I don’t think that’s good theology.
So you believe that “all ‘religiously motivated’ acts are equally compatible/consistent with the religious ideals inspiring them” because… they’re all somehow “founded on an understating [understanding?] (on the individual level) of the dictates of a religious ideal”? You seem to express here some kind of vacuously tautological faith in the proposition that all instances of individual understanding of religious ideals are equally well-founded, and, in particular, that it is not possible to call any such individual understanding a misunderstanding. Have I understood your meaning correctly?
I certainly had, and have added more examples since.
Sure, that’s not what faith means in many circumstances, and sometimes love and cynicism are compatible, and of course it is possible for a skeptic to be more loving than a believer. But your taking note of all this here is surely nothing but a red herring.
Well in what does that “more of a justification” consist?
Basically but I think there is enough in the Bible (or Koran or Gita or or or) to justify basically anything and is routinely used for that purpose. Further, I think there are enough varied schools of thought vis-a-vis religious faith that most individual instantiations are simply adherence to these thought-out schools.
My off the cuff answer is probability that one is correct. The probability a given line of thought is correct is markedly less when it is based solely on a reason than when it is based on proof. Does that make sense?
The Catechism of the Catholic Church (1994, revised 1997) on faith, evolution and science states:
I suppose they would do well to make that explicit; regardless, thanks for following up.
This is an example of the development of doctrine which shows that the Church takes into account scientific discoveries and is not fossilised as some people make out…
St Paul may be excused for not being aware of the role of death in the evolutionary process but he was right with regard to spiritual truths - and it remains true that moral evil is a frequent cause of death, disease and other physical evils.1008 Death is a consequence of sin. The Church’s Magisterium, as authentic interpreter of the affirmations of Scripture and Tradition, teaches that death entered the world on account of man’s sin.571 Even though man’s nature is mortal God had destined him not to die. Death was therefore contrary to the plans of God the Creator and entered the world as a consequence of sin.572 “Bodily death, from which man would have been immune had he not sinned” is thus “the last enemy” of man left to be conquered.573
Life is more than suffering. Not all desires should be suppressed because they are valuable and a means of fulfilment. Buddhism is negative in denying the existence of the self and the value of transient things, and aiming at the loss of one’s identity.
If that is not negative, what is?!
Unlike Guatama Jesus foresaw His death, accepted it as a means of overcoming evil and inspired many people to follow His example by forgiving their enemies rather than resorting to revenge. The Last Supper was not a cause of His death but a celebration of His self-sacrifice and victory over death which was intended to be commemorated and shared by His followers.
I think you agree that to inflict needless suffering is morally wrong, i.e. objectively evil.
He reconciled it by making his life meaningful by becoming a humanist and fighting for social justice. He took it for granted that - unlike Sisyphus - we have the insight and the power to change the course of events. He did not explain how this is possible.
Do you mean things of which we are unaware are useless, valueless and purposeless? Is awareness the only significant criterion? If so we are the only living beings that matter…
Why should we be exempt from subservience to physical laws? The immense complexity of the brain does not lead to emancipation because it remains a physical mechanism no matter how complex it becomes. An increase in the number of neural connections does not alter the fact that they belong to a closed system. Where is the loophole?
If you cannot give any reason why it is unconvincing I’m not convinced your conclusion is convincing…
.How do you reconcile this with the Church’s acceptance of the scientific origin of man? Was bodily death confined to man? If not did animals die before man appeared because man subsequently sinned?
Surely there is more to life than suffering–at least for the vast majority of the living–but that’s not what the first noble truth is meant to show. Again, your repudiation of Buddhist belief, I feel, is more indicative by the great chasm between your thought and theirs than by any perceived fault.
I think that is first and foremost unsourced. Secondly, I think it is incogent because of the break introduced since ‘thereof’ cannot refer to either suffering itself or attachment. Finally, I think it is different not better but certainly not worse than Christian ideas of suffering, attachment, self and afterlife.
You’re missing my point. I was just saying that Guatama didn’t die of food poisoning as you allege and that by the logic applied to get to the conclusion that he had we could blame the crucifixion on the last supper (that one thing happened after another and hence must be because of it).
I think that follows from the self evident principle that ugliness ought not to be intentionally created.
But regardless of how we change events the biggest events are–unless you are with the singularitarians–fixed and unchangeable. We will die, as will everyone one we have ever known/loved/hated. All that we have ever done will be brought to dust.
Not necessarily, the universe is a fearsome big place.
I do not find science and philosophy at odds as your statement above implies since they endeavor to answer radically different sorts of questions. I’m not sure what you’re trying to ask with your ‘what else?’
I don’t understand what you’re asking. There is no loophole. You implied that free will defied the principles of thermodynamics which is blatantly false on the face of it and your comments above prove this. If the brain were a closed system as you imply it would not need the continual addition of energy and matter (i.e. heat and oxygen) to continue to function. To treat the brain as a closed system–that is to say, to cut it free of a human body–will show that free will or life for that matter does not persist in a closed system.
You didn’t answer my question and retorted with an almost wholly unrelated one. The answer to which, by the way, is that the question assumes that there ought not to be matter without justifying that assumption. If you are advocating an incorporeal mind then you are answerable as to how it interacts with a physical brain and just saying it does and we don’t know isn’t sufficient and is a huge strike against your claim.
That should be all but self-evident. Philosophy is complicated and an online summary is (a) a secondary source at best and (b) is abridged which can therefore miss important points of the original text for space concerns. Hence, to argue against someone’s claim having only read what someone else wrote about his or her claims is–for these two reasons–often little more than tilting at windmills.If you cannot give any reason why it is unconvincing I’m not convinced your conclusion is convincing…
That is part of a quote from my online summary, the whole of which read ‘Quine objects in principle to Carnap’s proposed translation of statements like “quality q is at point-instant x;y;z;t” into his sense-datum language, because he does not define the connective “is at”.’
Well, as far as I know the Church doesn’t have much to say on “the appearance of man”, as to just how or when humans as we know them-and as Adam & Eve essentially were- with self-consciousness, the ability to reason, free wills, etc. arrived on the scene other than to say that all living humans descended from a single couple who committed an original act of disobedience against God.
The Church has stated quite unequivocally:
1008 Death is a consequence of sin. The Church’s Magisterium, as authentic interpreter of the affirmations of Scripture and Tradition, teaches that death entered the world on account of man’s sin.571 Even though man’s nature is mortal God had destined him not to die. Death was therefore contrary to the plans of God the Creator and entered the world as a consequence of sin.572 **“Bodily death, from which man would have been immune had he not sinned” is thus “the last enemy” of man left to be conquered.573
No it hasn’t. The Church still very clearly teaches that man is not a mere product of evolution (biological processes), but that each individual spiritual soul is directly created by God. When the first pair of humans were created they could well have been created in a literal kind of Eden, so far as I can see. Anyway, I think this topic is banned, so we should drop it.
Wow, that’s really surprising to me. You think that all readings of religious texts are equally justified, i.e., that the texts themselves equally justify any reading? In a dispute over the meaning of a religious text, there is never one view that is more justified than another? I can only express my incredulity that you would make what appear to be such absurd and extremely intellectualy lazy claims, while vaunting your own intellectual rigor. Do you further claim that you have arrived at this apparently absurd position by means of something like ‘demonstrative’ reasons? Or do you now admit that your earlier claim about your own eschewal of ‘intellectual laziness’ was false? (indeed, nothing but egregiously naive intellectual pride, I would say)
This is another vacuously tautological answer. It doesn’t “make sense” because it simply doesn’t tell us anything. If you are to follow, you need proof (you claim), not just reasons, because proofs carry a greater probability of being correct? Can you not see how totally unenlightening that is, not to mention absurd (please try to notice your own self-contradiction here)?
Each soul…
That does not resolve the problem of how there could have been physical life without death on this planet - unless you are a Creationist…
Evolution has been banned but not Creation!
You are right, of course. I pasted Thomas’s spelling automatically - being more intent on the argument than the name…
Correct, it does not, but it does open the way to a fairly obvious inference: man is God’s only creation endowed with an immortal soul and so it is naturally fitting that man should have been destined for immortality from the moment of his creation (indeed, perhaps destined to redeem all of creation by his own perfect act of obedience - which act was in fact accomplished by God himself in the person of Jesus Christ) - whereas other souls naturally were not so destined.
These days Creationist is usually understood to mean a literal interpretation of Genesis. Do you believe there was life on this planet before the advent of human beings?Correct, it does not, but it does open the way to a fairly obvious inference: man is God’s only creation endowed with an immortal soul and so it is naturally fitting that man should have been destined for immortality from the moment of his creation (indeed, perhaps destined to redeem all of creation by his own perfect act of obedience - which act was in fact accomplished by God himself in the person of Jesus Christ) - whereas other souls naturally were not so destined.
I am Catholic, so certainly I’m a creationist!
That seems to imply that the death of biological organisms is not due to sin…