Ship of Fools: Universal Mind?

Thread: Universal Mind? Board: Oblivion / Ship of Fools.

To visit this thread, use this URL:
http://forum.ship-of-fools.com/cgi-bin/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=get_topic;f=70;t=028906

Posted by Tyler Durden (# 2996) on :

Someone suggested to me the other day that what I call God is real, that there actually is an intelligence or consciousness that 'speaks to' people, guides them etc but that rather than being the Creator of the universe, this 'universal mind' is simply something that has evolved along with us.

That feels wrong to me but I'm unclear on what basis I can argue that the God I experience is the Creator and not just a product of evolution.

Does that make sense and does anyone have any thoughts?

Posted by LeRoc (# 3216) on :

quote:
Tyler Durden: That feels wrong to me but I'm unclear on what basis I can argue that the God I experience is the Creator and not just a product of evolution.

Well, the obvious basis you have for that is your faith. I'm not sure that you need anything beyond that.

Posted by Raptor Eye (# 16649) on :

I like to keep an open mind to possibilities, and recall someone with a nde saying that they seemed to be in a place where all of the knowledge of the world was 'on tap'. But that knowledge wouldn't guide us, even though it might inform us if we could tap into it.

There is certainly a spiritual connection between people, I have too many times called someone at the precise moment that they were calling me, or had someone come to mind who was in trouble at that moment.

It is possible that all of this is true, that we have connections with each other and with God, and that all of the collective learning of people since the beginning is stored in an i-cloud not of our making.

Posted by Golden Key (# 1468) on :

I lean towards the idea that everything's connected, everything affects everything else, and everything is (somehow) alive. I think it coordinates well with panentheism, which is the idea that everything is part of God--but God also transcends it.*

If you want to do a little reading, look up "Over-soul", "Akashic records", "panentheism", and "Indra's Net". Those approach the ideas of the OP from various perspectives.

The Wikipedia page on Indra's Net (link above) has some great quotes:

quote:
"Imagine a multidimensional spider's web in the early morning covered with dew drops. And every dew drop contains the reflection of all the other dew drops. And, in each reflected dew drop, the reflections of all the other dew drops in that reflection. And so ad infinitum. That is the Buddhist conception of the universe in an image." –Alan Watts

You might also check out scientist Rupert Sheldrake's work about connections. (Go to the navigation pane at the bottom of the page.) Also "The Tao Te Ching". (I strongly recommend the translation by Jane English and Gia-Fu Feng, with gorgeous black and white photos. The one I know is from 1972, but there seems to be a 2011 edition, too.)

*Frankly, at this point in my life, I'm just happy if God is good and loves us and tries to help us--even if She's a blue rubber frog bath toy! I.e., the fine theological details are less important to me.

Posted by Martin60 (# 368) on :

Pantheistic un-parsimonious nonsense.

Posted by Golden Key (# 1468) on :

Martin--

What, and in what way?

Posted by Martin60 (# 368) on :

The OP. That stuff is sapient apart from the bits in our heads.

Posted by quetzalcoatl (# 16740) on :

I have come across ideas like this, but more in Eastern religions. It is also usually linked to non-dualism, i.e. the death of ego, leading to the experience of One.

But then, it is impossible to judge these things from the point of view of ego, which is by definition, a separate viewpoint.

There is a whole range of imagery used to describe it, such as part/whole, or the hologram (which contains the whole), or I suppose, Blake's grain of sand.

Obviously, some Christians have expressed an interest in such ideas, maybe Thomas Merton? Also, de Caussade, Simone Weil, Meister Eckhart, and Angelus Silesius, ('God is not This nor That-do Thou leave Somethings utterly aside').

Posted by Martin60 (# 368) on :

Yeah, we can all get a bit spacey.

Posted by itsarumdo (# 18174) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Tyler Durden:
Someone suggested to me the other day that what I call God is real, that there actually is an intelligence or consciousness that 'speaks to' people, guides them etc but that rather than being the Creator of the universe, this 'universal mind' is simply something that has evolved along with us.

That feels wrong to me but I'm unclear on what basis I can argue that the God I experience is the Creator and not just a product of evolution.

Does that make sense and does anyone have any thoughts?

I think it's important to decide what you believe for yourself. And if something doesn't feel right, to my way of thinking, that's a pretty good indicator that it probably isn't right. If people want to argue, my personal experience is that the logical arguments are no substitute for experienced personal truth. And my opinion is that - if someone thinks that they can encompass God and prove Him or dismiss Him with a tiddlly bit of Aristotlean logic, they're probably not a reliable source of information.

Posted by ChastMastr (# 716) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Tyler Durden:
That feels wrong to me but I'm unclear on what basis I can argue that the God I experience is the Creator and not just a product of evolution.

I suggest 2000 years of Christian apologetics, and I especially recommend C.S. Lewis' work. Though of course our perception of God is not always the same as God's reality.

Posted by SusanDoris (# 12618) on :

quote:
Originally posted by ChastMastr:
I suggest 2000 years of Christian apologetics, and I especially recommend C.S. Lewis' work. Though of course our perception of God is not always the same as God's reality.

How do you know, or define, or work out, god's 'reality'?

Posted by Honest Ron Bacardi (# 38) on :

What do you mean by "reality", SusanDoris? (That's a huge question in philosophy.)

Posted by HughWillRidmee (# 15614) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Honest Ron Bacardi:
What do you mean by "reality", SusanDoris? (That's a huge question in philosophy.)

What do you mean by "huge", Honest Ron Bacardi?

I think you may have misunderstand why SusanDoris used the word reality. Some of us always find it interesting to hear what people imagine to be "God's reality".

Posted by ChastMastr (# 716) on :

quote:
Originally posted by SusanDoris:

quote:
Originally posted by ChastMastr:
I suggest 2000 years of Christian apologetics, and I especially recommend C.S. Lewis' work. Though of course our perception of God is not always the same as God's reality.
How do you know, or define, or work out, god's 'reality'?

I totally forgot about this thread. [Hot and Hormonal]

That said, I'm not sure what you're asking, as it seems to me to be, well, almost a restatement of what I said. [Confused]

Posted by Honest Ron Bacardi (# 38) on :

quote:
Originally posted by HughWillRidmee:

quote:
Originally posted by Honest Ron Bacardi:
What do you mean by "reality", SusanDoris? (That's a huge question in philosophy.)
What do you mean by "huge", Honest Ron Bacardi?

I think you may have misunderstand why SusanDoris used the word reality. Some of us always find it interesting to hear what people imagine to be "God's reality".

What do I mean by huge? Substantial, significantly large - something like that I guess.

A misunderstanding over meaning in any exchange is always possible. The average theist will usually locate God as the source of meaning, existence and thereby reality. My understanding is that SusanDoris is not a theist, so I asked the question out of interest, to see how she would make such a determination.

At an everyday level, nobody needs to trouble themselves unduly about reality. That's a rather mundane starting point, but I'm taking it that here we are discussing reality in the domain of the non-material. Unless you are a thorough-going logical positivist, then that's a POV worth enquiring after. Really more for an exchange of views than for a debate - that would probably be better on another thread.

Posted by HughWillRidmee (# 15614) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Honest Ron Bacardi:

......... At an everyday level, nobody needs to trouble themselves unduly about reality. That's a rather mundane starting point, but I'm taking it that here we are discussing reality in the domain of the non-material. Unless you are a thorough-going logical positivist, then that's a POV worth enquiring after. Really more for an exchange of views than for a debate - that would probably be better on another thread.

Not being knowledgeable about the terminology I looked up logical positivist - not sure I'm quite there.

Should such a thread exist I think I'd have to start by asking what you meant by the domain of the non-material. I suspect, perhaps wrongly, that I might then ask if you could demonstrate that what you meant exists, if it impacts upon the non non-material[material?] domain and if so how that impact can be detected/measured.

Posted by itsarumdo (# 18174) on :

Logical positivism - that Thought/Mind (with a capital T/M) is primary and the material world is secondary has been formulated into Quantum Mechanics by Amit Goswami. It carries a lot of implications - one of which being that that we are co-creators and what WE think/allow ourselves to put our minds on determines the nature of the world. Well - how we think about/interpret things certainly determines how they affect us as individuals, even if you're not a logical positivist. e.g. the matter of death - if we spirits on a physical journey, then death isn't so bad - in fact, it is a going home, that should be celebrated.

Posted by mousethief (# 953) on :

quote:
Originally posted by itsarumdo:
Logical positivism - that Thought/Mind (with a capital T/M) is primary and the material world is secondary has been formulated into Quantum Mechanics by Amit Goswami.

That's not like any definition of logical positivism I've ever heard.

Posted by Truman White (# 17290) on :

Yo Tyler Durden. If your Universal Mind evolved with us, it ain't the creator of the universe. Strikes me as a bit of a conceit to tie the evolution of this Mind with our own evolution. If there is such a person it could pre-exist humanity by the odd billion of years, or have come into existence sometime after Homo sapiens. And what did it evolve from? If its immaterial, what makes us think it evolved from matter?

On the face of it, this idea seems to generate more problems than it solves.

Posted by itsarumdo (# 18174) on :

quote:
Originally posted by mousethief:

quote:
Originally posted by itsarumdo:
Logical positivism - that Thought/Mind (with a capital T/M) is primary and the material world is secondary has been formulated into Quantum Mechanics by Amit Goswami.
That's not like any definition of logical positivism I've ever heard.

just shows how long it is since I read this stuff - Sorry - Gowami talks about Monistic Idealism

quote:
Monistic idealism holds that consciousness, not matter, is the ground of all being. It is monist because it holds that there is only one type of thing in the universe and idealist because it holds that one thing to be consciousness.

UBB.classic^TM 6.5.0