Dear Squeers,

Thank You for your comments. I think that in the future there will
undoubtedly be a growing religious diversity reflecting our individualism. Particularly in times of uncertainty and rapid social change, people may look, as they have in the past to religious values to stabilize and revitalize their culture. It may well be the case in fact, that the need for religion will eventually reassert itself more powerfully in precisely those societies that have become the most industrialized, rationalized and materialistic. Who knows? I certainly don't. As I stated earlier - to each his own. Whatever floats your boat and gets you through the night. Thank You for your Derrida reference. Fascinating. I'm now going to try to get hold of a
biography of Jacques Derrida. I want to learn more about his life and what was it that drove a man from a Sephardic Jewish family to become
an agnostic.

Lexi and Squeers,

Regarding the "stimulus" - the philosopher, William James spoke of religious impulse being a natural phenomenon.
I think most us feel an inclination or "pull" to search for a higher truth or meaning.

Will Durant wrote on James:
"Now the persistence of belief in God is the best proof of its almost universal vital and moral value. James was amazed and attracted by the endless variety of religious experience and belief....He saw some truth in every one of them, and demanded an open mind toward every new hope....In the end, James was convinced of the reality of another - a spiritual - world."

Durant quotes James:
"I truly disbelieve, myself, that our human experience is the highest form of experience extant in the universe. I believe rather that we stand in much the same relation to the whole of the universe as our canine and feline pets do to the whole of human life. They inhabit our drawing rooms and our libraries. They take part in scenes of whose significance they have no inkling. They are merely tangent to curves of history, the beginnings and ends and forms of which pass wholly beyond their ken. So we are tangent to the wider life of things."

[Lexi, I believe he's referring to "private" household libraries :)]

Thanks George,

I ordered "The courage to be", it is now on my reading queue.

I don't doubt that the material exists, I just point out that existence itself is an illusion. In other words, it is an illusion to believe or perceive that there is, or ever could be, anything but God.

As I mentioned earlier, I don't know whether or not all that exists can be investigated by science, so I suppose that in Sagan's terms I am sitting on the fence. What probably distinguishes me from Sagan is that this question does not bother me, nor does the question whether psychology is a real or a pseudo science. I am equally open to both possibilities because for one who trusts in God, the light of science is like the light of the moon in the middle of the day.

As I wrote to Poirot, a mental picture of a chair is... a mental image. Similarly, a concept of God is... a concept. Now as there is no current shortage of concepts, they sell very cheap.

Poirot & Crabsy,

Both symbols and signs are mental constructs (excluding the physical component, such as a wooden cross, aluminum road-signs or the number "1" written with ink on paper). As such, when talking about God I compare them to the light of the moon in the middle of the day.

Since our addiction to mental constructs obscures the reality of God, the question is which mental constructs are more helpful in eliminating our dependence on mental constructs altogether. I am not suggesting that any mental construct can defeat itself, but if we allow mental constructs to fight against each other in our minds, resulting in a smaller number of them still with a grip on us, then by the grace of God we have a better chance of eliminating the hold on us of the remaining constructs as well.

I care not much for a man's religion whose dog and cat are not the better for it. ~Abraham Lincoln

Yuyutsu,

If you were unable to represent your thoughts to yourself as mental images, might I suggest that it would render you merely a shell who would not be able to participate as a human in any active capacity. who might be "nothing but God", but who wouldn't be aware of it...or anything else, for that matter.

....and another thing, Yuyutsu,

"Similarly, a concept of God...is a concept."

Precisely!....and that is what you have presented to us - merely "your concept" of God.

In order for you to tell us of your "concept", you had to first construct mental images in your mind...and in order to comprehend the meaning of your words, we had to do the same in ours. Do you not see this?

Whether existence is an illusion or not, this is the way humans make sense of the material realm.