Fred: But can these questions actually lead you anywhere ? I think they can lead you to realising that you have no basis for belief in anything, that you have no basis for pride or arrogance, or self-esteem - no "rights" to anything, no justification for passing any judgement on others or yourself.. which, taken to its logical conclusion, causes one to cease to be an "I am"... Or at least exposes the fact that "I am" is, and always was, an illusion.
Fweddy! Now you fwightening me!
Scientists have recently been looking at why it is that humans seem to have evolved with a predisposition for concocting gods and religions for themselves. They want to know what it is about religion that seems to favor the survival of the species.
Perhaps you have found the answer.
The countless cults of gods, goddesses, redeemers and prophets (along with their simple explanations of the incomprehensible and promises of immortality) that man has created since the dawn of human consciousness have simply preserved the species from the nihilating effects of the Truth.
THE FOLLOWING IS PURE METAPHYSICAL / PHILOSOPHICAL BOLL*CKS - I ADVISE ANYONE AND EVERYONE NOT TO WASTE YOUR TIME READING IT (With the exception of Peter! LOL ;-)
If you choose to ignore the above, heres some music to accompany your reading.. ;-)
"this is a song thats guaranteed to bring you right down; - its called 'dont let it bring you down' - it sort of starts off real slow, and then it fizzles out altogether" - Neal Young on the album "4 way street"
I think that you are one of the few who knows this "truth" - I dont think that anything I have said is new to you.
As for "Scientists have recently been looking at why it is that humans seem to have evolved with a predisposition for concocting gods and religions for themselves" - I have written long expositions on this subject on other sites.. I have stopped doing that now, and I have deleted a book I have been writing for a year - Because I have now concluded that it serves no good purpose - Once one sees the truth, you cannot unsee it.. If this truth is demotivating and mostly "damaging" then sharing it is "wrong" - particularly if one shares it in an absolutely convincing way, dealing with every possible counter argument, going into the physics down to quantum level, looking at the prior science (Laplace and Hiezenburg) and present a comprehensive, water-tight argument, as I was doing.. I dont mind talking about it at a superficial level - People who "get it" from this would have "got it" anyway..
The first major delusion IMO was probably the "free will" or "identity" ("I am") delusion - The concept of free will brought with it concepts of responsibility, the ides that I am free to be "good" or "bad" - that these are my choices. If I make a "wrong" choice and choose to be "bad" and cause "harm" therebye, Guilt kicks in - Social interactions defined a set of functional behaviours "morals" and "principles" etc, complying with these allowed humans to "move forward"..
But sometimes (often) someone who was doing all the "right things" ended up being struck with bad luck - This caused a problem - "Why did this happen to me? I didnt deserve it".. "Why did that happen to him? - He must have deserved it!" - Our programming to look for reasons, combined with the delusion of free will, led to a conflict - And the way out of this conflict was the creation of another delusion - the god delusion.
Whilst the god delusion is severely imperfect (any delusion built on a delusion will have flaws, and require continual "tweeking" to keep it "functional") it did / does work to "satisfy" are requirement for reasons.. for some..
But the only way to get something which makes perfect sense, has no flaws, is to know the truth - and this cannot have any delusional foundation.. Strip away the delusions and every basis for being an "I am" must be stripped away too - every paradigm by which we make any sense of our human interactions - all the "hard wired" aspects in our brains - Our basic neurological evolution from the moment we consciously (or perhaps even unconsciously) obtained "identity", is all built on the core delusion.
Perhaps seeking the truth and trying to "wake up", is the real folly - Grim as it is, I think our delusions are probably more pleasant than the truth, and have a functional purpose - I think that the truth removes these - The truth is that there is no purpose, no reason, no meaning.. In the words of (I think it was) Isiah "Vanity, vanity, all is vanity and vexation of spirit" - Vanity is an old english word meaning (at the time of King James) "Emptyness" or "pointlessness".
Fortunately, "the truth" I have seen may not be the truth - It (IMO) certainly is the truth if one accepts the "physical" model - the physical universe cannot be any other way - But it may not be the truth if there is no universe, if everything is an "engineered" delusion - as in, "engineered" by some vastly superior entity or collection of entities (of which "we" may even be part).
But I personally cant accept this "escape route".
Fred.
"The countless cults of gods, goddesses, redeemers and prophets (along with their simple explanations of the incomprehensible and promises of immortality) that man has created since the dawn of human consciousness have simply preserved the species from the nihilating effects of the Truth." - Peter
I think this is a succinct summary, and accurate - I think that, in the main, it has been "unknowingly" dellusional - But I also think that some who studied and sought the truth within these - probably some priests or whatever - may have found it.. And seen the implications.. And perhaps "chosen" to hide the truth, both for their own sake and/or for humainties sake.
Fred, calm down man! Not that it's not good to hear your musings, just remember the bomb in Dark Star...
By the way, as far as posting vids and sound clips when less than good; well that all depends on one's definition of good. Taken to it's limits, no one would post anything...oh no...am I going down the route that Fred has taken...
"oh no...am I going down the route that Fred has taken..." - Roy
LOL ! Perhaps yes, perhaps no.. But you are certainly taking the route determined for you within the first few moments of the universes existance, if it exists! ;-)
"Thought you might get a kick out of my grade four class picture."
Thanks for sharing that, Peter - Such different childhood worlds we had! At that age I was surrounded by Afrikaaner kids whose whole focus was to get into the SADF and kill kaffirs.
Ha! Ta for the Dark Star clip Fred: no surprises to know that it is a favourite fillum of mine. So too is Dark City (now just where is Shell Beach) and the fantastic Blade Runnerhuman or replicant, real memories or implanted? Anyhow, on imagined things, here is a natty wee song from The Imagined Village which not only is kind of appropriate here given the name (not the Village bit...) and for the fact that it does have a theremin bit in it.
Fred: ".....I have deleted a book I have been writing for a year - Because I have now concluded that it serves no good purpose..."
A couple of years ago I decided to make a 2-DVD (three hour) theremin master class. I had a lot of fun doing it but once it was completed I abandoned the project. I decided, as you did with your book, that it served no good purpose.
Since I had already done the part of the project from which I would get any personal satisfaction (the actual teaching of the classes) the effort involved with copying, distributing etc., seemed like a waste of time.
Master classes are offered to students who are themselves budding virtuosos on the instrument being taught, and who already have a solid foundation in the study of music. This does not describe the vast majority of thereminists.
The older I get, the more I find that much of the time people don't have the slightest idea WTF I'm talking about. Not long ago, I was at a very nice cocktail party and told what I thought was a very amusing story about an afternoon I spent with Anna Magnani. It never occurred to me that there wasn't a single person in the room who had the slightest idea who Anna Magnani was!
It wasn't the fault of the people at the cocktail party that the name Anna Magnani meant nothing to them. It was my fault for not having realized it before embarking on a story that was of no interest and made no sense whatsoever!
That's how I felt about the now defunct theremin master class.
