What's Andy Cooking?

I tend to agree with your friend on many points. I do not, however, require that other religious texts (which I might call "false teachings" were I going to call them something) were written by Satan. There is an ingrained human propensity to seek the divine, just as there is an innate human tendency to sin. The concept of Satan is not a requirement for all sin; we provide the basis for that in our own nature. Given the desire to find God, we hunt and peck in systems which make us comfortable (instead of conforming to an objective reality) leading to all varieties of different worldviews.

What's more, if you friend has been far in the United States, she would know that we are not a Christian nation. A large percentage are nominally Christian, but in many ways it is worse to be a non-practicing Christian by name than to be an official non-Christian. Those who claim to be under the law of Christ are judged by that standard. Secular society has been successful for thousands of years externally to Christianity. To think that America is somehow impervious to the whims of history is a bit shortsighted, in my opinion.

As for the final argument, I think that's on about page 6 of the "Why Christianity is Better than Other Religions" handout. I imagine Zondervan publishes it. Most other religions stress the righteousness and worthiness of the self. We, however, deflect the attention from us to one more deserving of adoration and glory. That this someone is also approachable, so it seems to me, is a unique feature.

So, you say that there is an objective reality that many people try to find, but fail when they settle for a 'confortable' worldview? I assume this objective reality is that which is set forth in the bible?

Here's my probleem with that: any academic look at history shows us that historical accounts are always colored by the person who records them. In this sense, history becomes a very subjective thing. This is true for religious writings also. Any record of divine happenings has been put to word by the hand of man. Certainly, in the case of spiritual texts the word therein is attributed to the inspiration or even dictation of some deity. This is true of every Word that has been written.

So which word is better? Can we truly say that one is more true than another? I say no, and I say it precisely because, in the end, they all come from the hand of man.

Now, as for the 'relationship' aspect, I've been puzzling over this piece for the entire break. My thoughts: as men of science and math, we can agree that any theory can be disproved by a single counter-example. But we're not talking about something as concrete as math. The problem here lies in interpretation of what we mean when we say 'relationship.'

It seems to me that we're talking about some real, true interaction between ourselves and a higher power. If this is the case, then I give you the counter example of the Buddhist belief system.

As far as I understand it, Buddhists meditate in order to achieve some greater state of being, or zen. If we think about this state as a new way of viewing and interacting with the world, then we are talking about a relationship. In this case, there is no single deity to focus our relationship on. Instead, the greater power is the world itself: nature, energy, people, family - it's all included. When a Buddhist achieves zen, he or she is gaining a new relationship with the world, and yet still existing in this world. So there you have it, it's all about the relationship, just one of a kind we're not necessarily accustomed to.

There is a common assumption made by many science types. That assumption is that there is no God. The first step, then, in considering God is to think, "ok, so lets say there is a God..." and go from there. However, the problem with many people is that they allow that there might be a god, but then make him into a tame puppet god of their own creation, one that fits nicely into their minds. He is allowed influence in vague things, like deciding who gets into mystery fantasy afterdeath land, but is still removed from the "real" world, defined as a place where this god can have no influence.

Under that assumption, you're right, the Bible is written by human hands, the Bible is open for error, the Bible cannot be trusted. In assuming that the Bible is not true, you have taken that not only is it not true, but it can't be trusted. How can something which is false be trusted, after all. Beware of science that lives on slippery slopes.

So, given that you hold these truths to be self-evident; that if there are gods, they cannot possible affect reality, that all texts are fabricated or at least corrupted, and that a search for truth can lead down any number of divergent paths, all of which go nowhere...given these anterior propositions, you will never find anything but what you've allowed yourself to find. You're examining as one wondering about the world while looking at it beneath the ice in a frozen lake. Until you allow yourself to crack the ice, all of your conclusions are invalid.

So ask yourself this: do they all come from the hand of man? I'm sure Dan Browne, Charles Darwin and Karl Marx have their opinions on the matter, but it might be beneficial to hear both sides of the debate.

Also, I don't know about you, but my relationships with inanimate objects are rather one-sided. I don't want to debate whether a rock is really a rock, but I think there is a qualitative difference between having an understanding of the world and having a relationship with its Savior.

I have trouble understanding the "relationship" concept as well. I view "relationship" as being some sort of association or connection between two things. When we're talking about inanimate entities, it's simple -- the rock is next to the tree. That's their relationship. They're next to each other. For psychological entities, a "relationship" CAN be just physical like that (I'm standing next to another man, for example), but it's typically used and meant in a greater sense than that, which implies the recognition of each being (by each being) AS a psychological entity, via some means of communication.

So, in the "relationship with christ" sense, I don't understand what this vehicle for communication is. The questions become:

* Where, physically, is the counterpart in your relationship located?

* How does the information of your communication which affirms the belief in the other as an actual psychological entity get conveyed?

* Does that communication travel both ways?

So, are there answers to those questions? -- or do I have the concept of 'relationship' (as it's meant in the relationship with god sense) wrong, or what?

A relationship, in the sense which is applicable to this discussion, is the interplay between two thinking entities.
1) Everywhere. Ever thought about someone when she's not there? Ever spoken to someone who you haven't met face to face? Ever commented on the website of someone you've never seen? Relationships are more intricate than spacial proximity.

2) Holy Spirit. Close your eyes and hold a pen an inch from the spot between your eyebrows. Move it closer. When I do that, even though I'm not looking at it, I know it's there. I don't hear it. I don't taste it. I don't smell it either, and there is no contact between us that I should feel it. I don't have sonor, so far as I know. Certainly this is a manufactured example, but that Jesus and I don't talk on the phone doesn't mean that I don't still sense his existence. For the man/God who died and rose again to be believed, that existence is sufficient. Attempting to argue deeper is more tenuous and ill-advised if you're taking my stance.

3) Given that it travelled from him to me, as per the previous illustration, yes, it goes both ways, as I surely know it's going at least in one direction.

Doesn't it state somewhere in the Bible that judgement should be left to God? I mean, talking about a qualitative difference between having an understanding of the world and having a relationship with its Savior is passing judgement on another's beliefs. That's where religion (for the most part) turns me off - where it seems to become self-righteous in this way.

Listen, what I'm saying is that as far as I understand, a Buddhist believes that he is in a relationship with the world around him. If we define the word 'sacred' to mean 'of the spiritual world' as I think of it in most senses, then I think you talking about 'relationships' is just a way of saying you are connecting to that spiritual world. For the Buddhist, instead of a God/Christ to focus on as the sole sacred being in the world, suddenly everything (yes, even rocks) become sacred. And having an understanding of the sacred is the point, is it not? Isn't that what all religion is about? Somehow making a connection with 'the sacred?'

Whether it's a peace pipe being passed around a campfire, a consumption of some old bread, a thought sent out, a feeling of happiness, or a moment of calm, each religion has its own ritual for connecting with the other world. In your case, the other world is a being you can neither see nor hear. In the Naitive Sioux case, it's the sacred animals and the sky above. In the Buddhist case, it's everything we can sense and everything we can't that exists in this universe.

How is your connection to the spiritual world more valid?

1. I've never thought about someone who isn't there who I've never met. The "some" in someone requires an identity, otherwise it would be "fakeone" or "pretendone".

2. For one, there's probably a complex interplay between the nerves controlling your hand that's moving the pen and the nerves on your face which might twitch in anticipation of being smacked by a pen. Manufactured or not, you have clear evidence of the pen based on sensual perception. So, having ruled out a phone call, what IS the SENSE you use to detect His existence? You can pick from any of the five more popular ones, or add new ones.

I tried to have AE answer this on Trent's site a few months ago, but I think that fizzled out. If none of the well known senses are used to "sense god exists" (or other similarly phrased concepts), then... which sense IS used? Or, is "sensed" even the right word? I think that introspection and revelation are more plausible than anything sensory, if only because it's at least logically consistent. I'm not trying to be an ass here, people use phrases like "I can sense his existence" all the time, and I honestly don't know what they mean or what sense they use.

What makes the "relationship" aspect of Christianity more sellable and popular than the Buddhism one is that it's an easy-to-swallow, down-home / close-knit friendship with your hippie pal Jesus. He's a really nice, easy-going, cool guy who lived as a regular ol' living, breathing, Birkenstock-sporting, eating, drinking, sleeping human for years on this earth, before being revealed as the son of a deity, dying for everybody's sins, and being whisked away to the right hand o' the father forevermore.

The "relationship" enjoyed in Buddhism is no less of a relationship in the sense that it's a connection/tie/vibe/feeling-of-relation between two things -- one side of which can't be absolutely proven to exist -- but it's harder to swallow. It requires a lot more effort to envision rocks as your friends. It's less desirable without images of skipping through market, holding hands with Jesus while he turns a sidewalk vendor's one remaining loaf of bread into 40 falafels. Where's the draw -- especially in this anti-nature, super-commercialized/-consumerist world where nobody really has to exert any kind of effort -- in communing with dirt and clouds? Especially if you're not getting a glitzy gold-embossed afterlife complete with all your dead relatives living in harmony with all your dead pets?

Establishing Jesus -- a guy just like you & me, our friend, our pal, a human whose shoulder we can cry on and who pats us on the back, forgives us, and says "there, there, my child" in our native tongue -- as savior was a smart choice for the changing times, marketing-wise.

Jesus is easier. Rocks don't have shoulders to cry on.

Forgive me if this is terse, but I'm trying to shortify topics instead of elongate them.

1) There are statements regarding the judgment of the sins of another. We are evaluating mutually exclusive worldviews. There is certainly no verse which says, "accept all worldviews, even if they contradict the truth which you suppose is found in this book."

2) I enjoyed Bess's statements on Buddhism/Christianity. In the end, no more than one of those two views is right. It could be that they are both wrong, but they are not both right. Either they tie in their error, or one is better than the other. Like, if they were boxing the judge would hold up the hand of one of them and the other guy would go home empty handed. Gray areas work best when there is an absense of reality.

3) The ideas of fake and pretend imply an intentional deceit of oneself. Is that what you're going for?

4) Jesus is like potential energy Matt. I don't suppose anyone else here knows your views on potential energy...

No, I was just saying that "some" implies an actual one as opposed to a speculative one, but I care way less about breaking down the semantics of the word as it applies to reality as I do about the sensing god thing.

You said - "that Jesus and I don't talk on the phone doesn't mean that I don't still sense his existence" - the only question I care about is this: which sense do you use do detect his existence? Alternately, redefine the term "sense" so that I know what that sentence means.

Wait a minute, isn't 'sin' defined as the act of turning away from God? I mean, what I understand is that all actions, however big or small, and all thoughts that are somehow against God are considered sinful. In that sense, talking about other religious beliefs is talking about the judgment of sins.

Either way, I believe casting judgment on one worldview based on your own worldview is wrong (to the extent that it is based on assumptions, and not a true understanding of that other worldview. Basically that a person who is ignorant (read - general American Christian) of these other religions has no place to judge).

And if what you're saying about Bess' statement is that you think it's rediculous to say, "one is right or none at all" (sarcasm is hard to read on the interweb), then I agree with you wholeheartedly.

"In the end, no more than one of those two views is right. It could be that they are both wrong, but they are not both right. Either they tie in their error, or one is better than the other. Like, if they were boxing the judge would hold up the hand of one of them and the other guy would go home empty handed. Gray areas work best when there is an absense of reality."

So, Furstiekins, you adhere to the rules of science/logic/probability when COMPARING two religions, but not when examining the lack of realities within your religion itself? Just making sure I've got that right.

You take all these big, sweeping, totally-unaccountable-by-provable-laws-of-reason beliefs on absolute FAITH -- and nothing more -- but you have no qualms about immediately knocking any/all other religions that do exactly what you're doing but with marginally different actors playing essentially the same roles?

First, I have to say that you are absolutely wrong about judging worldviews. Nowhere in the Bible are we told to accept things that are wrong.

For instance, I read no more than a few chapters a day. Just today, in a small random sample, this came up:

Proverbs 17:15
"He who justifies the wicked and he who condemns the righteous,
Both of them alike are an abomination to the LORD."

I'm not going to sit here and defend the merits of false religions. That's the way truth works. Either something is true, or it isn't true. It is a black and white, which is a comforting thing to have in a world which attempts to remove any objective reality from our lives. Call it close-minded, call it intolerant, call it whatever you want, but remember that making such "judgments" while claiming that there is no basis for any judgment whatsoever makes you both hypocritical and wrong by your own internal contradiction. I am at worst wrong, at least my view is internally consistent.

Bess, you've spent a long time supposedly reading my site. You have put horse-blinders on yourself to see "absolute FAITH -- and nothing more." Countless times Carl and I have gone into the arguments, the evidence, the historicity. Yes, at the end, faith is required, I grant you that, but I do not allow you this melodramatic sweeping generalization. It is not what you've seen there, it is what you continue to imagine Christians as doing.

You may see marginal difference between the religions, but that is only because that is how you must see it to remain comfortable in your un-belief. I do the same thing in my life, compartmentalize then trivialize. It's the best way to avoid an issue, it's the best way to forget a girl, it's the best way to move on. Find a way to cleave the issue from yourself, then make light of the issue until you convince yourself that it never was important in the first place. It's all the same, that's a good way to trivialize something.

Matt, it trickled away because we started to look at whether you might have some kind of genetic spiritual deficit that makes you unable to sense God, while at the same time, unable to trust the veracity of those who can. Which I said was kind of intellectually inconsistent of you, given that you somehow trust the reality of female orgasm, and don't have much reason to believe in it within your standard paradigms, given that there's very little scientific argument for it, virtually no evolutionary purpose for it, and you'll certainly never get to know it first hand.

I wish there was something better, because that particular phenom makes the whole conversation kind of snicker-snicker, but as a tool of the logical argument, it's rock solid.

Andy, if you think it's wrong to cast judgment on another worldview based on one's own, then on what basis shall we judge? There is no other way but to compare to one's own values.

My worldview doesn't instruct me to assess and condemn others, but only to "be a light unto the nations." Basically, act right and the righteous will follow. I don't have to be responsible for the souls of unbelievers.

But OTHER worldviews, including many Christian sects like the one your friend apparently subscribes to, DEMAND that their adherents go forth and carry their message, be proactive. And many of us outside don't like that. We see it as shoving their God and their Christianity down other people's throats, colonizing, spiritual imperialism, etc. So we condemn it. Is that not judging them based on our worldview?

And I still want to know if you are masquerading as Jack Hays, or is it the other way around?

Also, Andy, not to be argumentive, but Judaism isn't about connecting to some "other world." This is where we think Christians went sideways, and why there seems to be so much of the Ju-Bu phenomenon of Yids getting all tuned in to the Dalai Lama and whatnot. Judaism is about identifying the sacred in THIS world, embracing and enacting the divine in each of us, here and today, of our own volition and not riding on someone else's effort. That's why we have so many different prayers for such pedestrian acts as washing our hands and eating different kinds of foods and seeing a rainbow. We acknowledge the holy in the mundane. We have all these arcane rules about what we can eat and what we can wear and how many days we have to wait between one specific event and another. It's all about awareness of the actual, physical world as the locus of holiness, manifest through our choices. Heaven is finding God in the details of now, it's not "mystery fantasy afterdeath land."

But that description is why Eric Furst is my very favorite Christian.

I cannot resist joining in here...

Unfortunately (in my opinion) many fundamentalist/evangelical Christians heavily buy into the idea of salvation coming only through Christ. (I use the word buy quite deliberately, but I'll get to that later.) What form this salvation takes creates quite a rift between those who favor a universal view of salvation (this includes many Unitarians, Catholics, Episcopalians and other non-fundamentalist denominations) and their more fundamentalist brethren. Many Christians of the former category believe that Jesus Christ literally died for the sins of humanity. That would be all humanity and that means, quite literally, everyone including non-Christians. Of course, there are things that one should do (good works, etc.) in order to attain a more complete salvation, but Jesus basically took care of it all himself. By contrast, most evangelicals feel that a strong faith of acceptance (or being born again) is somehow necessary for salvation. It's the old works versus faith dichotomy compounded by dogma.

The idea of non-Christians going to hell part is at once more complex and simplistic: it's the traditional us versus them mentality with some carefully rendered biblical interpretation. There is a belief in what is called the unpardonable sin which involves rejecting Christ forever and/or blaspheming against God. Central to this belief is the concept that all humans intrinsically know the truth (that God is real and Jesus Christ is his only Son, etc.), but refuse to believe it. Thus, Buddhists, atheists, Jews, Muslims, pagans, Hindus those who follow native religions, etc. are supposedly, conscious of the truth of Christianity but intentionally choose to reject it. Admittedly, not ALL evangelical Christians believe this explicitly, but almost all feel that acceptance of Christ is the necessary key to salvation and that everything else is a sin. The difference being solely that the latter group feels that missionary work is necessary to bring the word of god to those who are destined for hell. The idea of unpardonable sin is found in Mark 29-30 and again in Matthew. It reads ?But he that shall blaspheme against the Holy Ghost hath never forgiveness, but is in danger of eternal damnation: Because they said, He hath an unclean spirit.? While that may not seem to directly state that only Christians are saved, this a good part of the fuel that is used to justify the attitude. On a more secular and capitalist level, the ideology of rebirth is what might be called the ?hard sell?. Some theologians interpret such thinking as a way of simply scaring people into submission and hoping for a guarantee of obedience. I tend to agree.

Here is something interesting to note: Christianity is virtually the ONLY major religion that actively requites members. Sure, you can become Jewish or Muslim or Buddhist but you have to want to do so first and that decision is up to you and you alone. Most other religions have no directive to go out into the world and gather converts. Converts happen, religion spreads (especially Buddhism and Islam) but that spread is not based upon a direct order from a deity for go out and spread the word, etc. The Buddha gained many converts but never deviated from the firm belief that enlightenment is a personal thing and cannot be directly taught or forced upon people.

As to the idea of a personal relationship with Jesus, while it is fairly unique amongst the world?s major religions, it is not entirely unknown in other faiths. Native Americans often have a sort of personal relationship with their spirit guides and most ancestor worship and even Spiritualism involve a type of interpersonal communication. However, those sorts of relationships are more nebulous in that the entities in question are more non-specific that of Jesus the Son of God. (My bear spirit may not be YOUR bear spirit for example and some of our ancestors may be helpful while others are angry, etc.) In fact, most mystic sects (including Sufi Muslims) have some sort of personal interaction/relationship with a deity. That being said, your friend who mentioned the focus on Judaism being on relationships upon the sacred of this world is perfectly correct. Buddhism shares that view as well, as does mainstream Islam. In other words even that which is divinen is ephemeral and impersonal. (Note that is why most Jews and Muslims to not refer to G-d by name, etc.) This is in direct contrast to many evangelical Christians (as in the movie Saved) who seem to view Jesus and their buddy, their pal and their best friend. On a very crass note, when I contemplate this sort of thinking I cannot help but picture Cartman of South Park signing that awful ?Body of Christ? song in the episode in which he formed a Christian band!

These are just some random thoughts I had, but please do not lump all Christians together with your evangelical co-worker. Although I may not call myself Christian, I recognize that there are elements of truth and beauty to it as well as all religions. Have you ever read anything by Thomas Merton? He's like the coolest Catholic ever!

I found Jesus six times in the above comment.

pax out,

t

Who is this Michelle character and how can we recruit her as a member of the Bigwhoop clan forever and ever, thanks?

Michelle, you're pointing to a verse that is not applicable to the lion's share of humanity. To those those in the business of repenting for their sins, learning from their mistakes, recongizing their redemption, the only unforgivable attitude is the blasphemy of the very mechanism that is able to cleanse them. Those who curse soap are not easily cleaned, even if they try to shower.

Every sin for which one does not repent is an unforgiven sin. The Bible is careful to imbue many of its sweeping redemptive passages with this concept. Healing is for those who recongize that they are diseased; it is the evangelical worldview which returned to the religion which had been hijacked by medieval that rediscovered this as taught in the Bible.

No sophomore level religion class can replace the actual reading of the text in question.

I'm pretty sure I am the least informed of any of the people reading this thread. So I don't have anything meaningful to add, other than to say: Andy, I'm proud of you for following through on posting this within a week of the previous post.

At this point, I'm feeling a bit underversed as well. I think it must be because I've only got a sophomore religion class as my knowledge base . . .

p.s. Michelle is a great lady and a well-versed friend of mine, and not another interweb personality I undertake to confuse people.

Hello, everyone!

First, yes, I do realize that the verse in question in hardly applicable to everyone. (And, by the way, I have read the texts in question. I was merely pointing out that there is a faction of Christianity which feels that those who do not recognize the so-called truth are, by nature, sinners.). But perhaps the more pertinent question to examine is the nature of sin itself and question whether it is absolute or conditional. Do we have to be able to recognize sin in order to sin. Using Bess? wonderful soap/shower metaphor, does the idea of what is clean mean the same to everyone? I may feel recognizably unclean if I do not shower and wash my hair at least once per day, but I know plenty of people who shower only several times per week and feel (and smell) just fine. Should we all expect to be held to, say, a surgeon?s standards of cleanliness? Maybe even the concept of clean has some personal and arbitrary aspects!

Could not sin be the same way? To many evangelicals my friend Tom (names have been changed to protect the innocent) would be a sinner because he is gay. However, to Tom, who is of another faith, taking another life - even that of an animal - is sinful. Tom, by the way, does not project that view of sin onto others, he just chooses not to eat meat for himself. Yet in that scenario both Tom (the so-called practicing homosexual) and the pork chop loving Christian who might condemn him are both sinners. Should one be asked to repent for what is not, in one?s personal ontology, a sin? Do we not have to recognize some sort of consequences to our actions in order to call it a sin?

This question is part and parcel with the question of absolute truth. Is what is true for me true for Andy? For example, for me it is true that raisins are delicious! For Andy it is true that raisins resemble evil, desiccated rabbit turds to be to be avoided at all costs. Are not raisin both the proverbial nature?s candy and one of Andy?s personal nightmares? If that is true, than perhaps the nature of our personal relationships with the divine is conditional as well. One person may have a personal relationship with Jesus that completely works for her and is, therefore, true, while another person may prefer to deal only with the physical world around him. One person may find it sinful to allow injustice to exist in the world and another may find it sinful to be in the company of those who smoke weed. Who is correct? And are they mutually exclusive?

I am rambling but my essential point is that I wonder about the concept of everyone being held to the same standard of faith and sin-free existence. I realize that to fundamentalists of virtually every faith there is a sense of absolute truth, but I?m afraid that I do not fully understand it. Anyone?

Thanks and take care, everyone!

It's too bad I missed this whole discussion. But I have a few bones to pick anyway . . .

To address all the sense/Bible/truth issue at once, let me pick on the Bible a little bit (as Catholics are wont to do). The main problem I have with accept the Bible as The Word of God AND the only Word of God is that implies internal revelation was only infallible for a few decades after Jesus lived. This is not only uncomfortable (how do we imperfectly revealed people know when the perfect revelation stopped), but it seems inconsistent the entire concept of the Holy Spirit being accessible to us humans. If we really were given the power to prophesy, for instance, how is that truth not on par with the truth in the Bible? Why isn't this information added to the Bible? Oh yeah, how does this answer Matt's sense question . . .

I haven't thought about this a lot, but I think maybe the sense is simply internal revelation, after a Dawkinsian fashion if you like (and I think you do). IR is actually sort of a metasense rather than a sense: senses convert physical stimuli into measurements, whereas IR converts sense measurements into meta-sense-measurements. I'm not sure how much sense that makes to anyone but me . . .

As for the question of sin, it seems pretty easy to me. It's impossible for one person to even conceive of another person's sin, since that person's sin is essentially only between him and God. The only valid action concerning another person's sin is forgiveness; anything else assumes we have some knowledge of their sin. Forgiveness doesn't require any detailed knowledge about their sin. I think . . .

So we shouldn't try to stop our brother or sister in Christ from abusing their children, torturing prisoners, polluting the earth, because all of that sin is between them and God? We have no roll to call them out on it?

I do think we have a role to do something to stop the sorts of things you mentioned. But I don't think it's necessarily our major function. If you're obsessed with stopping injustice in the world, you'll never be fulfilled. Of course if you're in a position to do something you should, and it's probably also worthwhile to get in that position. But as for "calling people out" on their sins, I don't think that's very Christ like. One example I can think of is the apostle that was a tax collector. According to Mark, Jesus didn't "call him out" as a sinner, he just asked him to follow him and started hanging out with him.

First off, thank you Trent for not letting my dream of getting an answer to my sense question die. I will continue to pursue it everywhere it's been posted until the cows come home. Actually, I just wanted to write that about the cows.

"but I think maybe the sense is simply internal revelation, after a Dawkinsian fashion if you like (and I think you do)"

I do like that, depending what you mean by "internal revelation". If you mean "there's some source of information that exists within a person's body or consciousness that can provide reliable information about the outside world without processing any information from the outside world", that's a good start, but what mechanism does it use and how is it possibly reliable in terms of providing information about the outside world?

"IR is actually sort of a metasense rather than a sense: senses convert physical stimuli into measurements, whereas IR converts sense measurements into meta-sense-measurements."

Where do the sense measurements that it converts come from?

Thought Experiment 1: Suppose you're born without sight, hearing, sense of touch (or at least the ability to perceive touch in some way), smell, or taste. You can still survive if you have someone taking care of you, but you have never had any physical senses whatsoever.

Thought Experiment 2: You see something that's blue. How do you know that it's really the same blue as the ball you looked at yesterday if you don't have that ball in front of you there to compare?

"Follow me" also meant "stop being a tax collector." Like with the woman at the well in John 4, he told her to leave her life of adultery. There's something to be said, for it.

But the key is, how are you calling people out and for what purpose? Because if none of it is in love, it should be left alone.

Fair enough, Lara, but I think in practice there are two problems with calling someone out on sin out of love: First, people often seem quick to evaluate the character of someone's sin. I mean, to do something out of love for someone you have to know them pretty well. So if you're going to go around pointing out sin you had better start with the people closest to you and only later get to, say, co-workers. Second, and maybe more important, is that in practice people seem to withhold the love part of the deal until the person acknowledges offense. It's just a matter of emphasis, it seems like emphasis is always on the sin and not the love.

In regard to thought experiment primary - you might be able to "survive" in the strictest sense of the word, given aid from other people, and assuming that without any sensation at all your body was somehow able to trigger internal metabolism to happen. It's actually absurd, but let's say it can happen. You still don't have any sense of identity, or that you relate to other beings who are like you, or that there IS an outside world at all.

Is it safe to assume that the bizzaro meta-sense we're inventing can still detect the existence of god, given all that?

On TE/2 - I hate conversations about colors and if anyone's color is the same as anyone else's and anything else that mixes the linguistic use of color terms with the conceptual meaning of colored things. Point being, you probably don't know it's the same blue as the ball you saw yesterday unless they're right next to each other for comparison.

I also have no idea where that one is going.

TE2 is trying to define the metasense for you. I'm not trying to talk about whether your blue is the same as someone else's blue, because I'm talking only about blue for you. I'm assuming your blue can be held constant. I'm simply asking how you know how item A is the same color as item B if you don't have both together. The answer I'm suggesting is that you made a measurement of item A yesterday, and stored that sense measurement. The next day you can recall that measurement to compare with your current sense measurement. TE2 then shows that there are operations that must happen at a higher level than physical stimulus. Comparing senses, averaging them, taking the standard deviation of them, etc. are the sort of thing that the metasense does.

TE1 then maybe tests whether this metasense is active in the absence of physical stimuli. But I think you're right about having to have some active nerves somewhere in your body. That may constitute a fly in the ointment, or possibly even a joker in the deck.

Anyway, I think TE1 and/or TE2 is going down the wrong path; I'm just not sure which.

On TE^2 -- I have a very solid memory of the blue that the desk I'm working on right now is. My eyes have taken in the outside stimulus and conceptualized that particular blue under the particular light it's in as bebing associated with the concept I store as "the desk in my room", which is a member of the set of all desks I have memories of. Some more fond than others, as a side note. If I were to be shown a blue object in similar light and asked to say whether it's the same, I could probably perform well within some margin of error, but I probably couldn't EVER say with certainty that it was LITERALLY the same shade of blue -- even if they were right next to each other. That's a drawback of my hardware though, not my comparison ability.

I think the point you're making though is that I have the ability to store information for comparison even when the original sensed information isn't there anymore. I agree with that, and don't think anything I said ruled it out.

Looking at the examples of comparison of objects, imagining an average in color, size, weight, etc - ARE obviously things people actually do, but I don't think they're sensory activities. They happen higher up the food chain, possibly subconsiously (ie, a split second "can I jump across this gap" decision made by integrating all previous knowledge of gaps and jumps with the perception of the width of the gap you are about to fall into), but certainly by an active internal mental process.

So I think the elephant in the room that you're looking for - or perhaps even the biscuit in the basket - is the challenge of answering the question of whether someone who literally never received information from the world outside themselves would be capable of "knowing god" or "sensing god" in whatever way people mean it when they say it.

If they are, than that's an interesting thing to explain, because it means that god is an internally generated thing, and you need to explain that.

If they're not, then it means that knowledge of god must pass in from the outside world, and we're still left needing to describe how that happens, which is right where we started.

I actually think that you'll run into trouble -before- even answering either of those questions, because I don't think that hypothetical person will ever form the concept of "I" or know their own identity, let alone have the faculties to learn about things that are NOT "I".

I suspect that TE2 is actually addressing some other thing that the brain does than this internal revelation . . .

So focusing on TE1, I can think of two responses now: A) They will never know God. This is actually logical since God created the universe. How could we know anything of God if we can't know anything about God's creation? B) Such a person *can't* exist. One could even appeal to the definition of life. You can't be alive if you're not in the world in some way. As mentioned earlier, your body needs to be in contact with itself to function as a body. And it must be in contact with the world to sustain itself (eating, avoiding falling rocks, etc.). That life could never exist in a way described in TE1 is telling: life created by God relies crucially on physical senses. So physical senses are intimately related to our relationship with God.

So now we need a third thought experiment, since TE1 clearly shows Godsense depends on the normal kind of sense(s) in some way . . .

Fantastic. We've ruled out internal revelation as a source of knowledge about the outside world. We've determined that knowledge of god (like all knowledge) must come in through the senses at some point, though we're leaving a strange backdoor wildcard bizzaro-sense that I don't genetically have open as a possibility here.

So I think that returns me to the original point. Provided that internally originated sources of information about god are not possible, WHERE is the external stimulus of god, and WHICH sense detects it's presence?