Law of One

[MonoAccipiter]

And good on you. I know you think someone who believes in something that is an impossibility is probably mad, but that is a normal train of thought.

That's a pretty huge assumption to make from what little I wrote on the matter. You don't see me describing what you are thinking, so why do you feel the need to do it with me?

 

 

Who quoted and then quoted?... ect., ect. Someone had to begin without quoting anyone.

Ra was quoted. The book in question is a transcript of things Ra supposedly has said. Philosophical thought was brought up as a byword for being open to supernatural matters. It has very little to do with that. 

 

 

You did a little. lol I mean, I read between the lines.

I tried my best not to, in addressing everything in a hypothetical manner. If that is commenting on its validity, then you read a lot more between my lines than I think between them.

 

The first part of my post took problem with using the term "philosophical thinking" about something that has barely anything to do with philosophy or its methods, as I pointed out it seems more about being told truths from entities than attaining them through rational thought, which is what philosophy does.

 

The second part addressed that it seems unreasonable to expect a discussion about the potentiality of something not commonly shared when that potentiality only applies if it is truth, and that if this were truth it is such an all-encompassing manner of truth that it reveals its own potential. Perhaps a discussion of interpretation would be more fruitful, but even then it remains that it is only interesting once you believe in it. You would hardly expect a firm atheist to be interested in how to be live by the rules of a god they vehemently deny, or vice versa. 

 

 

Yes, and most people would continue to call it fake even if the footage was 100% real and verified. So why should anyone even bother, real or not? 

The real question is what the point of asserting what people would or would not do in the case of 100% verified evidence is, when 100% verified evidence of the matter does not exist. The fact that you think something is completely believable does not make it 100% verified. That would mean it is beyond even unreasonable doubt. The same would of course apply if it was me instead of you.  

 

The reason why people bother is because they often have a fundamental longing for answers about the world they live in, like Camus points out in The Myth of Sisyphus. They want purpose. That can be something simple, such as success, or something more complex, such as living according to the views of a religion, or how the universe works. Different people feel a different need to think through that, and arrive at completely different conclusions as to what it might be. My point was more that if ghosts are real, we have already had people using their "potential" for years. You seem to mistake my comment about what you can achieve in discussing the potential of something uncertain for being on the point of attempting to find out whether they are real. The latter was not at all what I was commenting on.

[Guest]

That's a pretty huge assumption to make from what little I wrote on the matter. You don't see me describing what you are thinking, so why do you feel the need to do it with me?

Please tell me what you really think. You haven't denied it yet. :P Honestly though, the "probably" looks like it is in the wrong place so I'll fix it.

 

This is my opinion, but I don't think you can be open and skeptical at the same time. If you are in the least bit open, then I think at your core you are not skeptical at all. If you'd like to tell me how you see it, then please go ahead.

 

Ra was quoted. The book in question is a transcript of things Ra supposedly has said. Philosophical thought was brought up as a byword for being open to supernatural matters. It has very little to do with that.

You know I was merely saying that you don't have to quote a philosopher to be philosophical. It was nothing more or nothing less.

 

The reason why people bother is because they often have a fundamental longing for answers about the world they live in

I understand this, and you are right.

 

You seem to mistake my comment about what you can achieve in discussing the potential of something uncertain for being on the point of attempting to find out whether they are real.

Okay, but I don't feel like we are using hardly any of this potential. The very end of the potential currently reaches parapsychology and perhaps xenoarchaeology. I understand your comment, but how do you think people can harness more potential when it's not taken seriously and/or it's obviously hard to measure? We are not talking about things that are said to exist on our "plane" for most part. Edited April 19, 2017 by Guest

[Mator]

If you are in the least bit open, then I think at your core you are not skeptical at all.

In my opinion, the appropriate antonym for "skeptical" is "gullible", not open.

 

Honestly, I find it pretty lame that you and Tech have to alienate anyone from this discussion who isn't willing to assume the material is true.  That's not really the basis for any kind of "discussion", so I have to wonder why this topic exists at all.  It seems to me like this topic is here to have your spiritual beliefs reinforced, not questioned.  That's not a "discussion" the people here are interested in participating in.  This topic would better serve it's purpose on a spiritual discussion board with people who are more "open" to it.

[TechAngel85]

Sorry for my gaps, I joined this late and haven't been over everything. So they are just automatically reincarnated because they are too young? I was honestly expecting something more complex and intricate based on the other material. Is it wrong to question the simplicity here?

Well it's not really as simple as "BAM"...reincarnated. For the young souls, who are not aware of the process of spiritual growth after death, the..."caretakers" (a term I'm just using) are the one that process your life experience, help to set up your next incarnation, and the decide the catalysts that will be used for teaching in that incarnation.

 

So they come back without seeing anything? Or is this like an out-of-body experience if you will? Out-of-body is something that always intrigues me due to a story I was told by a relative. My great-aunt was apparently "clinically dead" when she experienced walking down a long winding orchard, and at the very end, she spoke to someone she didn't recognize. They told her it wasn't her time and they were waiting for "Kathy". A few weeks later her cousin Kathy died out of the blue. I can't say anything about this, but it is certainly interesting regardless of if you could class it as coincidental or not. It sounds like a bloody huge coincidence to me regardless. She also said that she would never be afraid of dying because of how "beautiful" it all seemed.

The way the Law of One explains ghosts leads me to believe it's more of an out-of-body experience. Though the yellow-ray body dies it can not be "deactivated" due to the extreme will of the entity, is how Ra describes it. Basically the body dies, but the yellow-ray mind and spirit remains. Yellow-ray is just our current density (third).

 

That's a beautiful story and I would say that your great-aunt met one of the "caretakers" who operate under the Guardians. These are the entities in the quoted text: "Firstly, there are those directly under the Guardians who are responsible for the incarnation patterns of those incarnating automatically, that is, without conscious self-awareness of the process of spiritual evolution. You may call these beings angelic if you prefer. They are, shall we say, “local” or of your planetary sphere."

 

Another interesting thing that Law of One briefly talks about is that astral projection, for entities of higher density, can be used as a form of advanced travel. Basically it's described that you project your mind and spirit to a location and through the will of your consciousness you can teleport your body to that location in an instant. This form of travel is used by Ra.

 

When would be become evolved enough to see everything? You are not talking about Darwin-like evolutionary theory, right? You talking about spiritual evolution or ascension to a new phase?

No, not Darwin evolution. It's an evolution of consciousness. Graduating from density to density is more of a graduation of consciousness than that of body. This is an ability of those of fifth density according to the Law of One material. This means we would still have to finish this third density and complete the forth until we would have such abilities of consciousness to reach into time/space with ease.

 

Not throwing anything around, but as I understand, energy can't be created or destroyed. Perpetual motion can't exist without an infinite energy source. What is supplying this source of infinite energy?

My understanding is that it is recycled and that energy is never truly depleted. It's only transformed and recycled. As it is "depleted" to our eyes and understanding it simply moves from space/time into time/space. This process of energy transfer can also happen from time/space into space/time. Therefore, it is simply transferred back and forth.

 

As for recycling think of heating a pot of water on the electric stove. The electricity is generated by the water of a dam. This electricity heats the coils on the stove. The heat energy from the coils boils the water. The water turns into steam vapor in the air. A few molecules of that vapor eventually condenses into rain which fills the lake that powers the dam. The energy is simply recycled.

 

Therefore energy is simply recycled or transferred. This is getting more into sciences since the Law of One doesn't really talk about this much. My views on energy are a bit of the edge of modern science and could be considered esoteric vs the common views.

[TechAngel85]

In my opinion, the appropriate antonym for "skeptical" is "gullible", not open.

 

Honestly, I find it pretty lame that you and Tech have to alienate anyone from this discussion who isn't willing to assume the material is true.  That's not really the basis for any kind of "discussion", so I have to wonder why this topic exists at all.  It seems to me like this topic is here to have your spiritual beliefs reinforced, not questioned.  That's not a "discussion" the people here are interested in participating in.  This topic would better serve it's purpose on a spiritual discussion board with people who are more "open" to it.

No alienation, but at the same time I don't understand the reason you (and others) feel the need to basically attack another's beliefs simply because you don't believe the same. Attack probably isn't the best word to use here, but I don't have the vocabulary to come up with anything else at the end of what was a very long day. The entire first page of this discussion was nothing but a bash on the material, a bash on my beliefs, and, in your own words, a questioning of my beliefs. Feeling the need to question someone's beliefs is probably one of the worse things to do it a person, in my book. You don't know their life experiences nor their personal story to know what shaped them into the person they are. Nor have you walked in their shoes for you to be able to understand how that person arrived at their beliefs. One thing I never consciously do is question someone's beliefs. If anything, I ask questions to understand because I am honestly curious to know how they arrived at their beliefs. For example, it's most fascinating to me how you believe in God or a higher power, but don't believe in ghosts. This is because in my mind the process of believing in one is nearly identical as believing in the other. That is why I asked about it. However, what I felt like I received on that first page and even now is intolerance.

 

I want to point out that none of this was said out of anger so please don't read it in such a tone. I'm simply being honest. I'm actually quite tired and ready of bed, but I wished for you to know how I view your version of discussing in this topic. To me it wasn't discussion. It as attack and defense. Though, as I said in an earlier post, I was kinda of expecting it and was just wanting to get past it. That sort of thing always happen with these types of discussions on the internet regardless of where they're started.

 

The point of this topic (philosophical might not have been the best wording) was to discuss the material in a sense "if it were true how would it all work, how would life be for us, how would we evolve as humans along this path, how would we connect with one another on deeper levels, etc and so on". But to have that sort of discussion you have to work on the basis that it is true. That doesn't mean believing it is true, but rather simply imagining it being true. As I mentioned before, it's rather simple to do as the majority of my college classmates were able to do it without attacking the information itself. SparrowPrince has been doing rather well with his line of questioning. However, in this regard I've sort of become the professor filling in the holes rather than one of the "discussees", but that's okay. ::

[Guest]

In my opinion, the appropriate antonym for "skeptical" is "gullible", not open.

So who is deceiving or tricking me? Come to think of it, I'm so stupid for not thinking they could hide someone in those cupboards at my local séance room. I go twice a week and that's two whole shillings down the drain. Eight shillings a month wasted!

 

Honestly, I find it pretty lame that you and Tech have to alienate anyone from this discussion who isn't willing to assume the material is true. That's not really the basis for any kind of "discussion", so I have to wonder why this topic exists at all. It seems to me like this topic is here to have your spiritual beliefs reinforced, not questioned. That's not a "discussion" the people here are interested in participating in. This topic would better serve it's purpose on a spiritual discussion board with people who are more "open" to it.

You are right, if someone isn't interested in watching terrorists take over Nakatomi Plaza they probably should avoid Die Hard.

 

Edit: Tech I'll get back to you soon like before. It's late again obviously.

Edited April 19, 2017 by Guest

[baronaatista]

'Feeling the need to question someone's beliefs is probably one of the worse things to do it a person, in my book.'

 

I think this really gets to why I was arguing as I was earlier.  I'm really not sure how any of that came off as an 'attack'...

 

Why is it harmful to question someone's beliefs?  

 

The questioning of beliefs is more or less what the entire process of science is about; and it is the very thing that produced the modern world. 

 

If we hold our beliefs precious to us, then how are we to grow, change, or learn?  The process of growth and learning is synonymous with questioning ones beliefs - it is only through being open to being wrong that you can learn what  actual truth is.

 

'But to have that sort of discussion you have to work on the basis that it is true.'

 

You are literally saying the only discussion you want to have on this topic is one that begins with it being true.  Don't you think that sounds like you may have a little confirmation bias?  Which is why it becomes frustrating to hear you then bring up 'science' in order to 'confirm' your beliefs.  Which is the opposite of science.

 

You want to believe this stuff.  It couldn't be clearer.

 

Denying legitimate science, mis-understanding the process by which it happens, then using pseudo-science to 'confirm' your beliefs; all on a computer on the internet on a messageboard... about a video game... where we've created a simulated world inside a box... none of which would exist if 'mainstream' scientists didn't understand the laws of physics and molecular structures to such a fine degree as to make all of that possible...

 

It just speaks to what I believe is an issue right now with society(ies)... What we really need right now is to come together, to work to make a better world for absolutely everyone.  Yet we remain divided, because we can't agree on the most basic things, because there is so much mis-information, and it is ever-easier to only listen to what we want to hear, and because no one ever wants to admit they were wrong - thus, actual conversation is impossible.

Edited April 19, 2017 by baronaatista

[MonoAccipiter]

Please tell me what you really think. You haven't denied it yet. :P Honestly though, the "probably" looks like it is in the wrong place so I'll fix it.

 

This is my opinion, but I don't think you can be open and skeptical at the same time. If you are in the least bit open, then I think at your core you are not skeptical at all. If you'd like to tell me how you see it, then please go ahead.

I never claimed to be open. I even stated that I was sceptical. There is a pretty large difference between being sceptical of something and being convinced that everyone who does not share your view is mad.

 

You know I was merely saying that you don't have to quote a philosopher to be philosophical. It was nothing more or nothing less.

Talking about large open questions is not philosophical, that is a huge misconception. There is a method to it. There are proofs in philosophy, which can be assessed and refuted. They do not base their reasoning on the words of a potential being, with alleged superior knowledge. Even Socratic fables are not content to take the words of gods as proof for their reasoning. Take the Phaedrus dialogue for example, Socrates does not conclude that love is good simply because the gods say so, he instead assumes that they would perhaps say so for a reason, and then attempts to discover that reason through the use of dialectical logic, not being satisfied it is true until he can prove it to himself. 

 

Okay, but I don't feel like we are using hardly any of this potential. The very end of the potential currently reaches parapsychology and perhaps xenoarchaeology. I understand your comment, but how do you think people can harness more potential when it's not taken seriously and/or it's obviously hard to measure? We are not talking about things that are said to exist on our "plane" for most part.

Again, what would be the potential of something untrue? The question of its validity must come first. There is no point in assessing the potential of something that might not be true. Descartes does not conclude that their is an exterior world based on there being a benevolent God, before he has proven that God exists and is benevolent. He realises that the former argument relies on the latter, and as such cannot be deemed of any worth until the latter is proven. I do not think people can "harness more potential when it's not taken seriously" or any such thing. That is precisely my point. So long as most people are unconvinced of its reality, its potential is virtually non-existent for them. There is no potential in parapsychology until we are convinced of the truth of parapsychology, which is why its main concern should be establishing its own truthfulness. Assuming that it can simply ignore that step is preposterous. 

 

So who is deceiving or tricking me?

Why does it need to be a who? It can be your senses, your mental state, the world around you, your societal biases et cetera. Mator is right to assess that the opposite of sceptical is not open. The opposite of being sceptical is being doubtless, believing, unquestioning, or even gullible. The opposite of open, in the way that you seem to be using it, would be being unmovable in one's believes. I don't think requiring proof before believing in something such as this is being unmovable. 

 

Why is it harmful to question someone's beliefs?  

Moreover, if there was no questioning of beliefs, every misconception would still reign wherever it had first occurred. This could be directly harmful to society, and a large deterrent on any form of progress. Never questioning self-held beliefs can also lead (depending on whether your first belief was the most true) to a state of being ignorant of oneself, which can be blissful, but it can also collapse in a rather disastrous manner. This is what leads to an existential crisis in some individuals. The fact that this doubt happens upon people differently is probably much of the reason for why the majority never questioned things such as god-invested power in the nobility over longs periods of human history. However, I maintain that anyone is more than welcome to believe in this, or any other form of religious knowledge, but expecting other people to engage in a conversation about its potential, or even alter society on the assumption that it is true, without questioning it, is what seems very strange to me.

[TechAngel85]

'Feeling the need to question someone's beliefs is probably one of the worse things to do it a person, in my book.'

 

I think this really gets to why I was arguing as I was earlier.  I'm really not sure how any of that came off as an 'attack'...

It's wasn't so much you as it was Mator who was making some personal jabs at the content which reflects back onto the people who have specific belief systems. I hold no hard feelings or grudges, though.

 

Why is it harmful to question someone's beliefs?  

 

The questioning of beliefs is more or less what the entire process of science is about; and it is the very thing that produced the modern world. 

 

If we hold our beliefs precious to us, then how are we to grow, change, or learn?  The process of growth and learning is synonymous with questioning ones beliefs - it is only through being open to being wrong that you can learn what  actual truth is.

Let me answer this for both you and Mono, but you've answered your own question in a way.

 

First understand that this is not science. It's a belief system akin to religion (but not a religion) where science can not prove nor disprove the mast majority of the information unless you look to the fringe sciences which most scientific minds write off. This has been well discussed already. Mainstream science simply is not advanced enough at this point in time to provide accurate data on the information anymore it can tell us whether or not the miracles God and Jesus performed where true or not. Hence why I would prefer to leave science out of it because it just becomes a "he said, she said" dueling match.

 

Questioning someone's beliefs should be done on your own time in your own space. As I said, you don't know that person's life story which led them to their belief structures. If you're curious, then ask them questions in a positive light to try to understand their beliefs. However, attempting to tear down someone's beliefs will almost always in end negative feelings and emotions because you're not just attempting to tear down the information you received. You're also tearing down and telling that person that their experiences in life that led to those beliefs were wrong. You can not separate one from the other because true beliefs are rooted in experiences. Who are you to judge the experiences of another person? I will post a few of my favorite quotes about judgement for your entertainment pleasure:

• "Judge not, that you be not judged. For with what judgment you judge, you will be judged; and with the measure you use, it will be measured back to you." -Jesus
• "We can never judge the lives of others, because each person knows only their own pain and renunciation.” -Paulo Coelho
• "It's not given to people to judge what's right or wrong. People have eternally been mistaken and will be mistaken, and in nothing more than in what they consider right and wrong.” -Leo Tolstoy
• "When you judge others, you do not define them, you define yourself” -Earl Nightingale
• "Don't judge a man by his opinions, but what his opinions have made of him.” -Georg Lichtenberg

I digress... With that said, I believe is it healthy and necessary for one to question their own beliefs. Without doing this there is no growth as you have mentioned. However, it's not our place as individuals to question another person's beliefs because true beliefs are those things and ideas that align to an individual's own spirit; their sense of right or wrong, appropriate or inappropriate. Only the individual holding the beliefs can truly question the beliefs because they are the one that had the experiences which founded those beliefs.

 

The one thing that seemed to be skipped over and ignored is my saying that I have already completed this process for myself. It's not anyone's place to try to get anyone else to question their personal beliefs. Sure, offer another view point, but without tearing at their the other person's beliefs by making it a "you're wrong, I'm right" match. I have already had the experiences, read the information, tested the information within my own spirit, and aligned my beliefs where I felt appropriate to my personal walk in life. I have been sitting on this stuff for months (nearly a year now), and other personal beliefs that align with the material I've had for many, many years now before find the material. I don't need to have all the flaws with how it conflicts with conventional science pointed out because I already know this. This gets to your next comments....

 

'But to have that sort of discussion you have to work on the basis that it is true.'

 

You are literally saying the only discussion you want to have on this topic is one that begins with it being true.  Don't you think that sounds like you may have a little confirmation bias?  Which is why it becomes frustrating to hear you then bring up 'science' in order to 'confirm' your beliefs.  Which is the opposite of science.

 

You want to believe this stuff.  It couldn't be clearer.

 

Denying legitimate science, mis-understanding the process by which it happens, then using pseudo-science to 'confirm' your beliefs; all on a computer on the internet on a messageboard... about a video game... where we've created a simulated world inside a box... none of which would exist if 'mainstream' scientists didn't understand the laws of physics and molecular structures to such a fine degree as to make all of that possible...

Yes, that is the point of the discussion. As I've said above, I've completed the process of testing the information for my own personal beliefs and need no confirmation. I am sound in my assessments for my personal experience and, thus, no longer require to question the material. Thus, that was not supposed to be the purpose of the topic. If anyone else needs to stack the material up against your own personal life experience for your own assessment, then I encourage them do so but know in doing so is a personal experience between you and your spirit (I would suggest to actually read the material and not just go off of what has been posted here before doing so). I'm perfectly willing to listen to anyone's views, else I wouldn't have replied to any of the science related posts. However, don't expect me to be willing to bend on my own personal views when I've already completed my personal assessment and refined my beliefs over many months of inwardly searching. As I go back and read, this is my own fault for not being more clear in the opening post on the direction I wished the topic to take.

 

I'd like to point out that I wasn't the one that brought science into the discussion. I merely responded. Unlike many, and there's nothing wrong with those that choose to do so, I rarely base my beliefs on what is provable by science. So the whole "using pseudo-science to confirm" does not register in my case. In my own life experiences I've found that trusting my own intuition and testing things against my spirit has been far more enlightening and accurate for me, personally. If I only listened to science, I wouldn't believe in anything of a spiritual nature: ghosts, life after death, a higher power, etc.

 

My personal belief of what's wrong with the world is there is too much outwardly seeking and not enough inwardly seeking. In older times we balanced mixing sciences with the spiritual. This eventually shifted to "all head, all thought" and we stopped truly seeking the spiritual aspects of life. Now we seek what can only be explained through science and reject or put to the side anything that can't be explained. To quote one of my favorite movies, "…too many mind. Mind the sword, mind the people watch, mind the enemy, too many mind.  No mind."

 

When we let go of our minds, our thoughts, and find a place of calm mind it is in that place where we find our true selves. Not who the world says we are or should or shouldn't be. Another one of the core principles to most religions is that in order to help others, you must first help yourself. We all believe we have the answers and that those answers are the right answers, but what is right for yourself may not be right for everyone or anyone else. So before we can help others, we must first look inward, come to know our demons, resolve them, and seek the person that we truly are. "And why do you look at the speck in your brother’s eye, but do not consider the plank in your own eye?" There's a hundred different ways of saying this same thing, but they all say to look inward before looking outward. Most of the world today reverses this concept. They take what they find outwardly and project it to who they think they are or want to be inwardly. I believe if this is reserved back, then we would not project ourselves and our beliefs onto others because they would be our personal inwardly beliefs; not what we discovered out in the world. We would then be sound in our differences and be accepting of those differences without the need for conflict. Instead of projecting what we received from the world back into it which is intolerance, fear, uncertainty, negative emotions, and so much more we would start projecting the true emotions from within us into the world which are hope, love, and unity. This would change the world as we know it. The world doesn't need more of what it is giving us project back into it. It needs acceptance, forgiveness, loving others, and servicing others without the expectation of return. Doing these things will naturally produce a better world. Of course, this is all just how I see things from my own prospective.

[MonoAccipiter]

Questioning someone's beliefs should be done on your own time in your own space. As I said, you don't know that person's life story which led them to their belief structures. If you're curious, then ask them questions in a positive light to try to understand their beliefs. However, attempting to tear down someone's beliefs will almost always in end negative feelings and emotions because you're not just attempting to tear down the information you received. You're also tearing down and telling that person that their experiences in life that led to those beliefs were wrong. You can not separate one from the other because true beliefs are rooted in experiences. Who are you to judge the experiences of another person? I will post a few of my favorite quotes about judgement for your entertainment pleasure:

• "Judge not, that you be not judged. For with what judgment you judge, you will be judged; and with the measure you use, it will be measured back to you." -Jesus
• "We can never judge the lives of others, because each person knows only their own pain and renunciation.” -Paulo Coelho
• "It's not given to people to judge what's right or wrong. People have eternally been mistaken and will be mistaken, and in nothing more than in what they consider right and wrong.” -Leo Tolstoy
• "When you judge others, you do not define them, you define yourself” -Earl Nightingale
• "Don't judge a man by his opinions, but what his opinions have made of him.” -Georg Lichtenberg

I degrees... With that said, I believe is it healthy and necessary for one to question their own beliefs. Without doing this there is no growth as you have mentioned. However, it's not our place as individuals to question another person's beliefs because true beliefs are those things and ideas that align to an individual's own spirit; their sense of right or wrong, appropriate or inappropriate. Only the individual holding the beliefs can truly question the beliefs because they are the one that had the experiences which founded those beliefs.

 

The one thing that seemed to be skipped over and ignored is my saying that I have already completed this process for myself. It's not anyone's place to try to get anyone else to question their personal beliefs. I have already had the experiences, read the information, tested the information within my own spirit, and aligned my beliefs where I felt appropriate to my personal walk in life. I have been sitting on this stuff for months (nearly a year now), and other personal beliefs that align with the material I've had for many, many years now. I don't need to have all the flaws with how it conflicts with conventional science pointed out to me because I already know this. This gets to your next comments....

You seem to confuse questioning held beliefs with passing judgement on the person who has attained that belief. I can see how some of the things Mator said was akin to passing judgement on the person believing these things, such as when he suggested you should be embarrassed for believing in them, but I intentionally avoided that because it is very unnecessary. 

 

I don't judge ignorance of anything very harshly. Your exposure to certain kinds of beliefs is very much pertinent to your situation, which also happens to be completely unique. What happens in the sentence I highlighted is not so much a requirement in criticising something, as it is a potential outcome if the person being critical is more interested in assessing their own superiority than actually dealing with the matter at hand. This being said, there is a degree of embarrassment often bound to occur if something you believe in is torn down, but that is mostly tied to your own assessment of what it says about your character. Yes, declaring that a belief is false, will entail that the experiences or information that has led you to believe in it also must be misleading, but again, this is only detrimental to you insofar as you let it. You did not choose those experiences anymore than I would have chosen mine. What you can choose is whether to consider criticism and attempt to reason with it, taking in the whole of the evidence available to you, and participating in an attempt to discern truth where none have any right to claim wisdom from simply being closer in their initial guess. Whether this makes you happy is very hard to say, and as such it could only really be called a requirement if you want to convince someone else of this truth, discuss said truth with someone, or you want to alter society based on that truth. Which is why I said that what I consider strange is not that you want to believe in it, but only that you want to discuss it without the necessary step of discussing its validity.

 

A demonstration of the difference between level-headed and fair criticism, and the likes of which sinks to mockery, is the difference between the approach most atheist philosophers took in the past, and that which has been adopted by the New Atheism movement. Just look at the difference in book naming. People like Bertrand Russel wrote such books as Why I Am Not a Christian, which clearly states its personal motivation in the title, whereas today, one of the most popular books on the subject is called The God Delusion, already establishing what it thinks of people holding the opposite viewpoint in the title. The former approach is very non-intrusive, and can hardly be called an attack, simply concerned with proof that has seemed vital to the author, whereas the latter immediately announces the flaw in its opposition. That is, as I have mentioned, not at all a necessity.

 

When quoting Leo Tolstoy, as much as I respect the Russian gentleman, one should be aware that this is the same individual who insisted that medicine was a useless science because there was no such thing as a common denominator between the states of several sick people. Things were a lot different back in the 1800s, and he was at times convinced that in almost all things we should leave it for God to decide what should happen. Adopting this approach would probably never have done much for those poor folks who were not born into the nobility. Quotes can certainly be inspirational things, but there is no added weight to what they are saying simply because they are said by people who have accomplished something admirable. However, as I said, you seem to mistake judging beliefs in terms of their truth, with judging individuals in terms of their worth. There is no such inference of the latter from the former, that we can say they are necessarily connected.

 

I react to something you said later on however. Specifically the mention of beliefs aligning with people's conception of right and wrong. You do realise that arguing that we have an innate conception of right and wrong would necessitate that something gave us that (and that it is non-deceiving) and that you seem to argue for the validity of the things that gave us that by referring to our innate conception of right and wrong. That is circular reasoning. Not to mention the fact that believing we have an innate sense of right and wrong seems contrary to what history has taught us about cultural development, or the fact that there are different things considered moral in different parts of the world to this day. It is also worth mentioning that it presupposes this sense of right and wrong is intrinsically correct, which again assumes there is a universal law of right and wrong, something only possible within a belief system, several of which disagree on what that law is. There is a virtually an ocean of issues with that statement.

 

 

Only the individual holding the beliefs can truly question the beliefs because they are the one that had the experiences which founded those beliefs.

This makes little sense. Favouring experience in such a fashion presupposes that a human being is undeceiveable, or in the very least that it has the ability to discern between truth and untruth without the assistance of reason, something which has been widely disproved, and should be readily apparent as an impossibility. There is no connection between the observer of happenstance and the ability to assess that event. That is at best entirely contingent. If we are to argue that everyone is in possession of the same ability to assess evidence, then we need to allow reason back into the fold, and when we do that, we cannot dismiss the problems posited by its application, because logic is the foundation of reason. Thus we are left with option of either dismissing reason and relying on a deceiveable human being, or allowing reason back in, and being challenged by its logic. In short, we doubt everything other than the fact that we doubt, or we trust in the full sum of our logic, and need to follow where it leads us. Thus there is no middleground where we can randomly discard evidence based on what class of truth it pertains to, and if we are not to doubt in everything, then we must allow that anything truthful should be able to overcome the challenges of reason, whether they come from the person possessing the evidence or not. 

 

I completely fail to see how inward searching, directly presupposing that there is a deposit of truth within, which is circular argumentation as it is relies on the beliefs that inward searching is said to validate; should provide you with with any form irrefutable, as well as unpresentable, answers. They would in that case be based on reason, which would consist of proofs, and could be presented as well as refuted. You mention intuition, but intuition is not assessment of complex truths, it is the starting point of a simple truth. For example, I can intuit that I, or perhaps some other entity controlling me, doubt, because even if I doubt everything, that would still be something I could affirm that I am doing, and from that I can deduce several other truths. I can also intuit that I am able to be deceived, because when I do my ear training, I sometime mistake the chord of e for the chord of e minor. However, that is all based on assuming the mantle of rationalism, which is actually quite the leap of faith to make without any evidence, and why you rarely see someone claim the truth of something because they can intuit it is so. But as you can see, intuition is based on a relation that can be described, I cannot say that I doubt because I feel like I doubt, and in presenting the reason for why I make that intuition, the possibility is opened up for criticism. Which is why someone can clearly prove my intuition wrong if I said that I saw a sunflower today and intuited that all flowers are green and yellow.

 

 

 In my own life experiences I've found that trusting my own intuition and testing things against my spirit has been far more enlightening and accurate for me.

If your measure of accuracy is not science or its means of observation, or subject to logic, what remains as a measure is your spirit, which would be a terrible judge of the truths it has presented to you in the first place. What if a prophet were to argue that he had been told certain truths by God, and that he had verified these truths by asking God if they were true? Does that suddenly mean it is true?

 

 

If I only listened to science, I wouldn't believe in anything of a spiritual nature: ghosts, life after death, a higher power, etc.

No, you would be sceptical of any evidence that seem to suggest ghosts are real, discerning between proof and unreliable evidence, as well as being aware of the fact that life after death or the existence higher power remains no more proven by one religious text than another, the validity of which could be claimed by just about anyone. You probably also be knowledgeable of the fact that science is unable to fully disprove either of those suppositions, but is fully able to refute some their proofs, the others being refutable through logic, if they happen to be untrue. It would also remain of interest to you to determine whether the proofs for what seems reasonable as a belief to you can be refuted, because a follower of science would be interested in truth. There are several Christians who believe in science for instance.

EDIT: Actually, that last paragraph is not really true, as I misread what you were saying as "If I only trusted science," which was clearly not what you said. It remains as an assessment of what reasonable doubt still allows you to hold though.

Edited April 19, 2017 by MonoAccipiter

[Mator]

You seem to confuse questioning held beliefs with passing judgement on the person who has attained that belief. I can see how some of the things Mator said was akin to passing judgement on the person believing these things, such as when he suggested you should be embarrassed for believing in them, but I intentionally avoided that because it is very unnecessary.

To clarify my statements here, my statements were not made in the intent of passing judgement, but rather an observation that the general response of society (as I have observed it) to beliefs such as this is one of ridicule.  The act of having a belief privately is not necessarily embarrassing, but when you present that belief to the public and it strongly differs from what the public considers "normal" or "mainstream" you may open yourself to embarrassing situations.  The particular belief in UFOs and New Age spiritual movements are the kinds of things that leads our modern society to label people as "nutjobs".

 

That, of course, does not make the belief necessarily false.  There have been many times throughout history when the majority has been wrong (e.g. Darwin's theory of evolution, the Salem witch trials, etc).  That said, I think it is important for people to recognize and understand that if they hold a belief that strongly differs from what the general public considers "normal", it may not be in their best interest to parade those beliefs out in the open.  Doing so may cause them to lose the respect of their peers, or subject them to public ridicule - neither of which are particularly fun.

 

Honestly, I think that the creation of this topic was a very naive decision of Tech's part, because it will affect how certain people in the community view him and the STEP project.  Tech's personal spiritual beliefs don't really belong here on the STEP forums, and sharing them can only be detrimental to his reputation and the reputation of STEP as a whole.

Edited April 19, 2017 by Mator

[baronaatista]

As I've said above, I've completed the process of testing the information for my own personal beliefs and need no confirmation. I am sound in my assessments for my personal experience and, thus, no longer require to question the material. 

 

I really don't want to pile on here, and I'm certainly not attempting to cause  you any harm/frustration;  I'll probably leave this as my final comment.

 

You continually seem to talk around my main point;  perhaps you didn't bring up science directly, but these texts and the 'evidence' presented by supporters do directly reference things which science has much to say about, and happen to contradict it in some pretty major areas.

 

In a world so dominated by the obvious evidence of the massive power of the scientific process - to not discuss this is asking for quite a lot in my opinion.  Your statement here is literally what I was describing earlier - you don't want to have a conversation, you want to sit in an echo chamber.  

 

I find this statement interesting in regards to the discussion of 'openness' earlier.  You would describe yourself as open-minded?  Yet this statement is the exact opposite of that.  

 

You are suggesting that you have done the review, and accepted the truth of this document.  Yet the material it touches is vast - there are people who spend their entire lives studying just one of the subjects that these texts just casually tosses out.  You truly believe your assessment is equally as valid?  You truly believe that you aren't just choosing to believe what you want to, and only reading or thinking about material in a way that supports that?  Is there any new evidence or new view/explanation of the evidence that could change your mind? Is it not possible to take benefit from the spiritual/philosphical teachings without buying the stuff that contradicts modern science?  Are you certain that you are even accurately and completely interpreting this work in the first place, and not just making your own version of it (ie. practicing exactly the same confirmation-bias that you are already doing with the 'facts' directly to the 'teachings' themselves)?

 

As for the offence part...

Honestly I do feel Mator has been perhaps unnecessarily condescending at times.  However, I can't deny that I essentially feel the same way - it does seem ridiculous to me, and I'm not sure that pointing that out is truly a negative thing to do.  

I contend that if claiming your beliefs are ridiculous makes you feel uneasy - that is a sign that you aren't as sure as you claim to be, and that you would likely benefit from a little more of the 'inward searching' you claim to have already 'completed' - and probably some outward searching as well.

 

If someone accuses me of something or claims something that I am truly sure of - their claims have essentially no impact.  If someone says something that I know is true (or has truth to it) however but don't want to admit to myself, that is when I feel insecure.  It will often take time and serious reflection to work past that 'hurt' to be able to see the truth in what was said - and it requires an openness to the possibility that I was wrong to even begin the process of reflection.

[MonoAccipiter]

@Mator: While to me, that's a rather strange argument to make, viz. that someone should adapt what they do because of the irrational way which most people would judge them, I can see where it is coming from and I apologise for misrepresenting what you said. 

Perhaps I'm just more of an idealist, and would rather scorn negative behaviour (e.g. viewing something like STEP in a lesser light based on this very detached topic) than suggest we adapt to it. I'm kinda used to holding unpopular opinions anyhow; though I am always more than ready to debate them. 

 

@baronaatista: These two parts seem rather interesting when combined: [1] [2]

 

If one-fifth of the planets in the Milky Way is 67000000, or 67 million, the total number of planets would be 67 * 5 = 335 million planets. According to most scientific estimates, that number is actually at least 100 billion. 

I found this point in a Wikipedia user's page, so I didn't come up with it myself, but I cross-referenced it to make sure. Guess I'm making a statement on whether it is true or not, Sparrowprince, or more specifically, that Ra either does not know everything he pretends to, is a deceiver, or the invention of a deceiver. Which makes taking its statements for truth very problematic. Still don't think you're mad though.

Edited April 19, 2017 by MonoAccipiter

[Nebulous112]

@Mator:

 

Why would the creation of this topic (in the off-topic, general discussion forum) be detrimental to the reputation of STEP? Or, for that matter, detrimental to the modding reputation of Tech? I think you may be more paranoid than Tech is naive.

 

Everyone has their eccentricities. Some more than others. However, this off-topic discussion has absolutely nothing to do with modding and therefore is irrelevant to anyone's modding reputation.

 

Tom Cruise has a ridiculous belief in Scientology. Besides that, from some of his other behaviour (for example, the Oprah couch-jumping incident), I think he may be a bit unstable. However, he is a fantastic movie star. No one questions that.

 

Same with Michael Jackson...his childhood was so screwed up that he couldn't stop dreaming of being a child again himself. But he was a fantastic music artist.

 

Van Gogh was straight-up crazy. Isaac Newton spent the better part of his life researching alchemy, and believed in the paranormal. I could go on and on with further examples.

 

Tech's belief in Ra, etc. is certainly a little out there, but nowhere near any of these examples. Most people who are really good at one or two things hold some sort of odd belief. Yet no one challenges their professional reputation, because it is not relevant.

[Guest]

Test post, can't post my long text. Okay it works now after 5 attempts. The quotes make it really long!

 

 

 

Well it's not really as simple as "BAM"...reincarnated.

Gotcha'!
 

 

The way the Law of One explains ghosts leads me to believe it's more of an out-of-body experience. Though the yellow-ray body dies it can not be "deactivated" due to the extreme will of the entity, is how Ra describes it. Basically the body dies, but the yellow-ray mind and spirit remains. Yellow-ray is just our current density (third).

So it says they still have some free will like you were talking about. That's an interesting take.
 

 

That's a beautiful story and I would say that your great-aunt met one of the "caretakers" who operate under the Guardians. These are the entities in the quoted text: "Firstly, there are those directly under the Guardians who are responsible for the incarnation patterns of those incarnating automatically, that is, without conscious self-awareness of the process of spiritual evolution. You may call these beings angelic if you prefer. They are, shall we say, “local” or of your planetary sphere."

I thought I'd share it and see if you could relate this writing to it. She didn't have dementia or anything, she was always pretty fit and healthy. I asked another relative for confirmation and they said when she reached the end it was like they were guarding something with a "gate". It does sound very "angelic" like you describe and it's interesting you draw these conclusions.

If I may say something else... she once said she looked down at her hands and they were covered in blood, then when she saw this she told her son and his friend not to go out on their motorcycles that day. A few hours later his friend crashed into a bus and died instantly. What do you make of this? I will assume you will say that she could channel space/time (hopefully that's the right way around)? I'd be intrigued by your answer. To all those reading this and shaking their heads, I am not saying anything. This is just a very weird story to me. I am asking Tech how it fits into his material, if at all. Don't misquote it!
 

 

Another interesting thing that Law of One briefly talks about is that astral projection, for entities of higher density, can be used as a form of advanced travel. Basically it's described that you project your mind and spirit to a location and through the will of your consciousness you can teleport your body to that location in an instant. This form of travel is used by Ra.

So if I am correct here, you could compare this to the TARDIS in Doctor Who or a wormhole in Star Trek? Again, I don't make these comparisons to be sarcastic, merely to help me understand! :)

 

 

No, not Darwin evolution. It's an evolution of consciousness.

Okay, consciousness! Sorry, I got a bit confused there! Haha!
 

 

Therefore energy is simply recycled or transferred. This is getting more into sciences since the Law of One doesn't really talk about this much. My views on energy are a bit of the edge of modern science and could be considered esoteric vs the common views.

Well what I was trying to say is that if it is recycled, there should be more than enough excess then for some of it to still get stuck (unconverted) for a
while that the cogs can still keep turning elsewhere? Hopefully you understand me.

 

 

I never claimed to be open. I even stated that I was sceptical. There is a pretty large difference between being sceptical of something and being convinced that everyone who does not share your view is mad.

I am obviously a bit like that because that is what everyone has ever said to me. I'm talking about real life here and not the internet. It doesn't upset me, but forgive me because that is what I have been taught by all the skeptics I know. I just skip to the chase because I can discuss and discuss, but when I ask them if they think I am mad, they basically confirm that in various ways. I apologize for sort of doing that to you (my words were actually mixed a bit), but if you do think that please tell me so. It won't offend me because it's your opinion. I respect that or any of your opinions, up to a very tight threshold anyway. Just saying you are skeptical means nothing to me personally.
 

 

Talking about large open questions is not philosophical, that is a huge misconception. There is a method to it. There are proofs in philosophy, which can be assessed and refuted.

Understood.
 

 

I do not think people can "harness more potential when it's not taken seriously" or any such thing. That is precisely my point. So long as most people are unconvinced of its reality, its potential is virtually non-existent for them. There is no potential in parapsychology until we are convinced of the truth of parapsychology, which is why its main concern should be establishing its own truthfulness. Assuming that it can simply ignore that step is preposterous.

I'll have to agree with you actually. I guess there is no need to worry as I believe we will find the truth eventually. Maybe some things are best left alone though, like a surprise birthday party wouldn't be good without the surprise bit. I mean I want to find the truth obviously, but I don't know if we need it in this case.
 

 

Why does it need to be a who? It can be your senses, your mental state, the world around you, your societal biases et cetera.

Yes I was meant to write "who or what" but I changed it because "what" sounds like I could think it was some sort of fantasy creature or something. It can be [your senses], certainly! But as I wrote somewhere in here before, we aren't talking about wind or creaking floors here. We are talking about gravity-defying events with multiple witnesses for some of it. I haven't seen anything I'd call "WOW!" for seven years or so. This doesn't happen every week.
 

 

Mator is right to assess that the opposite of sceptical is not open.

In my terms I am right on the money. By open I mean not "taking the piss" and just being a normal human being who isn't there to just throw around sarcastic remarks. I wasn't the one bringing up the real antonym. It was my own interpretation to this strange and specific area. You can't say: "Let's go skeptics and gullible idiots!" because you might jump ship and become one yourself -- then you certainly wouldn't enjoy that label. Note: In this instance it would preferably be "...skeptics and believers!" but believers would certainly be more open to receiving an experience. By that I don't mean they are more easily tricked, but rather they would be more interested in experiencing another "event".
 

 

It just speaks to what I believe is an issue right now with society(ies)... What we really need right now is to come together, to work to make a better world for absolutely everyone.  Yet we remain divided, because we can't agree on the most basic things, because there is so much mis-information, and it is ever-easier to only listen to what we want to hear, and because no one ever wants to admit they were wrong - thus, actual conversation is impossible.

That's why I believe it's only a good thing that we put two people of differing opinions in the same place. It doesn't matter if this or that is real or not, we should come together and indefinitely respect each other. We shouldn't laugh behind each others backs, we should talk to each other without any kind of hidden tone or meaning.

 

@Mator

I just wish you would do that in a way that wasn't basically calling us retarded or something equal to stupid. I guess that is why I replied like I did to you because I am right that if you feel this way about something, just talk to us better or don't bother. I'll tell you where I stand: I don't have any stance. If that is not seen a logical by you, I don't know what is. I never say I have seen a *insert name here*, I say that I don't know what it was. It's unexplained to me, but I can't conclude anything from it. If you can only dismiss this by calling people like me "nutjobs" then maybe you do need to leave. I already told Tech I feel I don't need his material, but that certainly does not mean I don't want to try and understand it. As Z would say: "This is Banter Inn!"

Edited April 20, 2017 by Guest