Yuyutsu,

Solipsism is not at all helpful in the real world. Drop a brick on your toe and come back to me that the pain is an illusion.

Bertrand Russell had this to say about existence and if we don’t accept it we should at least accept the disastrous consequences because we don’t.

“To save the world requires faith and courage: faith in reason, and courage to proclaim what reason shows to be true.”

David

Dear Pericles,

If you need evidence for the fickleness of the human mind and how easily it falls into illusions, just look at DiamondPete:
I keep agreeing with him that no deities exist and he keeps bursting into an open door, still thinking that I oppose his statement.

If despite so many repetitions Pete is unable to make simple distinctions such as for example between what I say, and what a typical theist says (that God exists and is a deity), then how possibly could he distinguish between illusion and Reality.

The illusion I referred to was not that I exist or that you exist - existence itself is the illusion. Many things can and do exist within that illusion, just like many things "exist" within a dream. So sorry, so long as you believe in existence you will need to keep paying for your groceries (or go hungry, it's your choice).

<<Yours or mine?>>

Ours!

For something to exist, it needs to be an object, to stand in relation to other objects. In order to stand in relation, the two must be separate.

Part of the illusion of existence, is that we are separate, that you and I are separate, that in fact any two "things" are separate - amid themselves and separate from God. That is not so.

Dear David,

“To save the world requires faith and courage: faith in reason, and courage to proclaim what reason shows to be true.”

That makes sense, but I do not share Bertrand's goal of saving the world.

If a brick falls on your toe in your dream, which surely hurts, you have several choices:

you could crawl back into your mom's womb and cry, you could float across the ocean to find the wizard who will fix your toe, you can enter a time-machine to reverse the brick's movement, you could curse that brick, you could run faster than light so that the next brick you drop won't hit your other toe, or...

... you can wake up!

Trying to save the world is like banging the alarm-clock saying "hush, my dream is not over yet, my toe still hurts and I can't wake until it heals".

Yuyu .... as usual you are using a "simple definition" of what a "deity" is, in order to refute the presence of deities... a simple definition that you try to misrepresent that I "assume" when I use the word "deity".

As I said, you know *EXACTLY* what I mean by "deity", yet you STILL, on purpose, become obtuse regarding the presence of a deity/God/god/supernatural presence/Gods/gods/God ... me/ God ...you/ God everyone/ God ...everything etc etc etc etc etc etc etc etc, or any of the other hundreds of terms used by believers like you to describe hundreds of imaginary friends.

Obtuseness is NOT a defense of your "beliefs".

Yuyu, your imaginary friend does not exist, and you are NOT your imaginary friend.

"No deities exist".

>>So sorry, so long as you believe in existence you will need to keep paying for your groceries (or go hungry, it's your choice).<<

But if we convert to Yuyutsuism and start believing existence is illusory we will get free groceries. Seems unlikely. Maybe we'll able to go without food and not get hungry.

No... wait... got it! We'll buy groceries but we'll be paying illusory money for illusory groceries. I can see two problems immediately: the Police take a dim view of anybody trying to pass off 'illusory' money in place of real currency. But even if you can get away with your counterfeiting operation it won't be for long: illusory groceries have zero nutritional value and you will starve on a diet of them.

Cheers,

Tony

Yuyutsu,

May I suggest you stop playing the role of the wise prophet as you are not making any sense to those of us who value a rational approach to life. You may or may not think you have a higher understanding of the universe but if you cannot transmit that knowledge or satisfactorily explain how you got it to other human beings in an comprehensible manner, it is more than likely you are living a delusion.

The life you have now is as real as it is going to get and kidding yourself we are all of an immaterial nature is not helpful to anyone. In fact, it is a cop out.

You are sprouting nonsense and should re-evaluate why you do this. I can only guess and I have no desire to do this.

David