Archive for ego

Things Unseen

Posted in Atheism, Atheist, belief, culture, faith, humanity, Inspiration, life, naturalism, nature, random, religion, science, thoughts with tags , , , , , , , , , on February 18, 2010 by chouck017894

There is an unfathomable amount of creative activity swirling everywhere around us that we cannot personally perceive but which science opens to us a somewhat broader understanding.   Even so, the unknown remains vast.  We scrawny human beings still have to work around the fact that we are limited physical beings and, as an example, even those persons privileged with perfect eyesight see only vibrations between 450 trillions of red light and 750 trillions of violet light.  And those with “perfect” hearing actually hear only vibrations within the 32,000-33,000 range.  That is like hearing only one small tonal chord in the vast symphony of Creation.  Dogs, cats, and other animals—even insects—often have certain better physical senses than we embody.  So we should stop pretending that we are the undisputed masters over nature or that we are the darlings of a humanlike Creator, and face up to the reality that the how and where we fit into the universal diversity of “existence” is extremely limited. 

With only our personal aware consciousness to appraise universal consciousness from this dense matter perspective, the bulk of Creation’s dynamism cannot be perceived.  There are whole dimensions of creative action that exist beyond our limited awareness.  It was noted in The Celestial Scriptures that it is with our physical senses that each of us stays constantly in touch with the truth of the universe, although the illusion of our matter-being tends to cause us to respond to it inappropriately (selfishly) rather than respond with responsible coexistence. 

Through science research we know that transitional levels of energy exist.  Atoms were once thought to be the ultimate building blocks of all energy forms.  But after exhaustive research there was found to be even more minuscule energy levels that are apparently activated from the quantum level—a level, it was found, that is influenced by how it is observed.  What this seems to suggest is that an awareness we term consciousness is present even in quantum causation.  But that all-encompassing creative consciousness should never be thought of as a humanlike being complete with humanlike feelings, prejudices and weaknesses as the practice of religious escapism commonly chooses to picture it. 

Electric force is one of the fundamental forces of Nature, but only recently have researchers identified a physical phenomenon of electric force that they refer to as electromagnetic rotation.  With this new awareness of this phenomenon there is presented to mankind a means of better understanding how the smallest building blocks in nature interact to form gases, liquids and solids that make up the material world we know.  An interesting feature of electrostatic rotation is that when it is induced without the occurrence of friction the result is the initiation of spin.  And it is spin that is used in quantum mechanics to explain phenomena at the nuclear, atomic, and molecular domains.  This could lead to a deeper understanding of the fundamental properties of matter, which, unfortunately, holy “revealed” writings have never been able to explain. 

So man’s scientific inquiry into the unseen workings of the universe is not exactly an irreverent indulgence as fundamental religionists often claim.  It is really more of a determined attempt at expanding man’s awareness which confirms humanity’s close relationship to all that is created.  Delving into Creation’s wonder-workings therefore expresses man’s will to expand spirit as opposed to religious indulgence which appeals only to each person’s ego.  Ego, we should remember, always identifies itself as centrally positioned in every situation.

Human disposition must learn that it is only when ego can look upon its intimate relationship with all things without a commitment to the temporary physical senses that one’s potential “divine” nature begins to open up.  Yes, this sounds like religious rhetoric: but the subtle difference is that the religious message is always bound up with sectarian centralism.  This awareness of our close interreltatedness with all things that are seen and unseen is the key held out by all the wise spiritual leaders and classic philosophers when they have counseled man, “Know thyself.”

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Faith or Obsession?

Posted in agnoticism, Atheist, culture, freethought, history, humanism, nontheism, random, religion with tags , , , , , , on April 20, 2009 by chouck017894

Obsession and faith often tend to  share a perverted relationship. Indeed the definition of mental imbalance referred to as “obsession” too often also applies equally to religious “faith” to an alarming degree.

Obsession is defined as a compulsive preoccupation with a fixed idea or compulsive feeling that generates a driving emotion—more often than not with symptoms of anxiety. When unreasonable ideas or emotions infect mental function to the point of preoccupation, extremism becomes the inevitable consequence. The now-archaic understanding was that obsession was the state of being beset or actuated by the devil or evil spirits. On the other hand, hearing voices from a burning bush or from visions that no one else could detect is presented as  being divinely endowed.

Such “faith” is routinely whitewashed as: “A confident belief in the truth, value, or trustworthiness” of an idea, thing, or person. Religious “faith” is therefore presented as a reliance that need not depend on logical proof or material evidence–miracles, to them, are answers, not things that are questionable. “Faith” is also praised for an unquestioning loyalty to man-formulated doctrines and for extending numb trust that “sacred” texts that were written by various unknown mortal beings present the only access into spiritual enlightenment for man. The difference between “faith” and “obsession” thus hinges soley on how an individual’s egomaniacal temperament functions.

Both the words “faith” and “obsession,” in actuality, refer to some form of ego-gratifying conviction that panders to a sense of exclusivity. And any sense of exclusivity always results in mental obstructions. The next step for the faithful or the obessessed is then extremism–a condition that today infects so much of the world.  When “faith” fanatics try to take over worldly politics, history has shown that the end result has always been disaster for the subjugated, and mankind’s potential for truly moral conduct has been rendered impotent.

Recent research into brain activity has revealed that prominent neurological occurances linked with religious impressions are activated and intensified in the limbic system–the part of the brain governing basic activities such as self-preservation, reproduction, and expressions of fear and rage. It has been shown also that the prefrontal system of the brain–the prefrontal cortex and the parietal cortex of the brain–play an influential role in an individual’s religious devotion. Interestinly, persons suffering from obsessive-compulsive disorders are shown to have dysfunctional activity in the same prefrontal systems.

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