Reply personal responsibility is a crock: here is why

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AngelRho
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28 Jul 2021, 5:00 am

The kicker is absolutely NONE of that absolves any of us from our personal responsibility to change the status quo if we believe it to be wrong or evil. If you got the student loans and earned a crap degree after willingly signing the papers and exit counseling, you cannot make the excuse that you didn’t know or fell victim to actors in bad faith. We all had time to decide to act to live our dreams through college whether those were reasonable decisions or not. We’re stuck with those decisions. So if you end up dissatisfied with those decisions, what is the best choice you can make to correcting them?

Pay off your loans, get free of them.

Nobody else can do that for you, nobody else should be made responsible for that. If you want your freedom, you have to earn it, same as everyone else. That’s p.r.

PR isn’t going to be the answer for everything since not everyone will be willing to take PR. PR is always self-focused, which is why it gives the appearance of accepting the blame for everything even when the fault lies elsewhere. If I get mugged while walking through a dark alley, it’s not my fault that there are muggers in the world. It’s not my fault that educators deceived me since they were people in positions of trust and authority. Maybe I should have been wary of them and less trusting, but I had no way to know that. But if I get mugged, it is my responsibility to do what I can to lead police to the muggers. It is also my responsibility to avoid places that are unsafe. It is my responsibility and only mine to make changes in my life to deal with my own mistakes regardless of whether I was deceived into making those decisions.



cubedemon6073
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28 Jul 2021, 11:49 am

AngelRho wrote:
The kicker is absolutely NONE of that absolves any of us from our personal responsibility to change the status quo if we believe it to be wrong or evil. If you got the student loans and earned a crap degree after willingly signing the papers and exit counseling, you cannot make the excuse that you didn’t know or fell victim to actors in bad faith. We all had time to decide to act to live our dreams through college whether those were reasonable decisions or not. We’re stuck with those decisions. So if you end up dissatisfied with those decisions, what is the best choice you can make to correcting them?

Pay off your loans, get free of them.

Nobody else can do that for you, nobody else should be made responsible for that. If you want your freedom, you have to earn it, same as everyone else. That’s p.r.

PR isn’t going to be the answer for everything since not everyone will be willing to take PR. PR is always self-focused, which is why it gives the appearance of accepting the blame for everything even when the fault lies elsewhere. If I get mugged while walking through a dark alley, it’s not my fault that there are muggers in the world. It’s not my fault that educators deceived me since they were people in positions of trust and authority. Maybe I should have been wary of them and less trusting, but I had no way to know that. But if I get mugged, it is my responsibility to do what I can to lead police to the muggers. It is also my responsibility to avoid places that are unsafe. It is my responsibility and only mine to make changes in my life to deal with my own mistakes regardless of whether I was deceived into making those decisions.


Most people would agree with you but I'm one of the few who dissent. But, I accept that since most people agree with this public policy and social standards will go a certain way. I will accept this is the reality do things with and for my future children to avoid the fate of the millennials since we're back in the days of caveat emptor.

I would recommend millennial parents and gen y parents and younger gen x'ers like ourselves do the exact same.



cubedemon6073
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28 Jul 2021, 7:07 pm

AngelRho, let's say I buy a car and it turns out to be a lemon. And, the salesperson used all sorts of manipulative and pressure tactics as well. Should we go back to the old days and force people to be stuck with it or should I be able to get the money back?

With a car certain protections are in place. Under certain conditions I can get my money back. With student loans there is no protection and college guarantees nothing as others around that prospective student claimed.

To me, both situations are sort of similar.

Let me ask you this. Are we owed the truth about how things really do work, the products we're purchasing, services we're receiving, and what is expected of us to succeed in society at all? Let's say we're not then can any of us really trust anyone or anything at all? If there is no trust then how can we have a civilization if the building blocks of a civilization are relationships and the building block of relationships are trust.

American society is a society in which one can't trust anyone so can American society be counted as a civilization? I say the answer is no.

Now, that I know and understand the devils that I'm dealing with I will make sure there are safe guards for my children and raise and teach them accordingly.



AngelRho
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29 Jul 2021, 3:44 am

cubedemon6073 wrote:
AngelRho, let's say I buy a car and it turns out to be a lemon. And, the salesperson used all sorts of manipulative and pressure tactics as well. Should we go back to the old days and force people to be stuck with it or should I be able to get the money back?

With a car certain protections are in place. Under certain conditions I can get my money back. With student loans there is no protection and college guarantees nothing as others around that prospective student claimed.

To me, both situations are sort of similar.

Let me ask you this. Are we owed the truth about how things really do work, the products we're purchasing, services we're receiving, and what is expected of us to succeed in society at all? Let's say we're not then can any of us really trust anyone or anything at all? If there is no trust then how can we have a civilization if the building blocks of a civilization are relationships and the building block of relationships are trust.

American society is a society in which one can't trust anyone so can American society be counted as a civilization? I say the answer is no.

Now, that I know and understand the devils that I'm dealing with I will make sure there are safe guards for my children and raise and teach them accordingly.

Why can’t salesmen just not sell lemons?



cubedemon6073
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29 Jul 2021, 5:50 am

AngelRho wrote:
cubedemon6073 wrote:
AngelRho, let's say I buy a car and it turns out to be a lemon. And, the salesperson used all sorts of manipulative and pressure tactics as well. Should we go back to the old days and force people to be stuck with it or should I be able to get the money back?

With a car certain protections are in place. Under certain conditions I can get my money back. With student loans there is no protection and college guarantees nothing as others around that prospective student claimed.

To me, both situations are sort of similar.

Let me ask you this. Are we owed the truth about how things really do work, the products we're purchasing, services we're receiving, and what is expected of us to succeed in society at all? Let's say we're not then can any of us really trust anyone or anything at all? If there is no trust then how can we have a civilization if the building blocks of a civilization are relationships and the building block of relationships are trust.

American society is a society in which one can't trust anyone so can American society be counted as a civilization? I say the answer is no.

Now, that I know and understand the devils that I'm dealing with I will make sure there are safe guards for my children and raise and teach them accordingly.

Why can’t salesmen just not sell lemons?


Agreed!



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21 Aug 2021, 7:56 pm

The problem with the concept of self-evident is that what is considered self-evident to you may not to me.

I assume self-evident means not needing to be demonstrated or explained; obvious.

But, what if something is not obvious to me or other groups of people?

Let's look at this.

https://www.popularmechanics.com/scienc ... e-week-14/

If I was taught to and used to read maps on a piece of paper then I'm going to read it differently then I would on a 3d globe? On paper, the surface is straight so I will interpret going South, West and then North as an incomplete rectangle instead of a curved triangle on a 3d globe. Now, if I don't have an engineering, geology or cosmological background would it be reasonable to answer this question and be able to use critical thinking for it? Would it be obvious to the average person that what is stated out in popular mechanics magazine is the correct answer? So, the question musk asks be a reasonable way to assess critical thinking skills especially if one must have content knowledge to apply the critical thinking skills on?

Let's apply this to the whole concept of an entity being eternal. It is not self-evident to me because I may be lacking a certain amount of content knowledge. To me without content knowledge the idea that something could be eternal meaning it has no origin and beginning comes across as nonsense to me just like Elon Musk's question.

Again, how is it logically possible for something to exist without a beginning? I don't have the content knowledge that you may have or even what to type into google. I'm missing steps. And, don't just say I don't know what logically possible means. If logically possible means a proposition or idea which can't be disproved and if the idea of self-evident or obvious is part of our proofs then to me it is obvious and self-evident that something eternal cannot exist and all entities must come somewhere and have an origin. Even God is an entity and must have an origin. If it possible to disprove the notion that all entities must have an origin and beginning then I don't understand why or what the steps are to disprove the notion that all entities must have an origin and beginning.

Let me put it to you this way on what you are dealing with when speaking to me.

For a long time I didn't know what others meant by positive and negative attitude. I didn't know why people were using mathematical operators for one's emotions. Without context, I applied Boolean reasoning for a long time. E.g. A positive attitude is a negative attitude of a negative attitude or pessimist against pessimism. If you negate the negation of A then you have A.

Or, you're entitled to nothing... Again, without the proper context and content meaning it comes across as nonsense. E.G. If one is entitled to nothing then without the proper context and understanding of the phrase one could interpret it as one is not entitled to refuse to commit murder.

This is what you're dealing with my friend.



AngelRho
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22 Aug 2021, 1:44 am

cubedemon6073 wrote:
The problem with the concept of self-evident is that what is considered self-evident to you may not to me.

I assume self-evident means not needing to be demonstrated or explained; obvious.

But, what if something is not obvious to me or other groups of people?

Let's look at this.

https://www.popularmechanics.com/scienc ... e-week-14/

If I was taught to and used to read maps on a piece of paper then I'm going to read it differently then I would on a 3d globe? On paper, the surface is straight so I will interpret going South, West and then North as an incomplete rectangle instead of a curved triangle on a 3d globe. Now, if I don't have an engineering, geology or cosmological background would it be reasonable to answer this question and be able to use critical thinking for it? Would it be obvious to the average person that what is stated out in popular mechanics magazine is the correct answer? So, the question musk asks be a reasonable way to assess critical thinking skills especially if one must have content knowledge to apply the critical thinking skills on?

Let's apply this to the whole concept of an entity being eternal. It is not self-evident to me because I may be lacking a certain amount of content knowledge. To me without content knowledge the idea that something could be eternal meaning it has no origin and beginning comes across as nonsense to me just like Elon Musk's question.

Again, how is it logically possible for something to exist without a beginning? I don't have the content knowledge that you may have or even what to type into google. I'm missing steps. And, don't just say I don't know what logically possible means. If logically possible means a proposition or idea which can't be disproved and if the idea of self-evident or obvious is part of our proofs then to me it is obvious and self-evident that something eternal cannot exist and all entities must come somewhere and have an origin. Even God is an entity and must have an origin. If it possible to disprove the notion that all entities must have an origin and beginning then I don't understand why or what the steps are to disprove the notion that all entities must have an origin and beginning.

Let me put it to you this way on what you are dealing with when speaking to me.

For a long time I didn't know what others meant by positive and negative attitude. I didn't know why people were using mathematical operators for one's emotions. Without context, I applied Boolean reasoning for a long time. E.g. A positive attitude is a negative attitude of a negative attitude or pessimist against pessimism. If you negate the negation of A then you have A.

Or, you're entitled to nothing... Again, without the proper context and content meaning it comes across as nonsense. E.G. If one is entitled to nothing then without the proper context and understanding of the phrase one could interpret it as one is not entitled to refuse to commit murder.

This is what you're dealing with my friend.

Your argument in a nutshell: I am unable to understand a thing, therefore it is untrue.



cubedemon6073
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22 Aug 2021, 8:02 pm

AngelRho wrote:
cubedemon6073 wrote:
The problem with the concept of self-evident is that what is considered self-evident to you may not to me.

I assume self-evident means not needing to be demonstrated or explained; obvious.

But, what if something is not obvious to me or other groups of people?

Let's look at this.

https://www.popularmechanics.com/scienc ... e-week-14/

If I was taught to and used to read maps on a piece of paper then I'm going to read it differently then I would on a 3d globe? On paper, the surface is straight so I will interpret going South, West and then North as an incomplete rectangle instead of a curved triangle on a 3d globe. Now, if I don't have an engineering, geology or cosmological background would it be reasonable to answer this question and be able to use critical thinking for it? Would it be obvious to the average person that what is stated out in popular mechanics magazine is the correct answer? So, the question musk asks be a reasonable way to assess critical thinking skills especially if one must have content knowledge to apply the critical thinking skills on?

Let's apply this to the whole concept of an entity being eternal. It is not self-evident to me because I may be lacking a certain amount of content knowledge. To me without content knowledge the idea that something could be eternal meaning it has no origin and beginning comes across as nonsense to me just like Elon Musk's question.

Again, how is it logically possible for something to exist without a beginning? I don't have the content knowledge that you may have or even what to type into google. I'm missing steps. And, don't just say I don't know what logically possible means. If logically possible means a proposition or idea which can't be disproved and if the idea of self-evident or obvious is part of our proofs then to me it is obvious and self-evident that something eternal cannot exist and all entities must come somewhere and have an origin. Even God is an entity and must have an origin. If it possible to disprove the notion that all entities must have an origin and beginning then I don't understand why or what the steps are to disprove the notion that all entities must have an origin and beginning.

Let me put it to you this way on what you are dealing with when speaking to me.

For a long time I didn't know what others meant by positive and negative attitude. I didn't know why people were using mathematical operators for one's emotions. Without context, I applied Boolean reasoning for a long time. E.g. A positive attitude is a negative attitude of a negative attitude or pessimist against pessimism. If you negate the negation of A then you have A.

Or, you're entitled to nothing... Again, without the proper context and content meaning it comes across as nonsense. E.G. If one is entitled to nothing then without the proper context and understanding of the phrase one could interpret it as one is not entitled to refuse to commit murder.

This is what you're dealing with my friend.

Your argument in a nutshell: I am unable to understand a thing, therefore it is untrue.


Image

That is not what I said or implied at all.

I'm accepting the possibility that I could be wrong and I simply don't understand. So, Explain it. How can an entity be eternal at all?

You've yet to give an answer at all and all you have done is danced around the questions asked of you.

And, this is what a number of religious people do even though your way is more sophisticated. Religious people seem to worm their way out of something that they can't answer. You are the best I've seen at worming your way out of things.

So, if I'm wrong on anything and if I don't understand something which I've admitted and said then all you have to do is explain how is it possible for an entity to be eternal? How is it possible for something to have no beginning? What is the underlying mechanics and logic to this?



AngelRho
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23 Aug 2021, 11:09 am

cubedemon6073 wrote:
AngelRho wrote:
cubedemon6073 wrote:
The problem with the concept of self-evident is that what is considered self-evident to you may not to me.

I assume self-evident means not needing to be demonstrated or explained; obvious.

But, what if something is not obvious to me or other groups of people?

Let's look at this.

https://www.popularmechanics.com/scienc ... e-week-14/

If I was taught to and used to read maps on a piece of paper then I'm going to read it differently then I would on a 3d globe? On paper, the surface is straight so I will interpret going South, West and then North as an incomplete rectangle instead of a curved triangle on a 3d globe. Now, if I don't have an engineering, geology or cosmological background would it be reasonable to answer this question and be able to use critical thinking for it? Would it be obvious to the average person that what is stated out in popular mechanics magazine is the correct answer? So, the question musk asks be a reasonable way to assess critical thinking skills especially if one must have content knowledge to apply the critical thinking skills on?

Let's apply this to the whole concept of an entity being eternal. It is not self-evident to me because I may be lacking a certain amount of content knowledge. To me without content knowledge the idea that something could be eternal meaning it has no origin and beginning comes across as nonsense to me just like Elon Musk's question.

Again, how is it logically possible for something to exist without a beginning? I don't have the content knowledge that you may have or even what to type into google. I'm missing steps. And, don't just say I don't know what logically possible means. If logically possible means a proposition or idea which can't be disproved and if the idea of self-evident or obvious is part of our proofs then to me it is obvious and self-evident that something eternal cannot exist and all entities must come somewhere and have an origin. Even God is an entity and must have an origin. If it possible to disprove the notion that all entities must have an origin and beginning then I don't understand why or what the steps are to disprove the notion that all entities must have an origin and beginning.

Let me put it to you this way on what you are dealing with when speaking to me.

For a long time I didn't know what others meant by positive and negative attitude. I didn't know why people were using mathematical operators for one's emotions. Without context, I applied Boolean reasoning for a long time. E.g. A positive attitude is a negative attitude of a negative attitude or pessimist against pessimism. If you negate the negation of A then you have A.

Or, you're entitled to nothing... Again, without the proper context and content meaning it comes across as nonsense. E.G. If one is entitled to nothing then without the proper context and understanding of the phrase one could interpret it as one is not entitled to refuse to commit murder.

This is what you're dealing with my friend.

Your argument in a nutshell: I am unable to understand a thing, therefore it is untrue.


Image

That is not what I said or implied at all.

I'm accepting the possibility that I could be wrong and I simply don't understand. So, Explain it. How can an entity be eternal at all?

You've yet to give an answer at all and all you have done is danced around the questions asked of you.

My answer is the only one. Failure to understand something doesn't magically make it untrue. You're looking at an infinite being from the only perspective any of us have--a finite perspective. So the only way around this is the human imagination. Is it logically possible to conceive of an infinite being or an infinite anything? Of course it is. Mathematical number lines are described as infinite. So we do have an idea of what an infinite being MIGHT be like, even if it's not possible in the TRUEST sense to understand what such a being is ACTUALLY like. Going back to mathematical number lines being infinite, ACTUAL infinities do not exist in the physical universe in any knowable sense, so, again, that's going to make any accurate or even adequate description of a non-physical, transcendental being difficult if not impossible to describe. I mean...actually TRY to define "infinity." I mean, look it up on Wikipedia, you get this:

Quote:
Infinity is that which is boundless or endless, or something that is larger than any real or natural number.


When you keep reading, yeah, you get more math and philosophy, but there is no "hey, look, I have a handful of INFINITYYYYYY!! !!" where it can be completely understood in any terms we think of as being real in any physical or quantifiable sense. But...then again, that's kinda what infinity IS. If you can imagine something like that, you get as close as anyone can to understanding it.

Which brings me back to my original point--just because you don't understand it doesn't mean it doesn't exist or, perhaps, more accurately, lacks meaning. That anything can be infinite is a LOGICAL possibility, and the reality that anything or anyone is infinite requires an existence transcendental to our known universe as we know it. I.e., the Deist view of God is incorrect because it requires a god be limited to existing outside of and apart, separately, from our world or universe, whereas God is understood to be both within and outside our universe as per the definition of what infinite beings are. What is NOT required is whether one can actually understand infinity--we already accept that the finite human mind cannot comprehend infinity itself. Comprehension of infinite number lines, for example, doesn't prevent math students from using them or math teachers from teaching them.

cubedemon6073 wrote:
And, this is what a number of religious people do even though your way is more sophisticated. Religious people seem to worm their way out of something that they can't answer. You are the best I've seen at worming your way out of things.

No, I think you might be more/less conditioned to see it that way. I've heard that accusation a number of times. It's typically more about not wanting to accept any answer once you get an answer, and the older I get and the more I answer the same tired questions, the more I'm convinced this is the case. It's like the reverse of seeing the fnords. Part of my problem is I have long spells when I'm able to be more thorough in crafting a response, but lately all my time belongs to everyone else.

cubedemon6073 wrote:
So, if I'm wrong on anything and if I don't understand something which I've admitted and said then all you have to do is explain how is it possible for an entity to be eternal? How is it possible for something to have no beginning? What is the underlying mechanics and logic to this?

Yeah...I mean, that's just it. You're talking about something that by its nature cannot be described in the terms you're demanding. Real infinities do not exist in the natural world. Which...by the way, that's an EXCELLENT objection to having required math classes in high school, don't you think? Numbers and placeholders for them are entirely abstract but form a useful language for quantifying things when you need them quantified. If I go to a soda vending machine and pay for one bottle of soda, I don't expect the machine to give me all the sodas it has. I expect to only get the one I payed for. While having all the sodas would be cool in a way, it doesn't do the soda manufacturer any favors if it is wrong to quantify units of soda relative to what soda companies expect to pay for, the justification for which is that "numbers do not exist." If that's what we're using to justify things, then driving 55 mph on the highway is something I can just ignore because "55" doesn't actually exist. I somehow suspect that the judge isn't going to buy that defense if I'm caught exceeding the limit.

You could say, "oh, but you are counting distance over time, so it's not abstract. You're talking about things that ARE real." Am I really? Then what is "time"? What is "distance"? Aren't those simply language constructs? How do we define "time," "distance"? You can deconstruct those words or concepts such that they themselves are mere products of language and are language-dependent for their own real-world existence. They themselves do not exist in the real world. And if that is so, then when I'm sitting in jail for not paying a fine, I can just comfort myself by repeating "jail is a language construct. I'm not actually here" and all will be well.

So you have to pick and choose, like it or not. If anything at all is real, it is a logical necessity that infinities DO exist even though they only exist transcendentally and not dependent on our ability to comprehend what infinities are. To ask mechanistically (if that's the correct term) how God can be infinite or have no beginning is the same as asking the same of a line or plane. The axes of planes run perpendicular to each other and have no beginning or end. Rays are only infinite in one direction, so basically they are half-lines. They have a point of origin. Our universe appears at the moment to resemble a time-space ray because of entropy--i.e. the universe MUST have had a beginning--and there is no perceivable point (at least not right now) that the universe will ever cease to exist. However, also due to entropy, all the stars will eventually burn out. There cannot be a truly endless, infinite cycle. So the universe does have a theoretical shelf life. Outside of this universe, time really is meaningless. Space is also meaningless. Anything or anyone that exists beyond our perceived universe will occupy both dimensions we know and dimensions beyond ours. The film "Interstellar" depicts time-space as a tesseract, for example, and the main character has to figure out how to interact with 4D space as a 3D being. It's an oversimplification, I'm sure, but might be a clue as to how a being possessing infinite dimensionality can operate outside of what we see as normal 3D time-space. If God occupies, say, a 5th dimension, then God is active simultaneously across all points of time and space. From God's perspective, the past is still being written same as the future, with both "ends" informing the other. Jesus is both being born and dying on the cross and resurrecting. Adam and Eve are still living in the Garden of Eden AND they are eating the forbidden fruit. Even I'm still being born right now while at the same time I'm dying while all my grandchildren are being born. And so on and so forth. And...not only is the past/future being written/re-written, but at the same time God's already got it mapped out so even if "mistakes" are being simultaneously made AND corrected, it was all already part of the plan from the start--meaning that ultimately there are no mistakes. There never WERE, and never WILL BE.

Yeah, I get how paradoxical it all is, and I don't really have time to go any further than this. I'm well aware that it appears contradictory, nonsensical, and maybe even gibberish. IDK, maybe you can understand what I'm talking about by writing it out in mathematical terms. It's not meant for us to UNDERSTAND. It's meant for us to accept. Or not. The human mind isn't going to understand it and it's all going to seem like foolishness. Isaiah got it:

Quote:
9 He said, “Go and tell this people:

“‘Be ever hearing, but never understanding;
be ever seeing, but never perceiving.’
10 Make the heart of this people calloused;
make their ears dull
and close their eyes.
Otherwise they might see with their eyes,
hear with their ears,
understand with their hearts,
and turn and be healed.”


People, and I don't mean you specifically, but unbelieving people in general who aren't really looking for answers, reveal themselves to be willfully deaf, blind, and callous. Basically, if you think you can talk sense into someone by describing something for which there are no terms for description, you've already lost the argument. As a believer, though, describing the indescribable isn't part of your job. It's more about revealing what has already been known to be revealed together with what you've experienced yourself. Honestly, not even the number-line analogy is going to be adequate to fully understand the concept of an infinite God with neither beginning nor end because, again, it's referencing something from a finite, human experience to describe something eternal. You can choose to dismiss the idea. But, again, dismissal of the concept of an infinite God does not negate God's eternal nature.



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23 Aug 2021, 11:56 am

Regarding infinite beings and origins and relating that mathematically or geometrically, Point 0 (zero) is a point of origin on a line or plane and by nature represents a point of intersection by other points and lines. Plus, it's all relative. Imagine a number line 0,1,3. If you move the point of origin to 1, then your original point will shift down so that it reads -1,0,2. Any point of origin will be arbitrary considering all points in front of or behind can be infinitely positive or negative. The line itself, however, does not have a point of origin--the point of origin is only descriptive in terms relative to other things. Time prior to the big bang, for example, does not have any meaning. There is no "before." Likewise, after the universe collapses, there is no "after" that has any meaning. Time and space are relative. So "before" or "after," what exactly is there to judge time and space relative to? Nothing. At all. There is only "beginning" and "end" in the sense that time and space relate to the human experience. If all of time and space occupy a segment denoted as all points between "beginning" and "end," then God might be described, however primitively, as not simply the line along which the "beginning" and "end" segment is drawn, but that God is the infinite plane on which that line and all lines exist. Now, expand that to infinite dimensions, and you only just begin to start understanding what it's about.



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24 Aug 2021, 12:32 pm

As I was thinking about my posts yesterday, I remembered one other thing I neglected to mention. I've never been much for math or geometry, so I went back and reviewed some basics, the little bit I COULD do in high school, and I came across some relevant and interesting concepts that I think will help further clarify some things I said.

First, I hope that I made it clear that my line/plane analogies will never be adequate to fully explain concepts such as an eternal being. In describing what things or persons are like, at best all we can do is attempt to convey some mental image; the rest is up to the human imagination, and it still won't be enough. I don't routinely evade questions if I think they are good questions, but too often the questions are trick questions intent on creating an unreasonable trap. They are questions that cannot be answered because they aren't meant to be answerable. Sometimes this is deliberate, sometimes it's unintentional when a person honestly believes the questions are reasonable. Sometimes I have a difficult time understanding the difference, and I won't answer the question if it seems unreasonable. What makes it reasonable? When it is based on faulty premises, such as the question, "How many times did you beat your wife this week?" There's no way to answer that question DIRECTLY without implying something else that might be false. If you truthfully answer "None," that leaves the question open to other weeks. It implies guilt because the premise behind the question is that the respondent is guilty. The only way you can respond to questions with false premises is to refuse to answer at all. People can still make assumptions about what silence means, but any time that's the case they are going to conclude what it is their prerogative to conclude, not what is REASONABLE to conclude. So the answer to the question of how to define or describe God with regard to his eternal attribute is that with regard to God such a being cannot be defined nor described.

Second, to continue that, it is not out-of-place or unreasonable to understand things as being undefined. One definition of a line by Oxford is "a straight or curved continuous extent of length without breadth." The problem, hopefully obvious problem, is that this definition defines the line in linear terms--in other words, in its own terms, which involves circular reasoning. In other words, it is not a definition. It is, rather, a description of what a line is like, not what a line is. So for the concept of "line" to be useful, it has to be understood as axiomatic or primitive. There's no need to define it.

Relating to God, it's the same thing--sort of, yet not. Lines are described in geometric terms as continuous or infinite. God is described as infinite. Can all of what God is be summed up in a word, "infinite" or "eternal"? No, not any easier than you can sum up everything about a line by saying it has infinite length. At the end of the day, the best you can really do about defining a line is saying, "A line is, well...it's a LINE!" And the best you can do about defining any indefinable or primitive is just saying what it is: A is A, God is God. Something that is described as infinite or eternal has no beginning or end. Well, what does that even mean? How can an eternal being have no beginning or end? Well...that's just what an eternal being IS. What your left with are descriptions of God's divine attributes that at best can only give someone else clues of what God is like rather than what he is. Unlike primitive concepts such as lines, there's not a way anyone can convey any mental image of what God is like since God is so much more than geometry.

Finally, it's also important to understand the philosophical and theological dangers of trying to define God. Things like lines exist as concepts, so it's easy to describe in some terms what lines are and what they are not. In the case of God as an eternal being, God defines himself. To restrict an infinite being to a finite definition, you inherently restrict God's power and presence. That isn't something you can reasonably do. Questions like "Can God create a stone so heavy not even God can lift it?" are silly questions because they attempt to limit something that is limitless and thus contradict God's nature and character. Either way the question is answered, affirmative or negative, God has limits. You're supposed to come to the conclusion that an omnipotent God is absurd. I have two answers: On the one hand, it is unreasonable to expect any being or thing to behave contrary to its nature and character. Why would God do something contradictory? It doesn't make sense. So the question itself is absurd. On the other hand, God is so powerful he could create a stone so heavy he can't lift it...and STILL lift it. So if you ask an absurd question, you get an absurd answer. There is also the hidden assumption that God's ability to do all things requires God actually do all things, and that's a non-sequitur. I'm confident in the more absurd-sounding answer, though. Why? You can ask a similar question: Can an eternal, immortal God die? If God dies, he's not immortal. And, of course, with God the Father and the Son being one and the same, not only can immortal God die, but he can become mortal, die, and resurrect himself. I think to the unbelieving community, there are these apparent absurdities that stand out as self-defeating but end up being true. It is impossible to define or describe God in finite terms since any human terms will have a limiting effect.

=======

Setting that aside for now...

I still don't think you understand logical possibility. It's not that complicated. Logical possibility is simply anything that can be conceived or imagined. A purple duck residing at the South Pole that feeds on baby sharks is conceivable, therefore it, by definition, is logically possible. Now, in this world as we understand it, no actual purple ducks (as far as we know) live at the South Pole, and ducks don't eat baby sharks. Is it possible to imagine or conceive a possible world in which the entire South Pole is populated by shark-eating, purple ducks? Yes. And that's how we can say apparently absurd or nonsensical things can be said to be logically possible. Is it logically possible for God to be eternal, without beginning or end? Yes. This doesn't answer the question of whether God or purple ducks ACTUALLY exist, though. Whether logically possible things actually exist in our world is an entirely different question.

As far as God's existence goes and God's nature, start with the basics, or "prims" as I mentioned previously. God is eternal with no beginning or end, and God is omnipresent. Such a God is conceivable. Such a God is logically possible. If we are talking about God being eternal and omnipresent in any possible world, then by God's infinite (eternal and omnipresent) nature, God must also exist in all possible worlds. If God then exists in all possible worlds, it is inconceivable that God doesn't exist in any world, whether any possible worlds or the actual world. Therefore, it is not logically possible for God to not exist somewhere. That means it is not only possible that God exists in the actual world, but God is logically necessary.

That argument falls apart any time God's eternal nature is called into question. If God is not eternal, i.e. God began to exist, then a conceivable world in which God doesn't exist at all does, in fact, exist. But ONLY if God isn't eternal. Why? Because if God ever began to exist, then a world existed prior to God's existence. If God created the heavens and the earth, you might say that God still had to exist first and so it's not illogical that God began to exist. But that still leaves a possible world or universe of nothingness that preexisted God, and now you have all sorts of assumptions you have to deal with. You could say God and the universe came into being simultaneously, but that contradicts God's revelation that God created the heavens and the earth (the universe) himself. The best conclusion will always be that God preexisted the known, actual universe, God exists outside the same universe he created, and that God is eternal.

If God isn't eternal, then that means God began to exist. If God began to exist, then God was caused. That would require a caused cause and it's turtles all the way down. Idk about you, but I have no interest whatsoever in having to deal with the problems of infinite regress.

To avoid infinite regress, it's much easier to posit God as One, Singular, eternal, creative being without limiting personality or power. And so on and so forth back through the above argument that God is a logical necessity. It's not humanly possible to define God (God defines himself) nor fully describe God.

It's not that I'd rather not answer the question; it's more that those aren't questions that can be answered by anyone. If you've been confounded by believers that seem to run away, dodge, or evade those kinds of questions, to be honest, it's because Christians largely don't expend much time or mental effort pondering those things. I can't say I blame them, either. Why should we? I only do it because I happen to enjoy it, and I suppose that makes me a rare believer. What's important is salvation, and that's where most of us put our focus. If you try to approach things like "Eternal God" from the perspective of limited human intellect, you'll never reach any fully rational conclusions. I'm not saying faith in God is irrational. I think it is rational. What I mean is trying to pin down exactly what God is will never be a reasonable exercise since God by nature is too far beyond the human mind to comprehend. If you start with "prims" like "God" and "eternity," then you can make logical conclusions about God and everything else from there. Then ontological argument, for example. But what you have to recognize is that nowhere in my most recent posts do I take the position that God doesn't exist. Everything about the universe points to God's existence. So any conclusions you make about God's nature starts with the universe itself (where God firsto reveals himself to us) and works its way backwards. That's how you get things like God's logical necessity, because once you draw the conclusion that God is eternal rather than created, then logically necessary follows. If God is anyone or anything other than who he is, no argument regarding his existence and importance will ever hold up.



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28 Aug 2021, 9:31 pm

AngelRho, I will respond to most of what you said later but in the mean time.

Quote:
I still don't think you understand logical possibility. It's not that complicated. Logical possibility is simply anything that can be conceived or imagined. A purple duck residing at the South Pole that feeds on baby sharks is conceivable, therefore it, by definition, is logically possible. Now, in this world as we understand it, no actual purple ducks (as far as we know) live at the South Pole, and ducks don't eat baby sharks. Is it possible to imagine or conceive a possible world in which the entire South Pole is populated by shark-eating, purple ducks? Yes. And that's how we can say apparently absurd or nonsensical things can be said to be logically possible.



Well, what if a person(s) says something is conceivable and can be imagined and another says no. Who is right?

And, how is it conceivable for a purple duck to reside at the south pole and feed on baby sharks? And, is this duck really a duck or something else altogether? What makes a duck a duck? What are its properties and would this entity fit these properties?

And, what do we mean that something can be conceivable or imagined? And, is what is conceivable or imagined subjective to the person or is it objective?



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29 Aug 2021, 7:29 am

cubedemon6073 wrote:
AngelRho, I will respond to most of what you said later but in the mean time.

Quote:
I still don't think you understand logical possibility. It's not that complicated. Logical possibility is simply anything that can be conceived or imagined. A purple duck residing at the South Pole that feeds on baby sharks is conceivable, therefore it, by definition, is logically possible. Now, in this world as we understand it, no actual purple ducks (as far as we know) live at the South Pole, and ducks don't eat baby sharks. Is it possible to imagine or conceive a possible world in which the entire South Pole is populated by shark-eating, purple ducks? Yes. And that's how we can say apparently absurd or nonsensical things can be said to be logically possible.



Well, what if a person(s) says something is conceivable and can be imagined and another says no. Who is right?

And, how is it conceivable for a purple duck to reside at the south pole and feed on baby sharks? And, is this duck really a duck or something else altogether? What makes a duck a duck? What are its properties and would this entity fit these properties?

And, what do we mean that something can be conceivable or imagined? And, is what is conceivable or imagined subjective to the person or is it objective?

The questions about what makes a duck a duck are not relevant. It’s simply one example of a numerous many concepts anyone could come up with. How a duck happens to be purple and eat baby sharks isn’t relevant, only that one can possibly be imagined.

Some advice for you: Stay focused. Don’t get hung up on examples. I mentioned purple ducks. Russel’s teapot is another example. It’s not necessary to define terms to death. If we can say we know for sure that purple ducks don’t exist in the sense I presented them, is there a possible world in which they do exist? And that’s where something that is logically possible “lives.” I wouldn’t use the word “properties.” “Features” is a better word, because the concept of the duck I mentioned only requires that it be a duck, that it be purple, that it lives at the South Pole, and that it eats baby sharks. It is an example of a concept. If you take any concept and try to define it to death, you’re missing the point. Everything you try to define breaks down into absurdity when you depend on an ultimate definition for conceiving things since everything breaks down into primitives. Prims are, ironically, undefinable by definition. You can only try to describe them in language you hope the other person understands. So let’s set aside the overthinking and keep things as simple as reasonably possible.

The question that matters right now: What is conceivable versus inconceivable? I’ve mostly answered the first part of the question. Something that can be imagined is pretty much anything. The duck presumably has its own history or backstory. Such a possible world may have evolution and more favorable conditions for life at its South Pole such that purple ducks survived natural selection and baby sharks are abundant there. Perhaps this world has baby sharks spawning in fresh water like salmon. It’s whatever it takes in this world to make something like that possible. Could Russel’s teapot exist? Yes, and the argument Russel was making by invoking the teapot dealt with things that were logically possible but unproven in the actual world, the relevance being that Russel was dealing with the subject of dogmatic assertions and having to disprove things that cannot be proven in the first place. The teapot exists conceptually, but we do not know its existence in this world or universe. Russel never said regarding the teapot that God doesn’t exist, nor did Russel make the assertion that God doesn’t exist or couldn’t possibly exist. His point dealt with what could or could not be proven to exist.

Most things ARE conceivable, like Flying Spaghetti Monsters and unicorns. It’s determining that something is inconceivable that’s tricky. Things that are by definition contradictory are not conceivable, such as square circles (NOT referring to Euclidean geometry—a possible world could exist in which there is a geometry that allows someone to square the circle). Also, nothing can be said to both exist and not exist simultaneously in the same sense. A circle that is not a circle isn’t possible in ANY possible world. Squares have a definition that has to hold up no matter which possible world they exist in, else it isn’t a square. Squares that have one unequal side or angle cannot exist in any possible world no matter how hard you try to imagine it. That is an example of something that is logically impossible. An infinite God cannot both exist and not exist, so it’s not logically possible to conceive of a possible world without God in it.

If it’s not logically possible for infinite God to not exist, God must exist in at least one possible world. With God being infinite, he must exist in all possible worlds if he exists in one. If he exists in all possible worlds, he must exist in the actual world. It’s not an issue of whether you can prove it or not with evidence—empirical “proof” is a bit of a gotcha because the role of science is never to prove anything in absolute terms (If something is proven and cannot be investigated further or debated, it’s not science. God either exists or he doesn’t, and that is an absolute). Thus God is a logical necessity regardless of whether or not there’s evidence.



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30 Aug 2021, 8:18 am



One 'Thing' For Sure...
God Doesn't Have to
Be A 'He' Restricted to A PeNis...

God's 'Something' Like

Love That Connects

Folks And The

Process That

(The Force) Makes All Work

And Obviously As LonG As
Existence is Reality This Force Is Now

However Weak Ya Wanna Make it With

Just A PeNis or Out of A Book And Human Words Altogether...

(In Other Words Much Bigger than little he)

Love IS A Rather Creative

Definition... Particularly

If one Relates Love

As The Force of All Creation....
Meh... Humans With Tiny Little

Brains Tend to Reduce Stuff As
Small as A Fixation On A He With A PeNiS...

Particularly if they are Closed Minded (Tribal As Such) And (Gender
Centric) Can't Get Over the Fact that 'A Statue of David Has No Clothes'...

Guess What...

God Doesn't

Have to Wear

Clothes Forever...

Particularly the Human Species
Yet Here We aRe For Now WeaRinG God...

Not Everyone Takes Personal Responsibility for Wearing

God... Often Nature is Lost Without Gratitude Now For Being
Just Naked This Way Complete Whole Enough LoVinG (GoD) ALL ToGeTHeR Now
PS: i Don't Pre-Plan These Ornate Structures They Flow Like 'The River' (God) Now



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30 Aug 2021, 9:32 am

aghogday wrote:
One 'Thing' For Sure...
God Doesn't Have to
Be A 'He' Restricted to A PeNis...

Why are you suddenly so preoccupied by penises? Why should a pronoun be restricted to whether someone possesses a certain set of genitalia? There is more to sex than body parts. It’s an identity.



aghogday
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30 Aug 2021, 10:27 am

^^^



HAha!

Why Are You (AND MANY OTHERS)
SO Pre-Occupied
With Calling God

'HE'...

Now Do You Get it?
It's TOTALLY; YES, TOTALLy ALL
RIDICULOUS TO CALL GOD 'HE' ALoNE...

NO Less

RIDICULOUS

NoW THAN

RESTRICTING

GOD TO ONE PENiS OR ONE SO-CALLED "JeSuS";

Or One Pen Writing One Frigging Little
Bitty 800,000 or so Word Book, Even
IF only one Pen Wrote it and Not

Innumerable Ghost Authors
And Scribes Making Copy
Mistakes and Intentional

Changes By Their
So-Called 'Road

On Damascus'

'Holy Spirit' too...

"PeN IS"

In Other Words
Dude it's Just A Metaphor...

oF iGNoRaNCE That Still 'Rains'
Dry in Deserts Dead from the past....

Only Left With Tribal Traditions oF iGNoRanCE
That Support the Ilk of Practices Like Sending
Children to School Or Church Unvaccinated Unmasked

In A Deadly

Pandemic...

i LiVE iN
The EPiC
Center oF iGNoRaNCE...

The Panhandle of Florida...

It's Really a Great DarK
Muse for my Hobby... Hehe,

And Sure, 'Other Places' too...

Center EYe CAlm, Inhaling Peace
Exhaling Love Now And These 'All'

Are Just Winds of A 'Cat 6 Human Hurricane' or So, HAha..;)



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