Consciousness?

[Lex]

i agree in one thing:
religion is very hard to wipe. not that i try...
the entire western life is christian based. the values of hard work and good and evil are very dominant.

It's quite possible to be a hard-working, good person, without believing in God. It's also quite possible to be a lazy, nasty bum who does believe in God.

[copain]

I'm not sure what you mean with religion as an evolutionary heritage.

Evolutionary heritage in that way because humans as living beings which had and has to face serious difficulties – you Emma explained it very clear abouve in your comment – would have become completely mad if there were no religion to give them any hold. And if religious behavior was not implemented by a God itself, then this is a thing which must have its foundation in the evolution!

[Kalailan]

It's quite possible to be a hard-working, good person, without believing in God. It's also quite possible to be a lazy, nasty bum who does believe in God.

i don't say otherwise. i do say that capitalism is based on protestant working ethic.

the work ethic might seem to you to be something that every society has, but it is not true.

[Lex]

It's quite possible to be a hard-working, good person, without believing in God. It's also quite possible to be a lazy, nasty bum who does believe in God.

i don't say otherwise. i do say that capitalism is based on protestant working ethic.

the work ethic might seem to you to be something that every society has, but it is not true.

Yeah, those crazy Protestant Japanese are amazing, aren't they?

I fully realize that the work ethic is not something that every society has. My cousin has an amusing anecdote about that. His company opened up a plant in Brazil (I think; somewhere in South America, at any rate). They wanted to increase output, so they paid the workers more to produce product faster. This worked fine until Friday. On Friday, nobody came into work, because they had already made a week's wages in four days. It apparently never occurred to them that they could make even more money by working harder the fifth day as well.

Capitalism may or may not have co-evolved with Protestantism, but that does not mean that capitalism requires Protestantism.

[Emma_85]

Evolutionary heritage in that way because humans as living beings which had and has to face serious difficulties – you Emma explained it very clear abouve in your comment – would have become completely mad if there were no religion to give them any hold. And if religious behavior was not implemented by a God itself, then this is a thing which must have its foundation in the evolution!

Yes, I agree that the tendency towards religion has its foundation in evolution. Because certain traits that our species acquired through evolution make us want to know answers and question our surrounding. But not only that, I wouldn't say that certain clans survived because they had religion and others didn't, but a more inquisitive clan of humans might have been able to keep their clan together better because of certain rituals and just inquisitiveness in general might have helped with developing hunting skills too. The traits that lead to religion are what evolved though, and as a consequence we find ourselves with religion. It would be interesting indeed to know the true origin of religion.

[Kalailan]

Yeah, those crazy Protestant Japanese are amazing, aren't they?

i presumed they will be used as an example.
i wrote not every. i didn't say our society is the only one.

i do not say that capitalism requires protestantism.

[copain]

It would be interesting indeed to know the true origin of religion.

The true origin of religion we will never find out, I think. Like the very beginning of live it is veiled in the darkness of the past !

Yeah, those crazy Protestant Japanese are amazing, aren't they?

i presumed they will be used as an example.
i wrote not every. i didn't say our society is the only one.

i do not say that capitalism requires protestantism.

I think so too. Could we blame the church for human avarice ? It is true that especially in medieval times the church declaread, that to work hard is part of a good Christian live.
But it is not the fault of the church - let alone protestantism - that capitalism had appeared.
In every higher developed society you will find exploitation ! Look at the ancient Romans (for example) how they treated humans as slaves !

[Emma_85]

The true origin of religion we will never find out, I think. Like the very beginning of live it is veiled in the darkness of the past !

Ahh... back to the original topic at last !
If you use never then do you mean that it's totally impossible because the process of humans acquiring religion was somehow mythical?
Do you think it's possible to find out what the origin of religion is, or not?
I think it is possible (maybe not now, and maybe even never in the future), but at least possible. If you say never (never is a very harsh word! People also believed the Caeser shift could never be cracked, nor the sound barrier broken).

This is the very thing my topic is about. Are there things in this universe (such as the origin of consciousness or religion) than can never ever be explained, because they aren't explainable things, or could they be explained (not saying they will be though, just that the possibility may exist in the future)?

My teacher, and some others in my class (although they might actually just be sucking up to the teacher) think that those things (consciousness at least) that cannot be explained. Though my teacher was careful not to use the word never. But alone the fact that he doesn't want to use that word made me think, that he wasn't sure and had no good proof of this. So far I haven't heard any here either though.
Why do you think this Peter?

[Lex]

But it is not the fault of the church - let alone protestantism - that capitalism had appeared.
In every higher developed society you will find exploitation !

The labor theory of value is dead. Have the decency to let it rest in peace.

[Emma_85]

I think that Protestantism, to be more precise the Methodist branch of Protestantism certainly played a large role in industrialisation. They thought it was God's will that they earn as much money as possible, but they were not allowed to spend it on luxury, instead they should reinvest it. A strange view to derive from the bible, but that was what they believed none the less. And so they reinvested their money again and again and took on ventures which at the time no other sane person, who was interested in being very rich personally might have taken on. It's a fascinating to see what they were involved in.

[Kalailan]

just for the record, i wasn't the one who judged capitalism or the church.
i only described what has happend, without saying whether it is good or bad.

[Kalailan]

Ahh... back to the original topic at last

a true journey is coming back.

[copain]

The true origin of religion we will never find out, I think. Like the very beginning of live it is veiled in the darkness of the past !

Ahh... back to the original topic at last !
If you use never then do you mean that it's totally impossible because the process of humans acquiring religion was somehow mythical?
Do you think it's possible to find out what the origin of religion is, or not?

As explained in one on my further topics, the occurrence of religion can have two main reasons.
If a God is the reason, so I do not think that he/she/it could have any interrest that we can find it out, because (as rimon-jad had explained it so nicely) our sense is limited by this God ( is it not a main feature of a God that he/she/it avoids any clear apperance of himself ?)

An if religion is based on evolutionary terms, then it might be also a hard nut to crack!
Religion – which I think is going along with conciousness – is not as determined as a real physical thing like the sound barrier. And much more importend it happend only once long ago and in such way not reproducible. Can we know which influences in which way had an effect on the first humans? That is difficult to proof ! How can we trace back all the circumstances leading to the beginnig of religion ?
There will always remain some uncertainties! But that is really a feature of humans that they are eager in finding out the truth – or whatever they believe it is the truth !
But I have to confess that the use of the word „never“ in that context is really uncalled-for and it is wiser to replace it with a less harsh word.

[Emma_85]

An if religion is based on evolutionary terms, then it might be also a hard nut to crack!
Religion – which I think is going along with conciousness – is not as determined as a real physical thing like the sound barrier. And much more importend it happend only once long ago and in such way not reproducible. Can we know which influences in which way had an effect on the first humans? That is difficult to proof ! How can we trace back all the circumstances leading to the beginnig of religion ?
There will always remain some uncertainties! But that is really a feature of humans that they are eager in finding out the truth – or whatever they believe it is the truth !

Yes, I agree it would be something incredibly difficult to do (seeing as the stupid archaeologists are still have some problems working out the origins of civilisation), but there is a possibility at least, how ever small.

Anyway, I would like to continue our debate on religion in a separate post (the thread on religion which Keesa started ages ago).

[Apotheosis]

I think I'm kind of late, but here goes!

Just for fun, I did some research as to what conscience and consciousness actually is according to psychologists.

Conscience - According to Freud, conscience is the restriction demanded by the superego.

Consciousness - Awareness of yourself and the world around you.

Now, what does this mean? Let me start by introducing some psychological terms:

Id - In Psychoanalytical theory, the part of the personality which contains our primitive impulses such as sex, anger, and hunger.

Superego - In Psychoanalytical theory, the part of the personality that represents the conscience.

Ego - In Psychoanalytical theory, the part of the personality which maintains a balance between our impulses (id) and our conscience (superego).

I don't know if this will help the discussion at all, but it's interesting nonetheless.

[threewood14]

I think in quantum mechanics, a particle is everywhere is but observed thorugh its most probable position. Is that true? If it is, it kinda clarifies what chance is.

As of now, I'd have to stick with Einstein on that one. Einstein said, "God does not play dice with the universe." He didn't like the idea of a random universe. I think that there is a chance that a particle can be somewhere and it can be calculated. This would be in percentages. I think that a particle is in one position at one point in time.