A Challenge to Richard Dawkins and the Atheists

[Dontaskme]

DAM:

When I see an ape create something like a Shakespearean play, them I will take seriously your notion of no dividing line.

But I was asking seeds to explain who it was that told human it was naked?

Not sure where the ape idea came from, but wasn't it adam and eve who became aware they were naked.

what I want to know is who told them?

[Walker]

But I was asking seeds to explain who it was that told human it was naked?

Not sure where the ape idea came from, but wasn't it adam and eve who became aware they were naked.

what I want to know is who told them?

From the language, it appears that Shame told them.

From Genesis, KJV, with commentary:

“And they were both naked, the man and his wife, and were not ashamed.”
(We can infer that knowledge of nakedness means knowledge of shame.)

And when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was pleasant to the eyes, and a tree to be desired to make one wise, she took of the fruit thereof, and did eat, and gave also unto her husband with her; and he did eat.
(They were ashamed because they became conscious of good and evil, and that happened because the serpent convinced Eve that she would be wise after eating what she wasn’t even supposed to touch. Therefore, wisdom includes knowledge of shame.)

”But of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it: for in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die.”
(The thou who dies is whoever it was you were when you only knew effortless innocence, which means once gone it’s gone forever.)
(She had everything they needed but she wanted more. So she made an effort to be wise, by seeking wisdom. By eating fruit. The decision and the mastication required effort. Some call it the effort of free will. But really, she couldn’t help herself. She was hungry and chewing comes naturally. Anyone seeking wisdom can likely sympathize.)

Come back Shame!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lkkivgDXG1E

[seeds]

The point is that at some moment in the past, a division between humans and the lower animals has taken place.

And even though I rail against Biblical mythology, it is a division that is allegorically represented in the Eden myth when some “apes” suddenly (or perhaps gradually) became aware of their own “nakedness” (i.e., self-reflective awareness).

And that is a state of awareness that the lower animals are not burdened with.

Hello seeds.

Can there really be a diving [sic] line between the awareness of humans and lower animals that was made in the past ?

Yes.

And to be clear, we are discussing “levels” of awareness here.

With that in mind, are you implying that there is no difference between your level of awareness and that of an ant?

And if that isn’t enough of a contrast for you, then how about between you and a rock?

...who would make that dividing line? and who was it that told the human ape in the garden of Eden myth albeit the Garden of Eden was just an allegorically story/representation? whose voice was that? was it a voice, or was it a thought? what happened, how did the division happen?

In other words who told you you were naked ie: aware of yourself?

Who told you that all of reality is “non-dual”?


_______

[seeds]

These images are a problem for you.

How are the images a problem for me?

If you claim that god is the creator, then you have to accept all his creation.

If you had paid the slightest bit of attention to the conversation between IC and myself, then you would know that not only do I accept that “all” is the Creator’s creation, but also that the horrors you pointed out are essential in helping to maintain the “illusion” of objective reality.

Indeed, the deformed bodies you cited, along with every other “evil” aspect of this world, are precisely what causes you, Hobbes, to doubt God’s existence.

And doubting his existence, as I suggested earlier, is exactly what God wants us to do.

To repeat what I speculatively offered to thedoc in an earlier post:

“...the element of doubt as to God’s existence and our ultimate destiny is exactly the effect that God is after. For it is that “veil of uncertainty” draped across the threshold of death that makes us want to experience life on this side of the veil, on earth, to its fullest.

And that’s the point! That’s what God wants us to do. He wants us to experience and manipulate the constituents of this level of reality to the fullest degree, unhindered by any overriding awareness of a higher level of reality that might in turn detract from the intensity with which we apply ourselves to this level.

And the not knowing of the certainty of eternal life and the super-consciousness that follows death is what produces the inherent resolve in humans, not only to endure immeasurable hardships in order to survive and procreate on earth, but also to accomplish all that can be accomplished while on the planet...”

Now, besides the unfathomable size of the universe and the incredulousness in thinking that a singular living entity could create and control such a vast dimension of reality, what is the single most obvious reason that causes humans to doubt God’s existence?

It’s because he allows for the existence of everything that we assume a loving (all-powerful) being would (should/could) eliminate if he truly exists and truly cares about us.

Therefore, doubt concerning God and a higher dimension of reality ensues and we are thus able to stay focused on the intricate details and dealings of our momentary existence within the closed bubble of this “dream-like” illusion we call a universe.
_______

[Hobbes' Choice]

These images are a problem for you.

How are the images a problem for me?

If you claim that god is the creator, then you have to accept all his creation.

If you had paid the slightest bit of attention to the conversation between IC and myself, then you would know that not only do I accept that “all” is the Creator’s creation, but also that the horrors you pointed out are essential in helping to maintain the “illusion” of objective reality.

Indeed, the deformed bodies you cited, along with every other “evil” aspect of this world, are precisely what causes you, Hobbes, to doubt God’s existence.

And doubting his existence, as I suggested earlier, is exactly what God wants us to do.

To repeat what I speculatively offered to thedoc in an earlier post:

I don't need mutation for me to doubt what is stupid.
The problem is still yours.
"God's Existence" is not a phrase that is even meaningful. It is, as scientist would say. not even wrong. It's simply an empty contentless thought.

Your verbal excrescence assumes god, but fails to begin to challenge that assumption.
You've not even begun to think.

TO challenge Dawkins, you have to engage with what he has said. Yet nowhere in this thread have to presented it.

[Dontaskme]

Hello seeds.

Can there really be a diving [sic] line between the awareness of humans and lower animals that was made in the past ?

Yes.

And to be clear, we are discussing “levels” of awareness here.

Yes I understand from the dualistic framework of mind, but isn't the idea of levels of awareness just an illusory difference one is assuming of itself? differences where there are none? The minds knowledge is simply an appearance appearing to divide the whole (nonduality) into subject object (duality) aka illusory conceptual objects. When in truth the object is inseparable from the subject. The divide is purely illusory, and that all objects are only and ever the one subject objectifying itself, so any difference in awareness is simply an illusion. Can awareness be divided by itself? Can that which is just an appearance in ''no thing awareness'' aka ''everything''... can that everything divide itself, who or what would be the other separate thing apart from the everything dividing it?

With that in mind, are you implying that there is no difference between your level of awareness and that of an ant?

But the knowledge of there being levels of awareness can only be made by the illusion there is ''other'' aka the dualistic framework which is just an appearance inseparable from the whole.

And if that isn’t enough of a contrast for you, then how about between you and a rock?

Same logic applies to this statement. A rock is not known if not for the knowledge of it. Therefore the rock is inseparable from you. Aka the knowledge known aka the awareness of the rock. If the concept rock is known by awareness aka YOU, can the known concept rock also be aware/know anything..? No it cannot.

Who you think you are here is what knowledge has informed you, otherwise you are no thing at all, but lets not confuse that with total nothingness, YOU ARE NOT TOTAL NOTHINGNESS, rather, YOU ARE ..but you are not a separate thing apart from the everything you are aka awareness. There is here just EVERYTHING without a second aka AWARENESS in which things arise as illusory concepts/knowledge known by no thing awareness. So what's being said here is that there is a knowing, but the knower can only ever be one with the knowing...which is the one subject awareness, and that all knowledge comes from that one with the knowing unknowable source.

...who would make that dividing line? and who was it that told the human ape in the garden of Eden myth albeit the Garden of Eden was just an allegorically story/representation? whose voice was that? was it a voice, or was it a thought? what happened, how did the division happen?

In other words who told you you were naked ie: aware of yourself?

Who told you that all of reality is “non-dual”?

Knowledge told me, however, the knowledge I am is not who I really am ... for I am always ...with or without the knowledge. I don't know that I am without knowing I am not. BUT the I don't know that, ...that knowing arises in I from nowhere. It's an appearance in I but not I...as knowledge.

I do not stand apart from that knowledge as a separate knower of that knowledge. I am already one with the knowing...aka knowledge.

The Sanskrit expression, neti neti, as expressed by the realized sages points to that vast reality, which is more than dualistic fixation.

Many levels of Interpretation of who or what I am- aka ( delusions) ...But no levels of the awareness that knows all interpretations aka(reality) for it is only and ever one with itself, one with the knowing...appearing as the many, albeit illusory.

The expression, neti neti, literally means "neither this, nor that" or not this and not that. In the first level this is the rejection of a separate self or ego. It is a rejection of fragmentation or split from universal spirit which is embedded within all beings and things. In the wholistic multidimensional context, it means that human beings are not just separate egos, we can not ever be adequately defined as being separate from spirit without introducing a delusion -- spiritual self-alienation. The projection of an individual self or observer apart from the object, which the observer observes defines a limited dualistic mental framework. In turn such occludes the larger picture, which includes all time, space, and knowledge. Rather we, as human beings, are part of an immense sacred process, not apart from it.

Thus "neti neti", as a statement, means that we are not anything separate as in the disparate dualistic framework of a separate "I/ it" subject/object duality context (versus the sacred non-dual and transpersonal "I-Thou" context) wherein we identify as a finite expression integrally part of a boundless spirit (like a wave on the ocean). We are neither the ego, nor are we nothing at all. We are neither the all, nor nothing at all. Neither just this observer, nor just that (the observed). Neither eternal nor finite, neither eternalism nor nihilism, neither empty nor solid. Rather it is the great non-dual or advaya statement of both/and -- both, but neither by itself. "And" in the sense of a greater synthesis or unity -- call it the tantric Siva/shakti if one likes, albeit nihilists will take it as a negation of reality.

Conclusion: the presence of I cannot be refuted for there is no other here to refute it. That which IS EVERYTHING, CANNOT BE ANY OTHER THING OTHER THAN THAT.

I AM because I cannot know I am not. I am because I cannot not be.

[Immanuel Can]

Question:

Why is it okay for Dawkins to evangelize aggressively for Atheism -- publicly defaming people's beliefs as "a delusion," for instance, (thus insulting the vast majority of the world's population and "forcing his views" on them) and why is it just fine for him to rail away against the whole nature and character of God Himself -- but somehow it suddenly becomes unbearably offensive (according to certain persons on this forum) if a Christian even speaks about an issue from his own worldview?

[thedoc]

“...the element of doubt as to God’s existence and our ultimate destiny is exactly the effect that God is after. For it is that “veil of uncertainty” draped across the threshold of death that makes us want to experience life on this side of the veil, on earth, to its fullest.

And that’s the point! That’s what God wants us to do. He wants us to experience and manipulate the constituents of this level of reality to the fullest degree, unhindered by any overriding awareness of a higher level of reality that might in turn detract from the intensity with which we apply ourselves to this level.

This might fit with what you are saying,

Life is not about arriving at the grave, with a well preserved, manicured and maintained body,
But about being broken down, worn out, and used up,
Sliding in sideways, with a drink in one hand and a box of chocolates in the other,
Yelling "Damn what a ride."

[thedoc]

others about which he can have no experience of.

What 'Beliefs' are you claiming that IC can have no experience of?

[Dontaskme]

Question:

Why is it okay for Dawkins to evangelize aggressively for Atheism -- publicly defaming people's beliefs as "a delusion," for instance, (thus insulting the vast majority of the world's population and "forcing his views" on them) and why is it just fine for him to rail away against the whole nature and character of God Himself -- but somehow it suddenly becomes unbearably offensive (according to certain persons on this forum) if a Christian even speaks about an issue from his own worldview?

There is an energy here that can negate everything - even key concepts like God, mind, consciousness, the witness, ultimate subject etc... yet it cannot negate it's Source: the undying, unborn wellspring that has to be. For anything to be at all, be it real, unreal, apparent, conceptual, abstract, permanent, shifting... even for concepts like unconscious and nothingness to have an ontology or meaning... necessitates an essential inextinguishable Source - it's inescapable. Ultimately...Nobody knows what's going on.Something is going on... something intrinsically vital, creative, dynamic, intelligent...Yet ultimately ungraspable. Whatever it is... it's doing this right now - effortlessly accomplishing itself in every moment.

There is no thinking yourself into or out of this. Just notice that it is already the case. No ism's about this, just this.

[Immanuel Can]

There is no thinking yourself into or out of this.

So you're not interested in philosophy? Because "thinking yourself into or out of things" is exactly what philosophy is about.

Just asking.

[Hobbes' Choice]

others about which he can have no experience of.

What 'Beliefs' are you claiming that IC can have no experience of?

Who said anything about you?
Who said anything about belief?

[Dontaskme]

There is no thinking yourself into or out of this.

So you're not interested in philosophy? Because "thinking yourself into or out of things" is exactly what philosophy is about.

Just asking.

What is it you are attempting to think or reason?

If you are asking then you must already hold the answer, else the question would not have arisen. What are you trying to investigate, and where else but in yourself are you going to find the truth of your investigation? Can someone else give you your own truth?

And who is it you imagine is doing the thinking here? thoughts only create the illusion of a thinker after their appearance, so what's actually being acknowledged is an illusory thinker..aka a memory.

So all you are doing is basing this pristine uncluttered immediate present moment on what's already been and gone to past tense. And in truth that's the only place where you can exist, for there is nothing outside of that arena that has happened yet.

Separation is upheld in the mind and sustained by psychological time. In the immediacy of present actuality there is no past and future and no separation. There is only the ever-fresh unfolding of existence spontaneously presenting itself. So you have no way of knowing anything except what's already past and dead.

What branch is IC viewing from? do you know/see or have secret knowledge to something beyond what hasn't happened yet?

..and when an event does happen, did it ever really happen if the event is practically over in the same moment it got started? In a world of happened (past tense) things... is the illusion of separation. On reflection it can be seen that existence is an ever fresh spontaneous happening - an ineffable creative event presenting itself ..and that presently, no thing has happened - the only thing that is real is this happen-ing… now… this unmissable event of Existence. There aren't two events - there is simply THIS as it presents.This is my view and my philosophy.

PS..one doesn't have to believe or disbelieve, or think them-self into this present immediate moment ..because well.. it's a happening without doubt or error.

To question that is a fools game, and I've long left that un-evolved mind set.

[Immanuel Can]

If you are asking then you must already hold the answer, else the question would not have arisen.

This is a non-sequitur, a logical fallacy. It just isn't true.

Can someone else give you your own truth?

No, someone can show you THE truth, though.

To question that is a fools game, and I've long left that un-evolved mind set.

Ah. So to "question" is for "fools," and "fools" are bad? They're "un-evolved," you say? Then it appears as though you are trying to "give me my truth." You anticipate that if I think rightly, I'll agree with you. And those who don't agree are wrong, or foolish, or un-evolved.

That means you are imposing a singular "truth," your own, that you say we all ought also to realize is True in the ultimate sense.

You see, even you can't play your own game. The minute you advocate for your view, you're claiming a singular, big-T Truth about it exists. Moreover, you clearly believe that you can convey it to us, though a minute ago you asked rhetorically if it was even possible...

Clearly, it is. I believe it is, and evidently, so do you.

[Dontaskme]

If you are asking then you must already hold the answer, else the question would not have arisen.

This is a non-sequitur, a logical fallacy. It just isn't true.

Can someone else give you your own truth?

No, someone can show you THE truth, though.

How do you know what's true, who are you or me to know truth, we have never been alive before, how could we possibly have it all figured out..? the good news is we don't have to...because ..No one knows the truth ...we are it already.

To question that is a fools game, and I've long left that un-evolved mind set.

Ah. So to "question" is for "fools," and "fools" are bad? They're "un-evolved," you say? Then it appears as though you are trying to "give me my truth." You anticipate that if I think rightly, I'll agree with you. And those who don't agree are wrong, or foolish, or un-evolved.

That means you are imposing a singular "truth," your own, that you say we all ought also to realize is True in the ultimate sense.

No I don't think those things at all, all your own projections. You already are the living truth, that's all I'm trying to show. How can I give that to you?...I can't give anything to you that you haven't got already.

You see, even you can't play your own game. The minute you advocate for your view, you're claiming a singular, big-T Truth about it exists. Moreover, you clearly believe that you can convey it to us, though a minute ago you asked rhetorically if it was even possible...

Clearly, it is. I believe it is, and evidently, so do you.

I'm saying why believe, why disbelieve, what are we trying to believe/disbelieve here? ...the truth is self evident, it's just that sometimes in life, man will doubt and the truth does not evolve in those men, narratively speaking of course... That's through no fault of our own, it's just that life has not evolved the truth in some people yet, but there's plenty of time in eternity for that. It'll evolve in the human story of 'separate me' when it is time to do so. We can feel the truth right now if we want to, or we can wait until life evolves it in us . In other words we can awaken from the dream of separation now, or on our death bed taking our final breath....it'll come sooner or later, it's always here now waiting our permission to free it up.

PS..I can't convey it in words..we are only walking each other home - there is either a resonance or not with what's being attempted via words. No word is it, yet every word is it.

____________
I have a thousand brilliant lies

For the question:

Who are you?

I have a thousand brilliant lies
For the question:

What is God?

If you think that the Truth can be known
From words,

If you think that the Sun and the Ocean

Can pass through that tiny opening called the mouth,

O someone should start laughing!

Someone should start wildly laughing – Now!

Hafiz