Why we need religion

[Nilsi]

4 hours ago, Carl-Richard said:

I'm worried about the rivalrous games. This is my red herring: ? His name is Hegel.

I'm worried about the rivalrous games myself, I just don't think this problem is solved on the level of narrative.

Narrative is way too relative and unstable. 

Just look at me. I used to be very marxist-egalitarian and was fully bought into the story and now I'm a ruthless sales guy working in advertising. 

What went wrong? Did I get corrupted by some evil postmodern ideology, or is it that things are too complex and dynamic to contain them in some linear narrative/ethical system?

[Nilsi]

5 hours ago, zurew said:

If the incentives are aligned and we can agree on the main values and goals, then we can 10x our development and we can 10x our problemsolving capabilities and then proper cooperation is possible. That doesn't mean, that within that system we have to agree about everything, that just means we need to agree on the main building blocks.

1. Apparently our incentives and goals are not alligned, so how do we allign them, if not through debate? 
2. We will never reach complete consensus, so the best we can do is rule by majority (i.e. what we're doing) - which creates a whole gamut of problems that have been nicely illuminated by postmodern thinkers (e.g. marginalisation, alienation, oppression etc.)

We need villains, precisely to keep the status quo from becoming too decadent and complacent - so let's just fight it out, instead of trying to make peace.

[Carl-Richard]

20 minutes ago, Nilsi said:

I'm worried about the rivalrous games myself, I just don't think this problem is solved on the level of narrative.

Narrative is way too relative and unstable. 

Just look at me. I used to be very marxist-egalitarian and was fully bought into the story and now I'm a ruthless sales guy working in advertising. 

What went wrong? Did I get corrupted by some evil postmodern ideology, or is it that things are too complex and dynamic to contain them in some linear narrative/ethical system?

Ideology by itself, if you reduce it down to a theoretical framework which you can adopt willy-nilly, isn't inclusive enough to get all your needs met. You need something bigger than that. You arguably shifted from focusing on one set of needs to a different set of needs. If you haven't already, watch the guy in the video explaining his 7 features of a grand narrative.

Edited March 25, 2023 by Carl-Richard

[Nilsi]

1 minute ago, Carl-Richard said:

Ideology by itself, if you reduce it down to a theoretical framework which you can adopt willynilly, isn't inclusive enough to get all your needs met. You need something bigger than that. You arguably shifted from focusing on one set of needs to a different set of needs. If you haven't already, watch the guy in the video explaining his 7 features of a grand narrative.

My God, do I really have to sit through half an hour of some indian nerd talking to a blue-haired gamer about grand narratives? What good could possibly come from this?

I'm not critiquing some strawman version of a grand narrative. I mean what I say. No matter how many safety meassures your narrative has, it will always be partial - that shouldn't be so shocking.

Especially in the age of exponential technology and thus ultra rapid sociocultural evolution, the idea of some grand narrative is absolutely silly.

I say, lets figure out how not to blow ourselves up and then let people live and express themselves however they wish. All we need to get right is the not blowing ourselves up part.

[Nilsi]

15 minutes ago, Carl-Richard said:

Ideology by itself, if you reduce it down to a theoretical framework which you can adopt willy-nilly, isn't inclusive enough to get all your needs met. 

You're assuming that everyone has the same needs, to the same degree.

I need constant competition and challenge; I need extreme levels of aesthetic stimulation; I need to be the authrotiy, wherever I am; and I need to feel my power increase consistently.

Does your grand narrative call me evil, or will it deny the validity of my needs? In any case, I want nothing of it.

Edited March 25, 2023 by Nilsi

[Carl-Richard]

1 hour ago, Nilsi said:

You're assuming that everyone has the same needs, to the same degree.

I need constant competition and challenge; I need extreme levels of aesthetic stimulation; I need to be the authrotiy, wherever I am; and I need to feel my power increase consistently.

Does your grand narrative call me evil, or will it deny the validity of my needs? In any case, I want nothing of it.

I think if you had grown up in a society with a flourishing grand narrative, you would firstly be a different person, and secondly, you would be less likely to fall into the types of radical ideologies that you're experimenting with now, but if you still wanted to do that, maybe you should have the right to do that. Maybe that will be a part of the ideological portion of that grand narrative. It doesn't have to be Abrahamic fundamentalism.

Edited March 25, 2023 by Carl-Richard

[Carl-Richard]

6 hours ago, Gesundheit2 said:

I don't have this need. Used to, but not anymore. I'm comfortable with not-knowing and with loneliness. If this need is bothering you so much, you can try to transcend it like I did.

Or if you don't want to transcend it, you can satisfy it directly by joining groups, clubs, communities, charities, monasteries, etc.

Or you can do mix and match by following a personal mission/life purpose. Find what you're good at and is most authentic to you, and build upon it.

Many people on the journey of self-discovery face the desire to change the world in one way or another. You just gotta face it, man. Then you can decide what you want to do with it.

It's possible to convince yourself that you've transcended parts of your humanity, or to become accustomed to your own trauma, while in reality you're just not living up to your full potential. Survival is not flourishing.

Think about a grand narrative like an all-you-can-eat buffet. There are so many different types of food in one place, but you're so stubborn that you don't even want to taste it, and instead you want to spend your days growing your own carrots while all your friends are having fun in the restaurant. Religion is the all-you-can eat buffet, and New Age spirituality is the lonely carrot farmer.

Edited March 25, 2023 by Carl-Richard

[Nilsi]

1 hour ago, Carl-Richard said:

I think if you had grown up in a society with a flourishing grand narrative, you would firstly be a different person, and secondly, you would be less likely to fall into the types of radical ideologies that you're experimenting with now, but if you still wanted to do that, maybe you should have the right to do that. Maybe that will be a part of the ideological portion of that grand narrative. It doesn't have to be Abrahamic fundamentalism.

The point of a grand narrative is to structure society and orient people towards a common goal, no?

So, there is no "right to do that," as far as deviating from the narrative goes - that would undermine the whole thing.

Please tell me what you have in mind, but I can not stretch my imagination that far. 

I'd take Lyotard's "Postmodern Condition" over the Bible every day of the week, but because I'm an idiot and I want to be charitable, I actually started reading the damn tome. So, we'll see, if there is anything resembling an integral roadmap for 21st century humanity in the grand narrative.

Edited March 25, 2023 by Nilsi

[Nilsi]

The more I think about it, the more I can get behind the idea of simply orienting toward the "infinite game."

We have a big other/common enemy in existential risk. That should be enough of a narrative to not have to go on anyone's nerves with more elaborate stories about good and evil and how to conduct oneself.

[Carl-Richard]

8 hours ago, UnbornTao said:

In any case, what do you mean by spirituality and new age?

I was mentioning our condition: we don't know. Contemplation is the most effective and direct way for becoming conscious, not making up even more shit. Anything more than not-knowing is less than.

Religion also gets in the way of genuine inquiry, sometimes abruptly so. It's a common and convenient trap. Could perhaps be useful in some ways, especially for collective issues but it ultimately is a distraction, as opposed to direct questioning.

Spirituality is the search for the highest value ("the sacred"), be it God, Truth, Love, etc. New Age spirituality borrows concepts and practices from traditional spiritual traditions, but it does so in an incomplete way (examples are Ram Dass, Rupert Spira, Eckhart Tolle, Leo Gura, etc.). Traditional spirituality is found in things like Buddhism, Hinduism, Christianity, Islam, etc.

New Age spirituality places much more emphasis on aspects like mysticism (the direct experience of the divine) and associated practices (meditation), while traditional spirituality has a more holistic approach to serving human needs (e.g. the Eightfold path in Buddhism, the four puruṣārthas in Hinduism, etc.).

Also, the distinction between spirituality and religion is really less about substance and more about history. I just think of religion as traditional spirituality. Nevertheless, traditional spirituality is much closer to the type of grand narrative that I've been talking about than New Age spirituality.

Edited March 25, 2023 by Carl-Richard

[Nilsi]

8 minutes ago, Nilsi said:

The more I think about it, the more I can get behind the idea of simply orienting toward the "infinite game."

We have a big other/common enemy in existential risk. That should be enough of a narrative to not have to go on anyone's nerves with more elaborate stories about good and evil and how to conduct oneself.

You know what? Fuck this.

You can not assert any kind of value or goal, without fucking shit up as a byproduct. 

That's why grand narratives will never work.

I got lured in and tried to be constructive, but that was foolish.

There is nothing to assert and everything to negate as far as grand narratives go.

[Carl-Richard]

2 hours ago, Nilsi said:

The point of a grand narrative is to structure society and orient people towards a common goal, no?

So, there is no "right to do that," as far as deviating from the narrative goes - that would undermine the whole thing.

Please tell me what you have in mind, but I can not stretch my imagination that far. 

It's to serve as many human needs as possible. If you don't want it, you can reject it, but if it was indeed serving your needs, would you really feel the need to do that? Probably not, but again, if I was in charge, I wouldn't stop you. Also again, I'm of course not talking about force-feeding you, an old dog, a new way to interface with the world. This is for the youth.

 

2 hours ago, Nilsi said:

I'd take Lyotard's "Postmodern Condition" over the Bible every day of the week, but because I'm an idiot and I want to be charitable, I actually started reading the damn tome. So, we'll see, if there is anything resembling an integral roadmap for 21st century humanity in the grand narrative.

See if you can find the 7 features of the friend of the blue-haired nerd.

Edited March 25, 2023 by Carl-Richard

[Carl-Richard]

59 minutes ago, Nilsi said:

You know what? Fuck this.

You can not assert any kind of value or goal, without fucking shit up as a byproduct. 

That's why grand narratives will never work.

I got lured in and tried to be constructive, but that was foolish.

There is nothing to assert and everything to negate as far as grand narratives go.

So should we just be lonely New Age carrot farmers then? Is that a better alternative?

[Carl-Richard]

8 hours ago, Gesundheit2 said:

See, 2000 years ago, you weren't a cog in a machine chasing material achievements one after another. So this was not a problem. 2000 years ago, you had all the time and all the freedom in the world to reflect, travel, and construct whatever narrative you want, and there were no traps because there was not an objective standard for life. You just were who you were. Life was simple.

2000 years ago, you had religion  The death of God was very recent.

Edited March 26, 2023 by Carl-Richard

[Carl-Richard]

On 24.3.2023 at 2:18 PM, Danioover9000 said:

@Carl-Richard

   So, one of the key question is how do we square alternative spirituality such that we still maintain that 'I don't know' state, whilst doing practices?

Like mentioned earlier, spirituality and religion isn't all that different when it comes to traps like beliefs vs. direct experience, or group-think, or dogmatism. Besides, New Agers will tell you things like "go out into the forest and meditate, that is where the real work is done" ...while typing on an internet forum... where they have thousands of posts. See what I'm saying? It's so obvious that you're craving these things I'm talking about. You're just making do with a constipated version of it. And when I present that case, what is the reponse? New Age dogma ("religion is about beliefs").

(@UnbornTao I didn't mean to sidetalk you like that, but it was what was on my mind ?).

Edited March 26, 2023 by Carl-Richard

[UnbornTao]

Listen to that and consider experientially for yourself.

Edited April 2, 2023 by UnbornTao

[Carl-Richard]

@UnbornTao Yep, one minute in and that sounds exactly like New Age dogma: "religion is based on belief". But hey, I can agree that most fundamentalists Christians approach it that way, but then you have people like John Vervaeke, Bernardo Kastrup or some of my professors who bring a bit more nuance to the concept. Besides, my previous points still stand: New Age spirituality is not immune to anything that religion is not immune against, and in fact, thinking that it is, will only make it more likely that you'll deceive yourself.

Edited March 26, 2023 by Carl-Richard

[UnbornTao]

@Carl-Richard 

Sounds like your mind may be trapped in intellect in this topic. You interpreted what I said from the lens of your beliefs and swiftly categorized it as X although I'm not coming from a spiritual standpoint, much less a "new age" one. You seem to be conflating social survival and smartness with awareness.

What is done with religion? Do you eat it? Can you wear it? What happens to your experience when a religion is followed? What do they provide you with? A few things that come to mind right away: statements about what the world and reality are, a set of ritualized practices, perhaps some wisdom sprinkled in there, a community of like-minded people (believers), et al. The point still stands: being ignorant is primarily the reason why beliefs are adopted.

To be clear, I'm not saying that there aren't benefits to be found in studying religion or that there have not been enlightened individuals affiliated to particular subgroups. However, separate the wheat from the chaff - direct consciousness occurs despite or independent of affiliations.

Again, contemplate: What are belief and religion? Maybe they happen to be like wetness and water.

Edited April 2, 2023 by UnbornTao

[Carl-Richard]

Just now, UnbornTao said:

@Carl-Richard you're trapped in (conceptual) sandcastles. Point still stands, those people belief in stuff and are not conscious of the absolute. You're somehow seem to be confusing smartness or social value with the important thing which is consciousness. Consider I'm not coming from new age spirituality or another.

Contemplate what belief and religion are. They're both like wetness and water.

I'm not sure how to interpret your post. If you're saying that religious people are not conscious of the absolute, you'd be surprised how many Christian, Sufi, Hindu, etc. mystics you just offended. If you're saying John Vervaeke or Bernardo Kastrup are not conscious of the absolute, Vervaeke is a practicing Buddhist who has had awakening experiences, Kastrup has taken psychedelics and had ego death experiences many times (and is friends with Rupert Spira). They're not just book nerds (even though that isn't actually relevant to what we're talking about imo).

[Carl-Richard]

10 hours ago, UnbornTao said:

Notice as an example how incoming communications from others are immediately interpreted from the lens of beliefs and swiftly categorized: "this guy is talking about or coming from new age spirituality when saying such and such", etc.

If I can accurately predict and label every utterance you make, wouldn't that be a little bit concerning for somebody who is scared about being trapped in a belief system?

We can chill if you want to

Edited March 26, 2023 by Carl-Richard