[lbo-talk] Question re: Religion vs "spirituality"

Wojtek Sokolowski wsokol52 at yahoo.com
Fri Dec 2 17:53:48 PST 2005


--- Julio Huato <juliohuato at gmail.com> wrote:
> driving force. That's why idealism and pantheism do
> not appeal to me
> intellectually.

I think you err by assuminng that my position on pantheism was an ontological one - i.e. a position on the existence of some non-descript entity called god. The questions itself is even more absurd that that pertaining the 30 pound snail in Carrol's posting. At least you know what to look for when searching for a 30 pound snail, whereas with god - this is really a humpty dumpty word that means anything that the speakers want it to mean, that is, nothing in particular.

On the other hand, if you take an epistemological position on the issue, pantheism simply assumes that nature is one, but does not limit its scope to what can be currently observed with our scientific apparatus (as positivism does). The "spiritual" (i.e. beyond the scope of current empirical science) becomes merely a metaphor for the "not yet known, but possible" which is an epistomeological postion not an ontological one. In other words, it says it is possible to extend our knowledge to the levels that currently are beyond human comprehension (just like modern neuroscience is beyond comprehension of the 17th century medical knowledge) - without saying anything about the ontological status of the subject of that knowledge i.e. whether it is "natural" or "supernatural."

I may also add that this whole existence of god business is really a fallcy of mixing up epistemology and ontology. We have a concept of limits of our cognition and the need for axioms as the foundation of any rational system and we project these epistemological postulates into ontology by claiming that they correspond to some kind of being. A good example of that reasoning is the "intelligent design" argument which is really an argument from ignorance - we (supposedly) cannot explain X, therefor X must have been created by a being we do not know. That is absurd on its face - by the same logic: I found a $10 bill in my pocket and do not know where it came from, therefore god must have planted it there.

Of course many people have this idea of a "big daddy, taking care and punishing" implanted in their childhood - which they again project into ontology and conclude that there must be a "big daddy" somewhere out there in the universe,which again is mixing up epistemology and ontology (i.e. something exists in my mind therefore it must exist in reality) - and this is what makes this whole absurdity so appealing to many people.

But let's make it absolutely clear, the fact that our knowledge is limited and there are possibly things that scientists have not dreamed of, and that our rational systems need axioms to be constructed - does not mean that what we do not yet know or what we assume as axioms corresponds to some daddy-like supernatural entity.

Wojtek

__________________________________ Start your day with Yahoo! - Make it your home page! http://www.yahoo.com/r/hs



More information about the lbo-talk mailing list