What do you consider spiritual?

[JowGaWolf]

When they talk about ‘faith’ in Zen, they’re often referring to unquestioning acceptance of the methods they employ in awakening.

Faith doesn't require a God. Faith is just a belief or trust in something or someone, often without requiring empirical evidence or proof.

When they talk about ‘faith’ in Zen, they’re often referring to unquestioning acceptance of the methods they employ in awakening.

I don’t consider Zen (Rinzai/Soto) to be a religion - there’s no Deity, no speculation on an afterlife and no scripture. I don’t know enough about Daoism to have an opinion on that.

I don't think having a Deity is needed in order to be considered a religion. I often Joke about Atheism being a religion because it has a belief system and doctrines. Atheism requires the person to believe that there are no deities, gods, or spirits. Many of the Atheist groups have regular meetings, discussions, and events.

What happens at an atheist church?

An "atheist church" in North London is proving a big hit with non-believers. Are we witnessing the birth of a new religion?

www.bbc.com

Scientology is considered a religion by its own followers. Both Atheism and Scientology requires the faith and belief that they are not wrong about gods, deities, and spirits.

Zen (Rinzai/Soto). I had to look this up. What he says is similar to how I see a lot of stuff. First do it and then write about it vs writing about it from an outside perspective without experience doing it.

I don't know if this guy is accurate, but I like most of the things he touched on. A lot of what he says are things I've naturally come across in my life.

Aspects of Enlightenment in Zen: Some of you may have already experienced this.

Direct Experience: Enlightenment is achieved through direct, personal experience rather than intellectual understanding.

Present Moment Awareness: Enlightenment is closely associated with being fully present in the moment, free from attachments to past or future. (This what happens when I train)

Everyday Life: Enlightenment is not seen as a distant goal but as something that can be realized in everyday activities and interactions. (marital arts training and how it influences who we are)

This may sound familiar to some of you

 

[Buka]

That’s the way to do it, but as, perhaps a 16-18 year old.

Which did you plump for?

It would be nice to say I picked the church that touched my heart, or the one that I felt part of. Or even the one that had the coolest stain glass windows.

Instead, I picked the one all the kids in my neighborhood went to.

 

[JowGaWolf]

Do you consider zen and daoist practice's to be a religion requiring one to believe.

I think the answer is yes. Can I be one of those without believing?

 

[windwalker099]

I think the answer is yes. Can I be one of those without believing?

who is asking

 

[JowGaWolf]

who is asking

It's just my question about religion. If religion requires belief, then can someone be a practitioner of that religion without belief? Does something spiritual require that same level of belief?

 

[windwalker099]

Those who practice religion might be able to answer
Those who are spiritual would know.

 

[Sammy Naur]

Didn't Malcom Muggeridge bury George Orwell?

I will tell you something is that isn't very spiritual: Arguments. One of the least spiritual things humans do (and of all animals only humans do it).

I think the term "spirited debate" is a contradiction in terms. Everyone wants to win, nobody really does, because to quote Kurt Vonnegut,

"If a bunch of them are lying around on a beach, and one of them farts, everybody else laughs and laughs, just as people would have done a million years ago...I tell you, we are here on Earth to fart around, and don't let anybody tell you different."

 

[Fungus]

I'm curious about what people consider to be spiritual. In that endeavor, if people could provide a working definition of spiritual/spirituality, under than 20 words,

I cant think of one moment where I felt the need for using or defining that adjective.

But I loosely associate others poeples use of the world with things that lacks a physical basis or motivation.

 

[Gyakuto]

I cant think of one moment where I felt the need for using or defining that adjective.

But I loosely associate others poeples use of the world with things that lacks a physical basis or motivation.

You are the best! My new hero and role model

 

[mograph]

I cant think of one moment where I felt the need for using or defining that adjective.

But I loosely associate others poeples use of the world with things that lacks a physical basis or motivation.

I agree with that, but I'd add that awe seems to be a component of that meaning of the word.

 

[Fungus]

Interesting, abstractly I think of "awe" as have some physical basis as beeing a survival trait of any "physical system", be it a human, a single cell, or an proton. Respect or fear of something surprising, could make you reflect twice on your optons before taking a knee-jerk action. This very rational and selv-preserving for me. All this is for me, philosophical ponderings about nature, where the word i think originates from "lover" of "wisdom", so very rational and physical for me.

 

[Fungus]

You are the best! My new hero and role model

I said it before, I love brittish humor!

 

[Gyakuto]

I said it before, I love brittish humor!

Well you have replace Paris Hilton as my role and style model.

 

[Fungus]

Well you have replace Paris Hilton as my role and style model.

I feel honoured

 

[Gyakuto]

Interesting, abstractly I think of "awe" as have some physical basis as beeing a survival trait of any "physical system", be it a human, a single cell, or an proton. Respect or fear of something surprising, could make you reflect twice on your optons before taking a knee-jerk action. This very rational and selv-preserving for me. All this is for me, philosophical ponderings about nature, where the word i think originates from "lover" of "wisdom", so very rational and physical for me.

Have you heard of the ‘God Helmet’? It a motorcycle helmet with magnetic coils place in specific places. The experimenter (Prof Michael Persinger) activates them in specific orders and frequencies and can produce out-of-body experiences, profound religious experiences (the awe of being in the presence of a god) etc in the wearer . It suggests that these experiences, reported by many people, are caused by the activation of neural circuits

Professor Blackmore attends the Zen meditation sessions I attend!

 

[Fungus]

Have you heard of the ‘God Helmet’? It a motorcycle helmet with magnetic coils place in specific places. The experimenter (Prof Michael Persinger) activates them in specific orders and frequencies and can produce out-of-body experiences, profound religious experiences (the awe of being in the presence of a god) etc in the wearer .

I had not before, but i looked it up now.

It suggests that these experiences, reported by many people, are caused by the activation of neural circuits

Yes, that makes sense.

It seems like hallucinations, which also presents itself in artificial neural networks. It is sometimes associated to "overfitting" insignificant details. The hallucinations are "extrapolations" that disconnects to reality (so a failure from the predictive perspective), while at the same time beeing perfectly consistent with the neural net predictions.

"AI hallucinations are similar to how humans sometimes see figures in the clouds or faces on the moon. In the case of AI, these misinterpretations occur due to various factors, including overfitting, training data bias/inaccuracy and high model complexity."
What Are AI Hallucinations? | IBM

I suspect the magnetic coils in that experiment might have been replaced by allowing participants in the same dark room, to sit on a popsicle. There is a good chance that many would have strange hallucinations?

One could ask; during what conditions are a neural net more like to start hallucinate? A wild guess might that that when put into an "odd situation", where there is little confidence in the predictions, maybe strange things are more likely to envisioned. Someone the whole sitaution, or beeing asked to relax, sit in a dark, room, attached to weird gadgets, likel puts your brain into unusual states, where it as "little training"...

I am not sure I would choose speak about spirituality in any of these cases. But fooling a predictive system, or getting it to derail is certainly interesting!! Both from perspectives of AI modelling and from psychiatry I guess.

 

[windwalker099]

.

If religion requires belief, then can someone be a practitioner of that religion without belief? Does something spiritual require that same level of belief?

Experiential, Transcendence
Not based on belief , or religion

A product, not a goal or purpose.