romansh

For me faith and trust are not the same thing. I trust my bank, because there is plenty evidence that it is secure. That does is not a guarantee in any sense of the word. The odds are pretty remote that my bank will go broke or abscond with my monies tomorrow. And the bank hedges it bets should I abscond with their monies. There is no faith involved here.

Yes it can ... it has to be chaotic otherwise evolution would not work (chaos in the scientific sense of the word) Well perhaps aspects of it maybe ... but not sure. This is the tricky bit. From a chemist's point of oxytocin and vasopressin are good places to start. But of course we are referring back to consciousness here. The conclusion I am coming to, is that our brain chemistry results in a trip of a lifetime. A universe without hate, fear, greed, sadness, grief, anger/rage, loneliness?

I look at them with puzzlement. How could the underlying causes be so strong that people take on beliefs that are ultimately indefensible. And then when they realize the beliefs are not defensible the faith card is played. Just an aside I was listening to a lady (Huma Abedin) being interviewed on CBC radio. She talked quite frankly about being a Muslim in the White House, her relationship with Hillary, the ups and downs of 2016. And towards the end of the interview, she said through it all she still had her faith in God. I struggled to see the relevance, but part of me wonders about her and others of faith, how can we have people who patently have faith in the absurd be in the highest echelons of leadership.

I don't have a clue what Jesus was thinking. "I and the (my) Father are one", likely gives us a clue as to what some ancient scribe may have thought Jesus had on his mind. I gather the betting is against Jesus having actually said John 10:30. I suspect I am agreeing with you here.

Nihilism is meaningless ... has a certain tautology about it I find. Perhaps we can add it to the great paradoxes of life? Personally, I find we or perhaps I need to be "careful" when discussing meaning etc. Looking at this from the no free will point of view, do chemical reactions have meaning? Or perhaps do quantum phenomena have meaning. Most of the time I go about my business ... unthinking. When I stop to think only then do things like purpose, meaning and reason appear.

Interesting question. I had a crack at these definitions a while back ... here Is it possible for you to agree with them? You can find definitions for Holy and Spirit at the start of the thread. I think there are attempts at Holy Spirit in the thread itself.

I have no idea what you mean by the Spirit. Could you please elucidate?

Ah a refined Englishman, a self made man, thereby relieving the Almighty of a terrible responsibility.

To be understanding and accepting of the shenanigans of our monkey minds perhaps. "If you meet the someone free of mind shenanigans on the road, kill him." (Rom, not Linji Yixuan)

Merton seems to got two of the three words wrong here. I don't see how in the Buddhist tradition that freedom can be valid concept. Bearing in mind that dependent origination is a core tenet of Buddhism. Unless Buddhism is pointing to God and freedom being illusory.

So, here's my take: your friend is trying to interpret "mindfulness" in a Christian context simply because he has found himself in a Christian society. That Christian context for him is simply what he currently sees as his society. The original context ... or even the antecedents to that context will be in large part irrelevant to him. I do similar things ... I try to see the world through a scientific lens. If and when I look at concepts like "mindfulness", I tend to look at them through observation (a bit circular I know) not some 2000 thousand year old lens. We have have found better tools since then to view the world.

I don't really understand this or perhaps even agree. So I am not Dogen.

Firstly ... I am using chaotic in its scientific sense. But if you claim it is not ... how do you know it is not? What bits of our existence are not chaotic? Here's a more of a layman's explanation of chaos.

I must admit I see freedom as a bit of an illusion, if not a delusion. The feeling of freedom stems completely from a lack of awareness of the underlying mechanisms in this universe as it applies to ourselves. Of course, having an awareness of the how the cogs are turning so to speak would make functioning untenable. So what Merton ultimately seems to be claiming is that God's gift is a lack of awareness. My perspective is that evolution has provided a capability to confabulate (even forward looking confabulation) as a societal mechanism for survival. It is really hard not to describe an ecological landscape without anthropomorphizing; it seems to make the landscape more understandable.

WAID? what am I doing?

I can't speak to what Joyce and his interpreters mean by chaosmos, but some chaotic systems have an "attractor", This prof gives a technical explanation, but I think the prof has a nice voice. These so called attractors, I can't help but think, parallel our illusion of purpose. The chaotic systems exhibit the coming together and falling apart. So it is not clear to me this represents purpose. I can't help thinking purpose is a useful illusion, like me thinking my kitchen chair is red.

Yes ... nice. The universe (cosmos) is clearly chaotic. And we humans are part of that chaos.

Yes ... We draw an arbitrary boundary ourselves described by the pronoun "I", and then we have the fuzzy bits of "my" and "mine". In reality all kinds of molecules, atoms and ions are exchanging in and out of our bodies. To be fair the exchange is slower in the brainy bits. I think the phrase inter-relationship in reality is an understatement. Indra's net perhaps gives a better analogy. Similarly, for more nebulous bits like ideas and beliefs. Our material goods exchange, monies exchange. For me, connection is a 'better' word. We are connected to the the rest of existence, at the very smallest to the very largest scales; through the depths of time. If someone were to ask me, "are you religious?" I would have to answer, "no, but I am perhaps ligious." For I am connected to the universe and don't need reconnection.

Bohm ... I have found to be a little impenetrable. It is interesting to think about how things like invention come about in a unfolding universe. Here I find myself disagreeing with Schrödinger a little. I agree that as yet we have yet to scratch the surface of the phenomenon of consciousness. Saying we cannot account for it in physical terms reminds me of Auguste Comte's prediction we will never know the composition of the Sun. Little did he know that the tools that lead to the understanding had been developed a few years earlier. Not really familiar with Heisenberg and his writings. But it would appear he was a devout Christian. I wonder if he had literal beliefs in Christ. If so ... how does an intelligent person believe in a Godly birth? It is as though we can't let go of our indoctrinated beliefs and perhaps if we do we fill the vacated hole with another belief?

Well you never know ... have a vague plan to visit out-laws in London next year.

I have a problem with the word "should" ... philosophically speaking. It implicitly assumes we could have done otherwise. Having said that ... never having been a card bearer of the Bible or Buddhist text carrying societies; potentially my hands are also free. But on closer inspection I find I am cradling reason carefully in my hands. I find people occasionally suggest perhaps I also carry compassion or perhaps love. If that happens ... it happens.

If your hands are free, perhaps you can bring a beer over.

Tariki I suspect you must be aware of the connection between Campbell and Joyce ... Just in case you are not .... this

No I don't think we are on the same page yet. I don't believe things can be empirically proven, perhaps disproven. The problem with trying to prove stuff about the universe is that we have to use inductive logic. And even with deductive logic there is always an assumption that our axioms are correct. There is always an if statement assuming our assumptions are true. This does not mean there isn't a truth or even the truth, just that our access to it is incomplete. The question becomes is how accurate is our description of the truth. From my point of view divvying up the universe into good and evil is not a very accurate description of reality.

I think opinions may well be in the eye of the beholder. And here you seem to be pointing to an opinion rather than a fact (and here facts are our attempt at the truth). In one case a mother is bereaved and in another millions lose their lives ... a tragedy versus a statistic? That an untimely death is taken as a bad thing, for the most part, seems like a truth. To me it is less clear that good and bad exist beyond a particular human chemistry.