. Being the Maker, He Makes the Standard: He is the Maker of all standards of Truth in this world – and the next, whether you believe in a “next world” or not. The “potter” and the “vessel he fashions out of clay” are TWO DIFFERENT THINGS.
And if you were to ask me, the vessel, finally, isn’t in much of a position to argue or quibble with the Potter.
* * * * * * *
I must stop for now, LogicWings. Though there is so much else in your last worthy of thoughtful consideration, the hour is grown so late, and I’m feeling so sleepy right now, that I hope you will forgive me if I just “sleep on it,” and (hopefully) I may get the chance to speak with you again tomorrow.
Good night!
This is central to this discussion. If people don't understand the process of abstraction, and how higher levels of abstraction encompass lower level abstractions, and that the process can go on indefinitely, then they quickly get lost. Just as you have here. Justice is a fairly high level abstract concept but that doesn't mean the word isn't ultimately rooted in actions taken, or to be taken by men, that we know about because we experience those actions.
Because they are rooted in experience, they aren't superstitions.
Roll it out. I suspect it’s the empirical/objectivist wolf in sheep’s clothing. Surprise me.