on any desultory glance. (It's also an acquired.. taste) needing wading through metric tons of the deflection of Main Questions about the existence of Anything and ranging widely from that (which alone is, I deem: quite enough to bear Pondering.) Can't go back to square One on the largest 'Issues', so will just drop in the bits that find me in opposition to the POV (and especially the arrogance) of PZ' and cohorts. (From other discussions elsewhere)
(Probably silly to link DC's latest opus here; I am likely the only one here who has acquired the above 'taste' for agitating to get back to the Basic Questions and skip angels-dancing-on-pins doggerel du jour. It's not even a blip on normal radars.)
I've briefly looked-in on Chopra's (now many) essays across the years, but hardly at all, this decade. I think I see what his aim has been, and that he is no Charlatan Heston. My own reservations about "scientific faith" do not derive from whatever has been his gestation, though we seem to agree on many sub-issues: that the [my paraphrases] anthropo-God created by imaginations is, on sober reflection ludicrous, that the word-itself needs probably to just be retired. And: merely dumping that whole model, becoming anti- has no bearing on the Big Questions, (certainly as are not 'answered' merely by omission of the bogus approaches as characterize most-all Corporate/organized religions.) Which, I believe is also Chopra's point--in his own words--in theis PBS airing. He is diplomatic as is required for the audience of PBS (or any other mass medium.) Most people 'have' a 'religion'.
Dunno why PZ would be so dense as to elide The Questions extant, but his personal attacks demonstrate he has never actually followed what Chopra has said in a variety of ways. He clearly has no slightest interest in actually listening calmly/alertly to DC's POV.) And they bring along their *religion-of-atheism, complete with Certainties over matters (their 'faith') that they expect "the magic of Science" must inevitably 'solve'. Am well acquainted with the phenom and with the suppositions.
* Did we'unses not Have the big 'Label' discussion: agnosticism says I Don't Know. a-Theism says "it's all Woo;" I dis-Believe ergo.. You're Wrong (imagining there are really only Two views possible, etc.) That corporate religions are broken is one thesis; whether or not there exists a perpetual Agency (pre- and after our spawned-Universe) is ever a legitimate Query. Never mind trying to assign our local concepts of Form, as the query is in no way related to petty squabbles about My God's Bigger, however perpetual amidst our dominant species.
Did you audition the audio with Kripal in the link?
Methinks that PZ (and group) exemplify the arrogance of ad-hominem/juvenile attack-mode. Chopra has been educating self since a young age; his hypotheses are neither simplistic nor is he didactic in insisting they are more than just a means to encourage people to think anew aka differently, about the significance of our own Consciousness--within a Cosmos which merely seems to be mechanical/material ... and on auto-pilot for the 'duration' (if that word can even apply to an 'Agency" as creates a Time=0 and an elastic-"Space" in which to play.)
The amount of vitriol in the ad hominems surely suggests an emotionally-infantile insecurity in the (apparent beliefs of PZ et al) that their mere (and justified) disdain for the standard religio model: is necessary also sufficient. In sum, re PZ: Methinks the gentleman doth protest too much PZ possesses the familiar stink of Certainty, along with the felt-need to demonize: as usually denotes (unnoticed) feare within.
A listen to that (brief) link: (a calm and serious exchange) probably suffices to limn the basis for the Unanwered Questions about "Why is there Anything at All?" a question which can only emanate via Words communicated amidst Conscious beings. And in a space/time/now add: 'communications==Information theory Continuum, where both space and time may vary (certainly quite A Lot in the first fSec) there exists always the Question about "matters" prior to that Event, (not even to say, perhaps n-such events, even so numerous as to be almost numberless.) We know-not about these but we bloody well can contemplate. Unless cowed into ignoring the Questions, as most do.
tl;dr this topic always Is. As I've frequently commented, we don't know shit about Consciousness (its origins, its possible interconnection even with the 'Rules' of space-time as perceived,) That we Are and are Aware We Are is as pregnant an event as ... the (fortunate) skewing in the %matter/antimatter and all the other physics curiosities.
I am Not 'Certain' about anything relating to the bizarre Fact that {I seem to BE} in some {Here}, amidst septillions of tons of inert mere-matter (all of which exist under myriad Rulez and equations because: math also IS.) But none of the 'material' all around: even knows IT IS. (I only 'believe' that) I comprehend that koan about, "throwing the baby out with the bath water". I can work with that Uncertainty.
Unless and until we 'explain' the Fact of Consciousness, employing the rigors demanded in science >where possible
(Probably silly to link DC's latest opus here; I am likely the only one here who has acquired the above 'taste' for agitating to get back to the Basic Questions and skip angels-dancing-on-pins doggerel du jour. It's not even a blip on normal radars.)
I've briefly looked-in on Chopra's (now many) essays across the years, but hardly at all, this decade. I think I see what his aim has been, and that he is no Charlatan Heston. My own reservations about "scientific faith" do not derive from whatever has been his gestation, though we seem to agree on many sub-issues: that the [my paraphrases] anthropo-God created by imaginations is, on sober reflection ludicrous, that the word-itself needs probably to just be retired. And: merely dumping that whole model, becoming anti- has no bearing on the Big Questions, (certainly as are not 'answered' merely by omission of the bogus approaches as characterize most-all Corporate/organized religions.) Which, I believe is also Chopra's point--in his own words--in theis PBS airing. He is diplomatic as is required for the audience of PBS (or any other mass medium.) Most people 'have' a 'religion'.
Dunno why PZ would be so dense as to elide The Questions extant, but his personal attacks demonstrate he has never actually followed what Chopra has said in a variety of ways. He clearly has no slightest interest in actually listening calmly/alertly to DC's POV.) And they bring along their *religion-of-atheism, complete with Certainties over matters (their 'faith') that they expect "the magic of Science" must inevitably 'solve'. Am well acquainted with the phenom and with the suppositions.
* Did we'unses not Have the big 'Label' discussion: agnosticism says I Don't Know. a-Theism says "it's all Woo;" I dis-Believe ergo.. You're Wrong (imagining there are really only Two views possible, etc.) That corporate religions are broken is one thesis; whether or not there exists a perpetual Agency (pre- and after our spawned-Universe) is ever a legitimate Query. Never mind trying to assign our local concepts of Form, as the query is in no way related to petty squabbles about My God's Bigger, however perpetual amidst our dominant species.
Did you audition the audio with Kripal in the link?
Methinks that PZ (and group) exemplify the arrogance of ad-hominem/juvenile attack-mode. Chopra has been educating self since a young age; his hypotheses are neither simplistic nor is he didactic in insisting they are more than just a means to encourage people to think anew aka differently, about the significance of our own Consciousness--within a Cosmos which merely seems to be mechanical/material ... and on auto-pilot for the 'duration' (if that word can even apply to an 'Agency" as creates a Time=0 and an elastic-"Space" in which to play.)
The amount of vitriol in the ad hominems surely suggests an emotionally-infantile insecurity in the (apparent beliefs of PZ et al) that their mere (and justified) disdain for the standard religio model: is necessary also sufficient. In sum, re PZ: Methinks the gentleman doth protest too much PZ possesses the familiar stink of Certainty, along with the felt-need to demonize: as usually denotes (unnoticed) feare within.
A listen to that (brief) link: (a calm and serious exchange) probably suffices to limn the basis for the Unanwered Questions about "Why is there Anything at All?" a question which can only emanate via Words communicated amidst Conscious beings. And in a space/time/now add: 'communications==Information theory Continuum, where both space and time may vary (certainly quite A Lot in the first fSec) there exists always the Question about "matters" prior to that Event, (not even to say, perhaps n-such events, even so numerous as to be almost numberless.) We know-not about these but we bloody well can contemplate. Unless cowed into ignoring the Questions, as most do.
tl;dr this topic always Is. As I've frequently commented, we don't know shit about Consciousness (its origins, its possible interconnection even with the 'Rules' of space-time as perceived,) That we Are and are Aware We Are is as pregnant an event as ... the (fortunate) skewing in the %matter/antimatter and all the other physics curiosities.
I am Not 'Certain' about anything relating to the bizarre Fact that {I seem to BE} in some {Here}, amidst septillions of tons of inert mere-matter (all of which exist under myriad Rulez and equations because: math also IS.) But none of the 'material' all around: even knows IT IS. (I only 'believe' that) I comprehend that koan about, "throwing the baby out with the bath water". I can work with that Uncertainty.
Unless and until we 'explain' the Fact of Consciousness, employing the rigors demanded in science >where possible