Saturday, December 27, 2014

Scientific Proof Of God - A Brief Review



God would be quite vainglorious if we followed the perception of Him by His followers. It is a perception that is not without merit for it is specifically stated that God is jealous and wants to be worshiped. But it is not God Himself who takes the credit, for the act of taking credit can be done (or assigned) by one who exists - namely followers. It is to these followers that the blame goes to in trying to assert that God exists (outside metaphor), and that God can be proven to exist.

Throughout history any given natural and celestial event was attributed to God and the supernatural, whether it was how all heavenly bodies were seen to go around the Earth in perfect circles, to eclipses being proof of angry gods. Many cultures stopped at that level of awareness; however, some did not and in Western societies, beginning with Aristotle and the Classic Greeks questioning the role of the gods, to Copernicus and Galileo we can see that much of what was seen as the work of God was nothing more than nature being what it is. Nature and existence have the essence of things being what they are: A = A.  Among that: orbits are not in perfect spheres, we are not the center of the Galaxy or even our solar system, the tides and countless other phenomena.

That what was originally seen as divine was later seen as purely natural does not detract those who believe from their sacred theory of a divine hand.  Even Nature is proof of God, and all the laws of Nature are those that God decreed - for those who think science can point to God instead of seeing the two as dichotomous (again, outside metaphor) as a Creator God and Nature are.  Just as in times of old, natural phenomena were proof of God, in times of new with scientific advancement exploring Nature, newer, more intricate details are offered as proof of God; as well as statistical models are used to justify Intelligent Design.  

The essence of their points is: everything in existence is too fine-tuned to not be directed by someone/something outside of it.

However, even using their own reasoning, what we actually see are all those supposed proofs of the Creator God, more as proof that a Creator God did not create anything or does not exist.  All the nuances, all the probability models each are those that are confined to scientific laws and statistical probability.  'Only God or some super intelligence could direct everything as it is' because if it was just a minuscule degree off, nothing would have happened - no life, universe or anything else.  But that is not an answer that points to God, for if there actually was a Creator God, then what would limitations of Nature and Existence have to do with God's power?  If a stick can become a snake, a man can be made from dust, and the Universe itself can be spoken into existence from where there was nothingness (excluding God), then what does the orbit of the planet have to do with sustaining life, the elemental make-up of Earth and the solar system and such, what would any of those limitations be to one who supposedly wrote and can violate those laws at will?-e.g burning bush that is not consumed, water to wine, sun stops in the sky and stars fall from the skies… all from will.

Additionally, whether one says God (or aliens as some do) guided the formation of Life, the necessary question becomes: where did those aliens or God come from?  This question will never end, for if you say A created B, and C created A, then what was there that created C, and so on.  Aliens have the same line of questions for any physical entity, but God needs an extra point of consideration.

Summed up in a Poem Metaphysics from The Gospel of Reason

Exactly why, does he, mankind, exist?
From where did life, and order, formulate?
And, how – without a cause, nothing to list;
Did all the Universe come from that state?

Is Nature fated? – did it have to be?
No plans, no script, just forces manifest;
Not cruel, nor mean, with no affinity.
Objective rules are learned from interest.

The other choice: a primal Creator;
The being living in vacuity.
But how did He, with nothingness before;
Beget the stars, all else? – His nascency?

The answer, Nature versus God, sublime;
There is no doubt that one has been all time.

What seems more probable when we come to the great mystery: that material forces created the material universe that set up the base from which life could emerge, or that before there was anything to be born from, sustain or be part of, there was the highest living entity who created everything without having anything to create with and maintained His own life without anything in existence for his birth or maintenance?  Whether the review of the Universe is correctly done doesn’t affect the reality of what is: we can say God is angry and that is why the sun disappeared, or we can learn and know better.                                                               

Thursday, December 18, 2014

Fundamentalists are not crazy; they are far worse


A saying that gets offered as justification, or rather as an explanation for the beliefs of those fundamentalist, religious followers who hold atrocious beliefs and commit acts of violence, is the dismissive claim that: they're just crazy.  That gets offered by those who lack any religious belief, as well as those who have somewhat a religious belief - generally considered moderates.  Though dismissing fundamentalists as crazy does do a good job of distancing them from oneself - appropriately so if one is rational - it is a false dismissal.  Fundamentalists are not crazy.

First off, let us look at the word fundamentalist: its base is of course fundamental which is based on fundamentalis - the foundation, or primary principles.  So we need to look at primary principles.  Abrahamic religions have as their base their respective God who is perfect and wrote their respective books (Old & New Testaments, and Koran, for Judaism, Christianity and Islam), and is real with a set of rules.  The fundamentalist's God wills and has His preferences; those who follow Him are to obey.  Here we shall see that it is not crazy to act with such a belief base, for it is much worse. 

Fundamentalist base: genocide is not only permissible, but is commendable.  One of the greatest figures to the three Abahamic faiths is Moses.  In the book of Numbers Chapter 31, through instruction from God, Moses killed the Midianites, and after seeing all the captives, then declaimed in verses 17-18 "Now kill all the boys.  And kill every woman who has slept with a man, but save for yourselves every girl who has never slept with a man."  Explicitly, this is genocide and sexual slavery.  When Boko Haram kidnapped a couple hundred schoolgirls, they were lambastated, except by other fundamentalists who shared their beliefs.  Moses did far worse, but is heralded as a hero.  Let's not forget human sacrifice in this for of the 16,000 captives, there were 32 who were 'tribute for the Lord.'

Fundamentalist base: infanticide and sacrificing one's own is commendable.  Another hero to the three Abrahamic faiths, and that term gets used because of Abraham.  In Genesis Chapter 22, God told Abraham to take 'your son, your only son, whom you love... Sacrifice him there as a burnt offering...'  To which Abraham obeys, but right before he slays Isaac, the child is spared and a ram is provided which is sacrificed instead and that pleases God for the willingness to sacrifice his son was a test of Abraham.  God did not stay Jephthah's hand, and he offered up his daughter as a burnt offering in Judges 11.  When Andrea Yates and Deanna Laney murdered their kids by drowning and bludgeoning with a stone, and did so because they were protecting them from Satan (Yates) or just because God told her to do so (Laney), neither one of them is looked upon as acting properly.  Both women were found guilty of homicide, and insane (or trying to get decreed insane).

Fundamentalist base: cult-like slavish devotion to the point of neglecting ones' loved ones and even oneself is expected from the highest.  "If anyone comes to me and does not hate father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters -  yes, even their own life - such a person cannot be my disciple" Jesus' admonition in Luke 14:26.  Jesus for Christians, was the Son of God; even those who do not see Jesus as the Son of God still hold a similar belief to their respective one seen as a proxy (Muhammad, Virgin Mary, etc) to God.  Whoever is the spokesman for one's creed, must be obeyed and given all to.  When David Koresh and Jim Jones tried to convince their followers to abandon all in favor of them and their groups, they were labeled as leaders of dangerous cults, and appropriately so.

Fundamentalist base: men and women are of different value, and women/girls have fewer rights.  This can be seen in the sexual enslavement of the virgins aforementioned with Moses (elsewhere male and female slaves - when both are kept alive are treated differently), in the marrying off of teens and children to old men (Jesus' mother Mary was a teen when wed to Joseph and Aisha was six when wed to Muhammad, though nine when consummated), both the bible and Koran declaim women as unclean, and in 1 Corinthians Chapter 14:34-35 "Women should remain silent in the churches.  They are not allowed to speak, but must be in submission as the law says.  If they want to inquire about something, they should ask their own husbands at home; for it is disgraceful for a woman to speak in the church." The sentiment is equally displayed in 1 Timothy 2:12 "I do not permit a woman to teach or to assume authority over a man; she must be quiet".  Not to be let out of the misogyny, the Koran has in The Cow 2:228 that women have rights that are similar to men, but men are 'a degree above them'; in The Clans 33, women are to be covered.  Though men and women have their differences, those differences are not in moral value.

Finally, fundamentalist base: Creation is as it is stated in the [their holy] book.  Additionally, God can and does change laws of Nature as He sees fit.  From this belief emerge evolution deniers, 6000-year-old Earth believers, prayer and faith healers, belief that sex with a virgin will prevent one from being infected with AIDS.  To believe the holy books is to believe that which we know is impossible.  In Joshua Chapter 10, God stops the sun and the moon for a day so Joshua could finish his victory over his enemies and in The Moon 54:1, God split the moon in two.  Such a miraculous base for celestial events make the handling of poisonous snakes as non-problematic; you just need to believe and you will be healed, like Jesus' restoring the sight to the blind or raising Lazarus. 

Each fundamentalist base reflects two things; 1) that Nature and reality are but facades to what is true and God can change anything at anytime for any reason, for He is omnipotent, omnipresent and omniscient, so examination of Nature is really futile.  If a stick isn't a stick, but a potential snake and dust is a human in waiting, then what really is the reason for studying anything outside God?-why study medicine when one just needs 'faith'?  2)  that God chose one and from that, the selected one can commit any atrocity and consider it good because God told him.  Whether murdering in mass, or just one's own child, it can be seen as good when told to be done by God, as He has told people to do beforehand.

To believe at a fundamentalist level is to state that the primitive, tribal men had a better understanding of nature and the universe than current scientists.  Following that, the moral base was built on tribalism where collectivism was formalized between 'us and them' and others didn't have same rights as one's ingroup; even within the ingroup, there is a hierarchy to abide by - men were the leaders and women were to be subservient.  Why is life like this?-it is because it was written.  Who wrote it?-God.  Who interpreted it, those who had the power.

There is no way that this can be argued.  Argument entails claims and definitions to come to truth that can change one's mind with the advanced idea; fundamentalism entails having 'the truth' and making claims and definitions change to fit.  How can we rationally argue with one who believes that the sun stopped in the sky?-that the moon was cleft into two pieces?-that a bush was on fire and spoke?  How can one rationally make a claim about anything scientific when their base is the negation that science rests upon: that things are what they are, and a stick is not a snake?  Similarly, how can one make an argument regarding morality when beloved heroes of fundamentalists were tribalistic, and willing to slaughter those members of outgroups, even kill children. 

There is nothing rational to be said to them for they reject reason.  However, selectively using the tools of reason, they apply it to their beliefs to further find ways of solidifying belief.  There is a furrow on the moon?-proof Allah split it.  There are large human bones in Latin America?-proof of the nephilim.  Others don't have the same rights, or are even to be killed?-they have chosen the incorrect path and are aligned with the evil ones.  If you try and contest those assertions, they will point to their holy books as final evidence and as it is written in them, how can you contest it further?  If you contest their holy book, then you are of the enemy trying to take away their moral base and personal relationship with divinity - a great threat.

These people are not crazy.  They have a definite value system, as well as a methodology within that value system's hierarchy.  Within that, they use the tools of logic only so far as to justify a conclusion already embraced and if logic shows it was wrong, then logic itself is incorrect.  True reason is every bit an enemy as reality, and that which challenges their belief is not just challenging an abstract notion of what is right or wrong, but one's personal relationship with what is right and wrong as divinely handed down by a specific entity that cares for them.  They blind themselves and lash out to threats.  The new world is not as much of a concern as the threat to the old; order is important. 

We need to better address the issue: 1) address the threat that those who are willing to use force to achieve their ends; 2) address the base of their beliefs, for it is not just wrong, but it is anti-life and anti-reality.  When they reject the reality they live both in the physical and moral worlds, and ultimately state this life that we have now is nothing but an impediment to the life that awaits for us after death - what reason can be used to deal with minds such as those?

Sunday, December 14, 2014

Proof of the New Highest God

In an archeological find that is sure to shake numerous religions to their cores, an expedition to the highest mountains, within the deepest caves of those mountains in the land of Iltamasastan, humanity has uncovered an unequivocal historic find.  There has recently been found a new Holy Book which will finalize any debate regarding the True Nature of God.  The first written excerpts date back many thousands of years ago.  Found deep within caverns that haven't been opened centuries BCE; it is a fascinating discovery.  This book speaks the Truth about the Creator, as well as made predictions that have come to pass. 

Written in a lost language, with not an individual whole copy, it has taken time to piece the book together and from that, we now have proof of God and Her nature, including how She created the universe.  Not only do we have Creation explained, but how a True moral system is to be implemented.  This morality as decreed by She not only shows how best to live on Earth, but how Paradise can be achieved.  However, just stating that this has been proven does not mean anything.  We shall look at the evidence and let it prove itself to us of the Truth.

Let us start out by reviewing God speaking about Herself as the Originator, as it is written in the book of Adamina Chapter 1 Verse 10: Behold, all that you see and yet do not see, that you have seen and will ever see, all this and more has come from Me; I birthed it for you.  You, who were in my bosom before you were born, I had loved.  I knew you needed a place to live and grow, so all of Creation is for you.  Take my gift and live well, but remember it is of Me, and from Me, as are you.

Not only did She announce Her prepotency in Creation, showing Her first Great Miracle, but She showed other miracles for us.  The next in Her Great Miracles comes in the regeneration of Life.  As it is stated in the book of Hortense Chapter 5 Verse 27: Behold, where you see death, you also see life; where you see life, you also see death.  Where you see the carcass, do you not also see that which feeds on carrion?-the insects and small creatures and the plants that devour the dead, then themselves are later eaten, and those eaters eaten, and those eaters eaten and so on?  Where you see life, regardless of how robust and healthy it may be, do you not see a life which will end by ending and a body decaying until it is to be returned to be reborn again?

She advised how to properly relate to your fellow man, as She made clear in the book Alma, Chapter 22 Verses 10-15: To those you know and love, treat them as such – love unshown is the same as food uneaten to a starving body.  To those you do not know, accord them the respect deserving of a stranger, with the same vision as seeing yourself through their eyes and how you’d want them to treat you; however, that unwritten description remains blank only briefly and for better or worse, descriptions will be made.  Be careful on how you act.  A mark on a smooth stone stands out and the only way to not let that mark be the only impression is to have others made, but one bad mark may keep further ones from being made.  Individuals are to treat individuals as such; cultures are to treat cultures as such.  To those who are hostile toward you, you must also act accordingly.  If their hostility is that of a buzzing gnat, they can be dismissed the same; if their hostility is that of a hyena trying to devour your lion cubs, then meet them as that lion who defends her cubs.  It is best for people to get along, interact and trade to the benefit of each party; however, not all have noble hearts and if they are set to your destruction and are acting on it, before they are able to devour you and yours, you must defend you and yours.

Sexual relations are reviewed by She in the book of Zalika Chapter 18 Verses 5-8: You were born to blend your body and mind into soul, for I gave you both; to be your highest self, it is through this achievement.  You have the ability to focus on one at the cost of the other - to be focusing on the physical for mindless stimulation, or to be only mind focused and lose touch with reality - but in either way is to live short of the grandeur I made you capable of.  This highest is not related to procreation only, for one may love without creating progeny and one may create progeny without love; whether one is of the same gender or different, there is no difference for either way the highest can be achieved.  The only thing forbidden is the procreation of same-pair coupling; however, this does not take away from the actualization of spirit potential for those in the coupling.  These are my offerings and my limitations.  Go forth, find your highest and share in body and mind.

She reveals the great mysteries of Life in Masego Chapter 1 Verses 1-2: You who seek to know Truth without Me! Do you think you can learn it on your own? How can you learn of Life and Existence without Me?-where will you look? Every direction your eyes look, you will see Me; every direction that your ears hear sounds, you will hear Me; everything you feel, you will feel Me; every scent and every taste as well, you will know My presence in Life!  If you seek to discount Me, then like the chick still within the egg, you will not see anything beyond your shell; your world will be limited to your confines, though you will know them well.

Like anything or one of Perfection, there are those who hate Her for it.  They despise Her Glory and their own smallness.  She, too, has enemies who want to pull us down to their flawed level.  As stated in one of the later books, the book of Ramona Chapter 6 Verses 16-18: The Jealous one has his minions and his preferred servants.  You will know them by the acts they do – all of which are attempts to silence She who birthed you, to remove your ear from her words, to benight you and leave you in darkness – as it was written, leave you unborn, with your world the extent of your unhatched shell, and you calling it the universe.  The Jealous One will try to trick you by demanding sacrifice to prove love, and will call for you to prove your love by offering your blood, but he will ultimately spare the males while letting the females feel the blade or the fire; he will reward those who will punish the feminine while rewarding the masculine.  He hates Her flawlessness and lets his rage rail against those who resemble She.  With the prophets of the Jealous one, you will see them live and die in ways that try to take you away from Her, to try and take that which is Hers and make it so you do not associate them with Her.  The glorious mountain overlooks the Earth while standing above it, the proud tree that touches the Earth and the Skies, and even the arms of a girl child from a forced marriage will be associated with death.  The Jealous One prefers death worship over Life.  Unable to birth Life, acts of prestidigitation will be offered as miracles when the Jealous One is merely using what She birthed.  The Jealous one will try to convince you that this life that was birthed to you is but a secondary concern to life after death.  How can you achieve Life after the death of what was birthed to you?  Do not be deceived!  The Jealous One is vain and will do what he can to convince you to his death worship, but you will not be able to enjoy Life!

She predicted the decrease in Her influence because of the increase of people falling for the Jealous one; She also predicted the turn away from the Jealous One and His deceiving and dividing ways.  We are approaching that time.  We can see the effects now.  To continue to fulfill the prophesy as written by the sacred Jaleesa in her book Jaleesa 9:99: The abuses you suffer by the Jealous One shall become too great - come to a point where the promises he made shall be properly brought into question.  When you question him, he shall give no answer that satisfies; he will speak vagaries and call them divine; he will obfuscate, but say the blame lies in you for not understanding.  Throw off his shackles!  He tricked you away from She, but you can shirk those chains yourselves.  When you come to realize he is powerless, you will see all the threats he made was because you believed them even though they were no threats he could follow through. 

Just as there were miracles that were for all of humanity, there were miracles that were to help specific individuals.  For example, in the book of Esperance, Padriac became ill and then died; it was She who helped Her people raise Padriac back from the dead.  Similarly, in the book of Terena, when the earth was parched as The Jealous One had brought drought, it was She who brought back the rains and bountiful harvests. 

We need not to just take Her word for it – that is not the way to objectively verify anything.  We already have secondary sources that can corroborate Her story.  We need to look no further than from Kaapo’s history; written centuries BCE, he recounts through oral legend of those who were there first-hand to see the miraculous resurrection of Padriac centuries beforehand.  Quillian reviewed the text and compared the taxonomy within its pages and found that it matches the plant and animal life of the area and the time.  Not only that, but scholars of the area attested to the veracity of claims within the Book.  Heralded for his attention to detail in reviewing the data, Agosta summarized in his Historie de Iltamasastan: When we review the text, and compare it to our observations in nature, we see that the script is correct.  We know we need the light of the Sun to see, and where the light of the Sun is not, we see not; can we see in the deep caves unless we have a Sun by proxy in a small fire? – even then, we see not far into that darkness, but only that which is around us and our fire.  So it is for us, as it was written by She: our entire Universe is that which is trapped inside a great egg, and our entire reality is that which is within the egg waiting for it to crack and our potential to come from that birth.

So, there we have it: proof in the script and verification outside of that script of the New Highest God… rather returning to The Original Goddess.  Within the text we can see proof of Her greatness as well as Her predictions of the coming patriarchal religions, and male-dominated societies.  Not only did She state our place in the Universe in the dark of a great egg, but She also specifically predicted the rise of the Abrahamic-based religions in Judaism, Christianity and Islam.  The examples of Abraham, Lott and others were predicted by She. 

Now there will be some of you who are skeptical of the new God, or return to the Original Goddess.  That is to be expected, as the Jealous One She talks about has deceived you into following Him and forgetting Her. However, when we read Her words, see how accurate they are and just experience Her presence, how can any still feel allegiance toward the False and Jealous One? 

For those who continue to be skeptical... very good.  This was all made up for this piece.  In creating this, I did use some general archetypal symbolism, history of religion and mythology along with items that are (or should be) part of any general education.  The appropriate question to follow up that statement is: why?  Why would anyone be skeptical about the Goddess presented here?  Just because I wrote something stating that it was divinely inspired and the Word of God[dess], why should anyone take it seriously?

My answer to that: outside metaphor, why should anyone take any base for religion seriously?  There are truths within it expressed as metaphor, but to be taken literally, one would be considered quite mad to believe it.  To elaborate, why do we not approach each 'holy' book with the same level of skepticism?  They each have nuggets that are beautiful metaphor, but if taken literally or following their laws and admonitions, have abominable and evil actions done in the name of Good because God said so. 

No one has a problem dismissing what I've written here about the Universe being contained in an egg and that is why we see so much darkness.  Similarly, there are no issues with disregarding Athena being born from Zeus' head.  However, Noah's ark, Moses' escape from Egypt with its 40-year journey, splitting the seas, various plagues, burning bushes and divinely handed-down stone tablets... that's real.  God made the sun stop in place in the sky for Joshua, and then let it continue on its path again; for Muhammad God split the moon in half and rejoined it.  Jesus' miracles are also well-known: water to wine, a couple loaves of bread and fish to feed thousands and walking on water to name a few.  Moses', Muhammad's and Jesus' miracles are 'real', but why?  In non-canonical books, there are angels whose heads are above the skies, walking crosses and bowing standards (banners) - was one of the reasons why they were not included in the canon because limits of credulity were being strained?

To believe biblical accounts as literally true regarding the creation of the Universe and Nature's laws, we will have to believe that a group of tribesmen from millennia ago, who had no real scientific understanding, were generally limited to the couple hundred miles around where they were born, that these people had a better understanding of the Universe and Nature than we do today from our collected millennia of experience and technological advances.  Even children in elementary school [should] have a better understanding of the scope of the Universe than those old tribal members ever could hope to have. 

Literally taking these old books as the basis for modern understanding of Nature and the Universe is wrong for there is no possible way that some of the claims in the books could be correct, which if inerrant would invalidate them as literally God's word; in a similar vein, using them as moral standards shows that there is no real morality outside of God saying who to hate, rape and enslave, such as Moses' admonition to kill all, but those girls who have not known a man so they can be kept by the conquerors - except those that would be offered as a sacrifice to God. 

There is equally an objective reality for the Universe we inhabit, and an objective morality for us to follow.  If we followed the religious books are the ultimate source of information, then you wouldn't be reading this for there have been a long series of medical, technological and scientific advances that enables this communication to happen; they wouldn't have happened if we kept our epistemology limited to religious textual understanding.  Equally, at a moral level, genocide would be the general norm.  We are better than that and have evolved our culture [most of humanity] beyond the divinely-subjective morality and realistically impossible views on existence.  Let us finish casting off the inappropriate lens through which modern religions are seen of true in actuality and see them through the lens of true in metaphor, and then place the remaining religions with myths of the past.