211105 What I learned in my studies this morning

Roads. Cars. Jams. Stop. Go.

Rushing 'round. Slow it down. Down.

The stream winds down, pools.

Daily Stoic:

Believing in a higher power or divine spirit usually means God (or goddess or god or gods or what have you).  It is a locus of otherworldly energy and potency.

For those who believe, this is easy.  Teachers (ministers, rabbis, priests, imams, lay theologians) can help if someone doesn't understand how to align their life with "the will of the director of the universe" as defined by their doctrine.

For those who do not believe, and are bothered by Stoics' continual reference to higher powers, thought patterns need to shift just a bit and it works itself out.

If the "director of the universe" is depersonalized and broadened to admit Nature (or physical laws or human consciousness or other acceptable abstraction), then this step becomes less bothersome.  Now, the something bigger and more powerful than the student, though impersonal and uninterested in the individual, is present as something they can observe, judge, and act upon.

Just because the "will of the universe" would be impersonal and unconcerned (concern entails consciousness), the nonbelieving Stoic can still evaluate their actions according to what they understand of the world and how things work, even without reference to a Supreme Being.

Today's Meditation:

Today's Meditation II:

Today's Pirsig:

In the story, John (the first speaker) naturally thinks this way about this topic.  He isn't trying to cause trouble or win an argument, it's how his consciousness is wired.  He is so clueless about how to even start grokking the topic that any minor correction in his viewpoint simply requires the extensive background to prepare his mind for grasping the point at hand.

Other people, however, use this approach as a rhetorical tactic when arguing, especially online.

If someone challenges their position, and undermines their reasons, they say "Well, you are missing The Big Picture™."   Just because this detail or that assumption in their defense is demonstrably wrong, it doesn't matter because those problems are unimportant once you grasp The Big Picture.

They continue expanding the sphere that must be considered until their interlocutor abandons the effort because, as Pirsig says via the narrator, they've challenged the mission to "debate a major philosophical enquiry" rather than "evaluate and judge the proposals, assumptions, support, and likely consequences" of their position.

This is why people like Richard Dawkins do not describe themselves as full-fledged atheists.  Instead, Dawkins says that he is an almost atheist.  He's 99.99999999999% agnostic because he admits that there is always the chance that something could come to light which would tip the balance toward the other side.

The problem is that not all questions about our universe can be answered without understanding the situation outside the universe.  Since we are proposing answers to a question about the system from within the system, this 0.00000000001% chance will always remain . . . unless and until we are able to discover that outside vantage point.

The faithful believe they know how to access that information.  Atheists / agnostics believe that we would need to escape the universe to discover it.