What is your religion and why is it the right one?

wolfsbane wrote:

Definition of objective:
5. not influenced by personal feelings, interpretations, or prejudice; based on facts; unbiased: an objective opinion.
8. of or pertaining to something that can be known, or to something that is an object or a part of an object; existing independent of thought or an observer as part of reality.
The sky is blue, the apple is red, etc. - all objective facts, even though some cannot perceive that. So what you can rightly say is that what I claim to be an objective fact may or may not be the case.

The problem is that you want to define objective fact as one that everyone can perceive. Is that the standard definition?

The definition of an "objective fact" I would use would be "one that everyone could perceive" - assuming necessary equipment, etc.

We can never move beyond your statement of belief, because to be able to perceive your experience, the second observer would also have to be you. Therefore we certainly cannot ever say that your experience of God is "existing independent of thought or an observer as part of reality", can we?

In turn, therefore, we will never know that the experience is "not influenced by personal feelings, interpretations, or prejudice".

wolfsbane wrote:

What is subjective may also be objective, No? What one holds to be so may be imagination, or it may be reality. It was not my claim here that my beliefs about God are true, but that bluewolf was wrong when he said It's your belief in god, wolfsbane, not a fact. Trying to pretend otherwise isn't going to make it any more true. He was claiming to know that it wasn't a fact. All he really knows is that he does know for sure either way.

No, he was pointing out that you cannot claim it to be anything more than a belief. You believe that it is a fact, but that, again, is only your belief. It is non-replicable, and therefore can never be found anything other than subjective.

cordially,
Scofflaw

wolfsbane wrote:

God either exists or He doesn't. My belief in Him doesn't alter that. So another person may well know Him. To return to the sky and the blind man - if lots of blind folk told me that the idea that the sky was blue was only a belief, not a fact, would they be right? Would a second observer would also have to be me for them to see the blue sky? No, just have seeing eyes.

It can also be measured instrumentally. We can also eliminate certain forms of cultural bias by noting that people worldwide agree that it is blue.

However, we cannot use your 'experience' of the sky's 'blueness'. Aside from anything else, we cannot, as the old philosophical chestnut tells us, determine whether what appears blue to you would appear green to me or not. That is the bit that is subjective. There is no evidence, for example, that the God you have experienced is not the Devil instead.

wolfsbane wrote:

Not while you remain in your blindness:
2 Corinthians 4:3 But even if our gospel is veiled, it is veiled to those who are perishing, 4 whose minds the god of this age has blinded, who do not believe, lest the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God, should shine on them.

Yes, yes. We consider each other blinded fools. Noted and agreed.

wolfsbane wrote:

Millions have replicated it. I live with two of them; I worshipped with about 200 of them this morning.

And billions have not. If the history of religion tells us anything, it is that people's expereince of God is effectively unique - indeed, I believe that a "personal relationship with God" is one of the selling points of your package...

You may all accept the pro-forma outline of deity from the bible, but your experience remains subjective. The experience of the next million is also subjective, and, I think you'd find if you enquired, not identical. That suggests that all you share is the type of mind that likes to make concrete and personal the sacred.

cordially,
as ever,
Scofflaw

wolfsbane wrote:

All you are saying is that I may be mistaken about the reality I claim to see. All I am saying is that bluewolf cannot say it is not a fact. He can only rightly say, as an outsider, that it may not be a fact. As one who is on the inside, I see and am persuaded.

Which is the very hallmark of a subjective experience. What you are actually claiming is that you may have experienced something (God) that is factually real, and that your experience itself is factually real.

The latter is less arguable, but cannot, in any event, lead to a claim about the former. You have had a real experience, and it may well even have been measurable....however it is not a 'fact' that you experienced God, whether you did or not.

If you claimed to have experienced a great joy at the playing of Bach, that is not a fact either - it is a subjective perception, entirely without meaning outside you yourself. It tells us nothing about Bach, except that you like it.

Even worse, if you were to claim to have 'experienced' music - what would we make of this? Clearly, it is not a fact - whether you did experience the music or only thought you experienced it is irrelevant, as long as the music could not be observed by a separate observer.

wolfsbane wrote:

As indicated on another thread, I'm afraid I won't be able to post anymore until the holidays - due to pressure of work. If anyone wants to PM me, I'll be keeping an eye on that.

All the very best, my friends.

Best of luck!

cordially,
Scofflaw