h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

apparently it doesn't matter what order the letters in a word end up in, as long as the first and last letters are right.

Returning, possibly to the somewhat more intellectual discussion (see how I resisted the urge to put "Returning, possly..." there?)...

With your "Well then you've met a none human intelergent being who did not create the universe." comment DoctorMO, where you replying tome, and what exactly did you mean. I'm a little confused since beginning the post "Well then..." suggests that it follows on from something that someone else said- which it may do. I just can't identify which post it is a reply to.

This vacillation between 'what counts as a typo?' and 'what is the true nature of God and can we truly say to have encountered Him?' reminds me of an exam question I once had - 'is it right to say that 2+2=4 is more certain than the fact that the sun will rise tomorrow?' Had some fun with that one, as I recall...

I think DrMO was responding, in his truculent way, to your claim to have met God, Neilfish. (Although 'met' is a word I would probably not have used myself.)

It's the use of a word when there isn't a suitable one available. F'rinstance if someone metioned you (Awix) I might say 'yeah, I've spoken to him loads' when in fact I have never spoken to you, I've typed to you.

Um, 'had interactions with' God? 'Met' suggests having interactions with while being in the same physical place, so while God is everywhere he also isn't specifically anywhere.

Hmm, but you wouldn't say you'd *met* me. That implies a physical encounter of some kind, and, well, that's tricky isn't it, when you're talking about God.

'Encountered'? Not as snappy as 'I know God exists because I've met Him.' A good line, hard to improve on in terms of snappiness.

I'm not sure I even want to get into the whole 'in what sense can something without a physical presence be said to exist' argument... I sense the words 'propositional attitudes' marching towards the thread with grim implacability...

Ah well you first have to say that does "what exists only account for what we can see"

-- DoctorMO --

Hmm - I'm getting deja vu all over again, a very similar point came up in another thread just the other day. Are you saying that our conception of what exists is necessarily limited by what we are capable of perceiving?

Well, yes, that's almost certainly true, but you can't factor in things which may or may not exist, and which we have no idea about even if they are real. It's like asking 'how many species of animal have yet to be discovered?' - it's impossible to answer, because they haven't been discovered yet! The same with 'do things exist which we have no way of perceiving/interacting with?' Theoretically, yes, but effectively, no.

ah yes you do see the problems inherent in identifing the objetive world.

-- DoctorMO --

So God can be encountered in a way that doesn't involve the senses, which suggests that stuff does exist that cannot be perceived by the senses, but can be experienced in another way.

How does one experience something without it causing a sensation of some kind? Not necessarily through the five 'official' senses but you have to know it's there *somehow*.

Or else you're in that Fast Show sketch where the guy turns up with his pet elephant, which can't be seen, heard, smelt or touched, and thus bears a striking resemblence to a non-existent elephant.

Obv I am referring to the official senses. And saying that in order to have 'met' God, one must have experienced him through some other means, possibly another 'sense' that doesn't get used in the physical world so much.

But we know that elephants can be experienced through pretty much all of those senses (if you're willing to go lick them). So one that can't is either not there, or not an elephant in the way I would use the word.

Okay then - what does it feel like when you meet God? I'm not attempting feeble humour (for once), I'm genuinely curious. Or is the experience of God a necessarily subjective thing that can't be meaningfully described?

In my experience it was just this random concept that popped into my head - only vaguely linked to what the minister was praying about at the time - some people have pictures.
and it was sort of like the feeling you get (or I get) when you have a gut instinct about something, a little jolt, a little unnerving

I am butting in, but I have been tracking Hermi across H2G2 (since she has gone missing on our other threads...), and I thought this was a brilliant thread on her trail.

What does one encounter when one encounters God? I had this idea that being nice Postmodern people (and cats), each of us encounters the Universe in our own, indvidual experiencial way. There is this idea that we cannot share viewpoints (we can guess but not really share).

God being God, is stable, timeless. In each of us, deep down is a small, stillness of calm and perspective. To touch that part of us, is to touch the image of God within us. To encounter God is to touch a _shared_ experience of perspective. It provides an objective and essentialist view of the Universe because we touch a perspective that is not personal: it becomes a transforming experience - one of embracing the Universe.

I don't have much of a humanist view of God and prayer.

Does what I say ring true? I haven't seen it talked about much (this might be for a good reason).

I think that in order to accept God at all, we first have to agree that there is a truth, and that everything is not nicely postmodern and subjective. We have to say that 'this is the way things are'.

Perhaps our language isn't capable of expressing unique viewpoints, but us each seeing the universe from a slightly different point of view doesn't mean that it _is_ different for each of us.

Sorry to come the old soldier, but I think it was Wittgenstein who argued that the idea that we each have totally subjective experiences of our own individual phenomenal worlds was bunkum, because (as well as heading for solipsism) it would mean two people would be incapable of communicating meaningfully.

In other words, for us to use the word tree meaningfully in a conversation, we must have a shared idea (and therefore experience) of what a tree is.

Interesting thread.

I hope no one minds me also butting in on this thread. I kind of followed Awix in here. I'm going off what I've managed to skim read and off the title here.

I have to admit that I would find it very difficult to not believe or to believe in God with complete certainty, and I find it interesting to hear people who do. I have been a Christian my entire life.

I believe that you should not destroy or replace something until you have something better to replace it with, not to change on a whim . Nor should you keep something static if change is required. Otherwise the structure collapses. I must admit this is partly why I am a Christian.

Perhaps I don't give my beliefs enough credit. I believe the Ten Commandments are an excellent guide to life (admittedly they are used at least in the Jewish faith as well [is it part of the Muslim faith?]), the religeon teaches to get on with your neighbours (whoever happens to be next to you at the time, not just the next house), to not cause conflict and not to worship the coin. Ironically it has been misused over the couple millenia it has been in existence, but that is not a reflection on the religeon - merely the people behind it at the time. Remove the religeon and the people still exist.

I think some things can be over scrutinised, and quite frankly we don't know enough to say very much for certain, never mind if there is a God. Thats not to say we shouldn't discuss it, but to be certain either way can not be healthy. There will always be uncertainty in human knowledge, and perhaps a small amount of uncertainty can be healthy.

How many universes are there? What is a Universe? When was the Universe Constructed? What was there before hand? And in the end will the answers to these questions have any relevance to why we are here in life?

I don't know. And perhaps they are the three most important words in the English language : I don't know.

Being a good post-modern literary type (I get to proof read English post-grad theses as part of my life-deal), I do not believe that we can all perceive the tree identically, merely congurently. That is, the tree exists and we all share a human view, but each of us sees it with a different understanding (and viewpoint) of this tree and all trees.

BTW, I would argue that the philosophers have a better handle on this than the literary theorists.

However, surely it is not in question that there is a still place of perspective within us. The question is, "is it an experience of an external reality (God) or not?". Then the really interesting question is, "what happens if you start talking to it?". My experience is that really interesting things start to happen. I am infavour of an external "theistic" God but many of the people who go to my church are not.

A tree of truly shared view and one of subjective standing would be very close, not exact admitidly but very close, the idea that within the universe there is a consistancy between what I see and say and what my father and his father have said about the same things is the loop hole to the objective world.

btw for anyone thats interested the Universe is the space within everything in which everything unique can happen, supose infinite space then there will be a finite region in which everything unique can happen (it's very very large but just not infinite)

-- DoctorMO --

What is infinite? I know its a value which goes on forever - but that is merely from our own perspective. No one has actually experienced infinite or infinity, so it must be difficult to reason what it actually is. There must be theories of course... but then isn't everything a theory?