--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, "John" <jr_esq@...> wrote: > > --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, "curtisdeltablues" <curtisdeltablues@> > wrote: > > > > Hey John, > > > > Well I guess I'll have to show the guts to engage in a friendly > > discussion with you having been challenged! > > > > I was pointing out that you were going from a single instance > > to support the assertion of a universal and that this is a > > fallacious form of reasoning. Just because we have a > > biological cause we can't automatically infer that a > > principle of universal causation exists. In the case > > of existence itself, it may have primacy without needing > > a cause. > > > > But I'll hang with the point if you are interested. Have > > I missed something? > > Curtis, > > You're jumping ahead of the game. We're still trying to > get a common understanding of the first premise: > > 1. Whatever begins to exist has a cause. > > Do you agree with this premise or not?
I'm going back to play "catch up" after traveling for the last couple of days, but I'll answer. The first premise has the same problem as the second. The problem is not with the word "cause" but with the phrase "begins to exist." That presupposes the condition that something came into existence which had not existed before. I have had many experiences in my life that cannot be described by this phrase. I have seen things that as far as I can tell were always present. Me noticing them did not cause them to "come into existence." Nor did anything "cause" them to happen. Therefore my own experience does not lead me to believe that this is a true statement. > I used a human example to illustrate the point. If you > don't agree, why not? > > We can discuss the other two premises after this premise > is resolved. I think I resolved it as far as I'm concerned, and explained why not. Now move on to the point you are avoiding like the plague, trying to extrapolate from this "human example" to a cosmic one, and making the assumption that the universe was "created." As I've said several times, I do not believe that this is the case. Therefore the entire argument, which hinges not on "cause" but on "begins to exist," is fallacious and moot. If the universe never "began to exist" for the simple reason that it has always existed, exists now, and will exist at all times in the future, then the whole argu- ment is without basis. I have already stated what I think is at the basis of people *making* this baseless argument -- they project their own birth and eventual death onto the universe and assume "As below, so above." I think this is anthropomorphism of the worst kind. But I think there is another factor at work in those who believe this. That is their aversion to the relative world, and the decades-long programming they have received from Maharishi and others to *look down on* the relative as "lesser" than the absolute. That, after all, is at the basis of the desire to "get off the wheel" and end the process of incarnation. In other words, I think that subconsciously the desire of a seeker to personally end incarnation, end experience of the relative, and become the "drop merging with the ocean" is what they think happens to the universe as well. They believe that the relative is a "lesser" state than the absolute on its own, and thus want to believe that there is/was a point in time when only it existed.
