More than One Atheism

[vicente]

There is more than one atheism. For many, atheism is a BELIEF in NO GOD. Well, a belief is a belief, and thus theists and belief driven atheists share a common ground.

Vajrayana or Mahamudra Buddhism could be said the be atheist because they do not believe in a god. http://www.buddhanet.net/ans73.htm
However, their disbelieve in a god is usually not about belief, but truth.

In the book Tantric Transformation, Osho said, “Start knowing what you really know, and stop believing what you really don’t know. Somebody asks you. “Is there a God?” and you say, “Yes, God is.” Remember: Do you really know? If you don’t know, please don’t say that you do. Say, “I don’t know.”. . . False knowing is the enemy of true knowledge. All beliefs are false knowledge.”

On the other hand, science, for the most part, is a religion based on belief, much like the patrifocal insanities of christians, muslems, and jews.

Many of today's atheists consider themselves to be Humanists, and believe in "true intelligence." They promote an idea of "core human values." Perhaps such an idea has potential, but is fully unattainable in today's world. The ONLY way that "core human values" can be accessed by a global community is on the grave of christianity and theism.

As Religious Studies was my college major, I can say confidently that in order to obliterate the religious memes, and thus the insanity on this planet, christianity must fall first. The other patrifocal delusions like islam and judeaism will fall as a consequence.

The atheist Sam Harris said, "Moderates do not want to kill anyone in the name of God, but they want us to keep using the word God as though we knew what we were talking about. They do not want anything too critical said about people who really believe in the god of their fathers because tolerance, perhaps above all else, is sacred. To speak plainly and truthfully about the state of our world—to say, for instance, that the Bible and the Koran both contain mountains of life-destroying gibberish—is antithetical to tolerance as moderates currently conceive it. However, we can no longer afford the luxury of such political correctness. We must finally recognize the price that we are paying to maintain the iconography of our ignorance."

I agree,...true intelligence cannot be built upon ignorance,...nor can any core human values grow from the soil of religion.

What is religion? Religion is a set of beliefs (based on faith).

Nobel Prize-winning physicist Charles Townes said, "Many people don't realize that science basically involves assumptions and faith." Science is a
religion,...which I assure you, would send Frances Moore-Lappe into a volatile rage against me. I've never seen such hate as self-professed Humanists when should proof that their beloved belief in science is just as insane as christainity.

I was once nearly killed by a group of Atheist/Humanists for saying:

Most people fail to recognize that the foundation of a mathematical statement is only true in relation to the assumptions of "set theory," the assumption that any collection of objects actually exists. All objects, without exception, are indeed mathematical. The reason for that lies in the multiplying/dividing nature of the optically organized universe. However, the modern cosmological understanding of the universe suggests that no objects exist, indicating that mathematics pivots on a misguided belief in materialism. The sciences usually expound on relative reality through the assumption that object-ive reality actually exists. However, objectivism is based on objects, and those objects are no more real than last night's dream.

I do not believe in a god. Perhaps I could be labled an atheist,...however, I resonate more with Buddhist Paul Brunton's lable of Short Pather. http://wisdomsgoldenrod.org/notebooks/23/5

JV Marco

JV Marco

[schrodinger]

You say all this and yet you knock science? Science relies on mathematical models, repeatable empirical experiments and, above all, peer review. To equate the scientific method with religious belief is just plain nuts. I’d say you are nuttier than a fruit cake, Vicente.:rofl:

[vicente]

You say all this and yet you knock science? Science relies on mathematical models, repeatable empirical experiments and, above all, peer review. To equate the scientific method with religious belief is just plain nuts. I’d say you are nuttier than a fruit cake, Vicente.:rofl:

Yes, mathematics is simply another belief system,...that was a point of my post.

Few seem to realize that those considered priests of the scientific method have neither uncovered nor explained truth. That is not their job. Scientists have little interest in truth or reality, for their paychecks are derived from the pursuit of facts about objects. Science builds its theorems or working hypotheses upon previous beliefs, and therefore it often labels any discussion of absolute certainty as absurd. For example, to say that there is no "present in time" is antithetical to science’s established beliefs. Truth and reality confuse the priests of the scientific method. Their paradigm, or fixed set of beliefs, is founded on concepts of a materially existing world; that is, sciential theorems, not the sapiential truth or the reality beyond objects. Scientists, like most others who are uninterested in truth, are as characters within a dream who think that the dream is real. As truth and reality are taboo in the scientific groupthink, they cling to a faith in objects, to make the dream—and their attachment to separateness—more palatable.

Infinity is another voguish belief topic among the mathematical, object-ive minded. Theories of infinite space, time, and quantity are just more object-ive math. Definitions of infinity are related or relative to the concept of immeasurability in space, time, or quantity. However, if there is no space, time, or quantity, as implied by quantum cosmology, then there is no infinity. In contrast, the word eternity points to that which is without beginning or end, timelessness beyond the perception of space, time, and quantity. Recognizing the difference between infinity and eternity is inevitable for those shifting towards an earnest spiritual viewpoint and subsequently a clearer understanding of consciousness. Time and eternity are contradictions. A belief in time perpetuates the dream as a dream. Eternity points to a timeless present in which the dream is just a dream and does not actually exist.


Quantum cosmologists Steven Hawking and Jim Hartle have articulated some profound insights through their observations. They have suggested that concepts such as the classic Big Bang model, a belief in a beginning and an end, or the Christian model of a beginning without an end are meaningless because time does not exist. Their "No Boundary" theory is consistent with what Mahasiddhas or Great Spiritual Magickians of the Eastern traditions have been saying for thousands of years. We only uncover who we are through understanding when we are, by directly experiencing the reality of eternal timeless.

Scientific or phenomenological principles are object-ive or relative truths. Within mainstream American society, the most agreed-upon definition of truth, apart from the superstitions of religious feelings, proceeds from individual perception or what today’s therapeutic society calls personal truth. Those who uphold the validity of these personalized, relative truths contend that there is one truth for him and another for her, which is a belief that everyone’s separate, personal truth is somehow meaningful in relation to reality.


Few, especially scientists and mathematicians who depend on those fields for their livelihood, have no interests in uncovering truth. To uncover truth, freethinkers, such as Johann Wolfgang Goethe, exclaimed, "Truth lies in the depth, where few are willing to search for it." And Nietzsche, commenting on people who cling tightly to personal, individual truth, said, "What they really mean is ‘I don’t want to know the truth.’ "Those able to appreciate these aphorisms can surely agree with Stephen Hawking when he says, "The greatest enemy of knowledge is not ignorance; it is the illusion of knowledge" or with Albert Einstein for saying, "Reality is merely an illusion, although a very persistent one."


JV Marco

[abaris]

vincente:

There is more than one atheism. For many, atheism is a BELIEF in NO GOD. Well, a belief is a belief, and thus theists and belief driven atheists share a common ground.


out of curiosity, how do you know what atheists "believe"? Did you conduct a survey? If not, I must assume that either you don't understand the rational foundation of atheism or you construe a classical straw man argument.

[Thomas Knierim]

Strictly speaking, there are two types of atheism, strong atheism and weak atheism. Strong atheism is the active rejection/denial of God's existence, or -in atheist terms- the God concept. It is by definition a reactionary movement to theism. Weak atheism does not even consider the question of God's existence and thus makes no propositions about God. Weak atheism is synonymous with non-theism and it is considered by many the default position. Sometimes strong atheism is called antitheism or explicit atheism. Weak atheism is sometimes called implicit atheism and it is often associated with the position of agnosticism.

Just to clarify meanings, before the discussion develops...

I don't think it makes much sense to call mathematics a belief system, because mathematics are just formal structures of thought without any inherent meanings. So the question is: belief in what?

Perhaps it is correct to call science a belief system, because science is knowledge producing and in epistemology knowledge is merely a subset of belief systems, namely the the subset of true, justified beliefs (according to the classical definition). But that is quite different from the everyday meaning of "belief", and I am not sure if it is a good idea to mix it with the epistemological meaning of belief.

Maybe we can agree that science creates models of reality and that these models serve the purpose of making predictions. In this regard, there is a similarity to religious belief systems, because all religions make predictions according to their internal models. The problem is that scientific hypotheses are always falsifiable and religious or metaphysical hypotheses are most often not.

Cheers, Thomas

[Michael]

I don't think it makes much sense to call mathematics a belief system, because mathematics are just formal structures of thought without any inherent meanings. So the question is: belief in what?





Numbers.

Many societies had only a rudimentary grasp of the plural. They lived in the communal and natural now. The advent of numbers has within it an objectivisation process which removes peoples from their natural apprehensions.

There are no numbers in bliss, peace, enlightenment, understanding (in the subjective sense) or love.

[schrodinger]

Numbers.

There are no numbers in bliss, peace, enlightenment, understanding (in the subjective sense) or love.

Correct! And that is why you cannot group mathematics together with the "emotional" belief systems, which include religion. Mathematics at its core is cold and hard logic; and it can also be absolutely beautiful, in a logical sort of way!:lol:

[Michael]

For the mystically minded the seeds of all religions are very real, if not as predictable as the mathemathical model. It is lax to call them 'emotional', although they may be for the vast majority of adherents.

The mathematical model also requires belief, for if nobody believed in it it could have no outcome.

I believe Heisenberg was right, we can't have it both ways, we can't have both wave and particle, religion, or spirit, being wave, and math being particle. Though I do wonder, do we change or make things by our mode of observation?

[vicente]

Strictly speaking, there are two types of atheism, strong atheism and weak atheism. .....
Just to clarify meanings, before the discussion develops...

I don't think it makes much sense to call mathematics a belief system, because mathematics are just formal structures of thought without any inherent meanings. So the question is: belief in what?

Perhaps it is correct to call science a belief system, because science is knowledge producing and in epistemology knowledge is merely a subset of belief systems, namely the the subset of true, justified beliefs (according to the classical definition)....
Cheers, Thomas


Yes,...there is a so-called Strong Atheism and Weak Atheism, however, my point was meant to be different. I consider both Strong and Weak Atheism to be part of the "Long Path",...that is, a belief based path,...whereas the Atheism that is beyond belief belonging to the "Short Path" (as linked in the top post).

Also from my point of view, science and mathematics very much needs to be identified as the belief system it is,...fundamentally no different than any other beliefs. After all, a beLIEf is a beLIEf is a beLIEf. If something were true, it would not be a belief. A "justified belief" is simply a lie agreed upon by the majority, not a truth. A dream, no matter how much it appears to be real, is not real.

Humanities belief in OBJECTS and its object-ivity about things is a fundamental promoter, and sustainer, of the illusion.

Gurta said, "none are more hopelessly enslaved than those who falsely believe they are free."

True liberation is the freedom from belief. In the USA, its Founding Father's recognized that,...the first sentence of the first Civil Right states: Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion (that is FREEDOM FROM RELIGION), or prohibiting the free exercise thereof (that is FREEDOM OF RELIGION). By law, one can follow no belief, or the delusion of their choice. Unfortunately, the deluded majority interpret the laws.

Vicente

[schrodinger]

For the mystically minded the seeds of all religions are very real, if not as predictable as the mathemathical model. It is lax to call them 'emotional', although they may be for the vast majority of adherents.

The mathematical model also requires belief, for if nobody believed in it it could have no outcome.

I believe Heisenberg was right, we can't have it both ways, we can't have both wave and particle, religion, or spirit, being wave, and math being particle. Though I do wonder, do we change or make things by our mode of observation?

The problem here is; there are so few mathematicians, and so many religious adherents. You cannot ever hope to understand what a differential equation means without years of ardous study. But any fool can thump the bible, or the koran or whatever religious scroll they may come across, and call it "Truth" without even any need to understand what it means, because by its religious nature it transcends human understanding and logically, nobody knows what it means!
There are two main differences here: 1) Mathematicians are not even searching for ultimate truth, just a way to describe and to interpret the physical world we find ourselves in. Carried to the limits, we may ultimately come face to face with what is called the ultimate truth, but that is not the immediate objective. If we get there at all, we will get there based upon facts, not beliefs. 2) Every step of the way must be verifiable and once it is falsifiable it must be rejected.
Now how does that compare with religious belief? The answer is; it does not compare in any way, not even in the slightest. The only resemblance that I can possibly see is that both mathematics, at the very highest level, and religious dogma appear to be inscrutable to the common man in the street. A second-order differential equation involving transcendental functions is just as mysterious and indecipherable as the dead sea scrolls, unless you happen to have spent at least 6 years of your life working with second order differential equations. And there is the difference! With sufficient education, mathematics is all logic, totally unlike the fairy tales told in all religious texts which are not supported by any logic at all.

[kris]

I don't think it makes much sense to call mathematics a belief system, because mathematics are just formal structures of thought without any inherent meanings.
The word for mathematics in India is gaNita, which is a compound word, gaNa + it(i). It simply means 'sets, etcetera' or 'about sets'. In other words it is a way of dealing with sets. For non-mathemathical types (an example of a set), a set can be thought of as a category, something that one can associate quality and quantity with. The notion of set, I think, was created to organize information. A set allows us to categorize things based on common characteristics, a forerunner to taxonomy.

Maybe we can agree that science creates models of reality and that these models serve the purpose of making predictions. In this regard, there is a similarity to religious belief systems, because all religions make predictions according to their internal models. The problem is that scientific hypotheses are always falsifiable and religious or metaphysical hypotheses are most often not.
I think that ability to explain observable reality gets a short shrift when falsifiabilty of hypothesis is overemphasized, which is unfortunate.

[vicente]

Now how does that compare with religious belief? The answer is; it does not compare in any way, not even in the slightest.

Mathematics, as you acknowledged are not even searching for ultimate truth, just a way to describe and to interpret the physical world. The so-called physical world is not real,...its a dream-projection-illusion.

So, how is the study of something that is not real, without even the knowledge that it isn't real, and different from a devotion to imaginary gods?

As a US citizen I have been taught that people can worship the delusion of their choice, whether that delusory meme is Christianity or mathematics. Unfortunately, both deluded beliefs believe that their delusion is the absolute truth.

For Christians, reason upsets their logic,...for mathematicians, zero upsets their logic. Neither have recognized a single absolute truth,...for if a single absolute truth is recognized (such as there is no present in time) all falsity can be equally recognized.

Eckhart Tolle said "we need to draw our attention to what is false in us, for unless we learn to recognize the false as the false, there can be no lasting transformation, and you will always be drawn back into illusion, for that is how the false perpetuates itself"
"It is always better to have no ideas than false ones; to believe nothing, than to believe what is wrong." Thomas Jefferson
V

As I mentioned in an above posts.....Most people fail to recognize that the foundation of a mathematical statement is only true in relation to the assumptions of "set theory," the assumption that any collection of objects actually exists. All objects, without exception, are indeed mathematical. The reason for that lies in the multiplying/dividing nature of the optically organized universe. However, the modern cosmological understanding of the universe suggests that no objects exist, indicating that mathematics pivots on a misguided belief in materialism. The sciences usually expound on relative reality through the assumption that object-ive reality actually exists. However, objectivism is based on objects, and those objects are no more real than last night's dream.

[Michael]

schrodinger, I'm not much for religions myself. But all religions, as distinct from sects, have a mystical root in common.

You are quite right when you say they are not logical. That is also my position. But quantum physics is also profoundly illogical. In fact you are taking a position which says that only the particle is significant, wheras you know that both wave and particle exist even though they can't be perceived simulateously.

But you chose not to see that aspect of my post.

[the_aphid]

However, the modern cosmological understanding of the universe suggests that no objects exist, indicating that mathematics pivots on a misguided belief in materialism.But as you said, this is only a suggestion, not a certainty. Should the fellows at CERN reveal a quantifiable foundation for the phenomenal world, then this 'misguided belief' might simultaneously be revealed as a logical necessity.However, objectivism is based on objects, and those objects are no more real than last night's dream.Once again, you know this to be true, or believe it to be true? Whether or not the phenomenal world is 'real', the apparent truth is that empirical investigations into the phenomenal world yield a high degree of predictability. Furthermore, to suggest that all beliefs are equal is to deny probabilities. I think I can agree that 'foundational belief' can be attributed to anything, perhaps even mathematics, but to suggest that they are all just as likely is to ignore everything that is experienced.You are quite right when you say they are not logical. That is also my position.I certainly wouldn't suggest that all religions are strictly illogical. There are logical insights into the phenomenal world that mathematics simply cannot provide, religion can harmoniously fill this gap. Just because it is not quantifiable or rigidly empirical does not mean that it cannot be logical.

[Michael]

Religions have applied logic to mysticical visions, the source confounds all logic. It would be helpful to the discussion if you reviewed all my posts in the thread.

[vicente]

Once again, you know this to be true, or believe it to be true? Whether or not the phenomenal world is 'real', the apparent truth is that empirical investigations into the phenomenal world yield a high degree of predictability. Furthermore, to suggest that all beliefs are equal is to deny probabilities.

Empirical....derived from or guided by experience or experiment. Why would this investigation be more valid than any other based on beliefs? The truth is, an experience based on belief can only be experienced through the condition of that belief.

Basically, we have to go back to this,...for those on the Long Path, authentic truth is not necessary, for they have no wish to "wake up",...they believe they are here to feel and experience and evolve. For those Entering the Short Path, the threshold of Unborn Awareness, then recognizing what is false is of the upmost importance.

Do you need to feel or experience to be alive?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lDg5IYNw558

[vicente]

Religions have applied logic to mysticical visions, the source confounds all logic. It would be helpful to the discussion if you reviewed all my posts in the thread.

There are no numbers in bliss, peace, enlightenment, understanding (in the subjective sense) or love.

That summarizes it, but few can grasp it. Mathematics is founded on "one",...with "one" there is no many,...without "one" there is no math.

One, Oneness, is not part of the Whole,...just as your last dream is not part of your Enlightened Self,...the permanent Self or Consciousness before you were born.

Everything about "one" is of the dream. Ego seeks Oneness, and everything else that is false,...the false attracts to itself falsity.

Mathematicians need numbers,...numbers is the livelihood, just as Christians need the Bible. Zero upsets both of their logic.

Zero, particularly the spiritual significance or value of zero, transcends the Greek concept of a one-based, natural number belief system, which the Greeks used to find solutions to all their questions. For those in Aristotelian times, like many of today’s self-proclaimed priests of science, even the mention of zero incurred ostracism. Look what the Greeks did to Hippasus in the fifth century BCE for expounding on irrational numbers: they killed him.

Our Western Judeo-Christian-Islamic concepts of Oneness, monotheism, etc., were constructed out of the Hellenistic need for a perceptual ratio, so they rejected anything that did not fit inside that illogical logic. Zero upsets ego’s logic, thus everything having to do with zero is discarded, and illusory concepts of oneness are clung to as a substitute. The real understanding of science, art, and everything else is directly proportional to our level of understanding zero.

Zero apparently made its debut in Western culture by way of Leonardo Fibonacci, a Pisan who was educated in Islamic North Africa. Fibonacci’s interests in zero were chiefly a consequence of double-entry bookkeeping. The introduction of zero appears simultaneously with not only art’s use of the vanishing point, but also the end of the Christian-initiated Dark Ages. They were called the Dark Ages because during that period, all non-Christian literature was condemned, particularly academic endeavors. Zero helped usher in the Renaissance. Then the Renaissance, which never really ended, ran into the high walls of religion and other belief, and the Age of Enlightenment, tethered to the Dark Ages, became impotent.

Most scientially minded people are aware that all form can be reduced to zero. When we add up all form, all phenomena, the sum equals zero. All positives plus all negatives equal zero. They do not however comprehend what that means. Object-ivists cannot imagine anything beyond their beliefs. They cannot recognize that zero, like the keyhole analogy of wholeness, is not a unity of the opposites around it. Science is a belief system based on the perceived cause and effect of objects, not the causelessness of zero. Objectivists think that zero is the number of items in what they believe to be an empty set, and that is somehow part of a subset of all sets. However, a set is a collection of objects. For the scientally inclined, zero or empty sets are meaningless without a phenomenal context. From their object-centric viewpoint, there is no set that can be named as empty, except from an object outside the set.


JV Marco

[the_aphid]

Do you need to feel or experience to be alive?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lDg5IYNw558
Interesting...did you happen to check out the related video Enlightenment is Scientific - Satsang with Dolano (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FAWbk0v5Gdg&feature=related)?It can only be scientific. Whatever is not scientific is happening in your imagination. Enlightenment does not need your imagination, to exist, do you know what I mean? It is here, with your ideas you overlook what is so here.

[schrodinger]

schrodinger, I'm not much for religions myself. But all religions, as distinct from sects, have a mystical root in common.

You are quite right when you say they are not logical. That is also my position. But quantum physics is also profoundly illogical. In fact you are taking a position which says that only the particle is significant, wheras you know that both wave and particle exist even though they can't be perceived simulateously.

But you chose not to see that aspect of my post.

I wish you would not try to tell me what my position is, when you clearly do not know what my position is. I have taken no such position that "only the particle is significant"; that is a conclusion you have come to without understanding the logic that I am employing.
Quantum physics only appears to be illogical when we attempt to understand it using ordinary Aristotelian logic. Obviously this approach does not work so mathematicians have produced another form of logic, appropriately called "quantum logic". In this new form of logic, it is no longer true that the negation of a negation of some statement automatically implies that the statement is true. However, anything that is true in the new logic, must also be true in ordinary logic. Even the puzzle of Schrodinger's Cat is easily resolved when confronted with the three-valued quantum logic.

Although all physical objects are inherently mathematical, in that they can ALL be described by mathematical equations, mathematics is not limited to physical objects!

Mathematicians do not believe that everything is subjective, as Vicente asserts. But we do rely on the premise that our cognition does not distort what is really there, and thus we can describe it using mathematical formulas.
There are many more points expressed in this thread that I disagree with, but I think I must leave it at that for now.

[Michael]

Well, it seems to my small brain that that is the position you are taking, as it applied to my earlier metaphor of particle and wave.

But you surprise me, I am right in thinking that you are saying that quantum physics in all its aspects is logical - and by that I mean all its possible implications and not merely its processes - ?

[schrodinger]

But you surprise me, I am right in thinking that you are saying that quantum physics in all its aspects is logical - and by that I mean all its possible implications and not merely its processes - ?

Oh no you don't Michael! You will never get me to sign a blank check which covers all of the possible implications about anything, especially quantum mechanics! :p What I am saying is quantum weirdness need not look so weird when viewed through a quantum lens. When we get into the more esoteric areas of mathematical physics, there are no bedrock criteria to use to reject some mathematical predictions as unrealistic. If ordinary logic rules these predictions out, we may be better off rejecting ordinary logic!

[Michael]

And what I am saying, schrodinger, is that mystic weirdness is not so weird when veiwed through a mystic lens.

As I said earlier, Mr H was right.

And we are not so far apart.

[Michael]

[QUOTE=vicente;91195]Most scientially minded people are aware that all form can be reduced to zero. When we add up all form, all phenomena, the sum equals zero. All positives plus all negatives equal zero. They do not however comprehend what that means. Object-ivists cannot imagine anything beyond their beliefs. They cannot recognize that zero, like the keyhole analogy of [FONT='Futura Lt BT']wholeness, is not a unity of the opposites around it. Science is a belief system based on the perceived cause and effect of objects, not the causelessness of zero. Objectivists think that zero is the number of items in what they believe to be an empty set, and that is somehow part of a subset of all sets. However, a set is a collection of objects. For the scientally inclined, zero or empty sets are meaningless without a phenomenal context. From their object-centric viewpoint, there is no set that can be named as empty, except from an object outside the set. [QUOTE]

I like that, Vicente, Zero as the white of matter. It has an elegance about it.

[schrodinger]

Zero is a number, same as any other number; and there is nothing special about it at all. If you want to go "deep" and risk driving yourself mad, then talk about infinity. But I will not be joining the conversation.:)

[kris]

To deal with sets, one needs to be able to count the members in a set. Counting process becomes clumsy when the numbers become large. (In some tribes, the entire number system consists of one, two, many.) To get around this problem, they created bigger sets. A bigger set is just a set of several smaller sets. This process of creating bigger and bigger sets as numbers get larger and larger can also get clumsy unless each higher order set contains the same number of sets below it. This gave rise to the decimal system and standardization of 10 as the number of members (of the set just below it) in a set. Zero or shunya in Sanskrit was created to indicate the place value or the order of a set relative to the lowest set.

Incidentally, zero or shunya does not appear to have been a stumbling block for the mathematicians who created it. They expressed infinity or the vastness of the universe as shunya mandala, literally, a collection of zeros.

[the_aphid]

Zero is a number, same as any other number; and there is nothing special about it at all. If you want to go "deep" and risk driving yourself mad, then talk about infinity. But I will not be joining the conversation.:)Amazing...nothing special about zero? I might not know as much about the topic of numbers as you schrodinger, but I personally find zero to be a fascinating number, probably my favorite number :lol:Zero is powerful because it is infinity’s twin. They are equal and opposite, yin and yang. They are equally paradoxical and troubling. The biggest questions in science and religion are about nothingness and eternity, the void and the infinite, zero and infinity. The clashes over zero were the battles that shook the foundations of philosophy, of science, of mathematics, and of religion. Underneath every revolution lay a zero—and an infinity.
- Charles Seife
Zero: The Biography of a Dangerous Idea

[abaris]

the_Aphid

Amazing...nothing special about zero? I might not know as much about the topic of numbers as you schrodinger, but I personally find zero to be a fascinating number, probably my favorite number


Allow me to explain the concept behind your favorite number:

a. You have an Apple
b. You eat your one Apple
c. You are left with ZERO Apples

No mystery here.

[Michael]

As usual, this discussion is revolving around meaning, which is understanding, which is subjective. The intellectualisation is an attempt to extricate us from this mire, but it only has the effect of making the pit deeper.

It is quite clear the each indiidual here is approaching the issue from their own ego perspective. It is also quite clear that no concensus is going to be reached.

Is there anything to be learned frrom this?

[the_aphid]

Allow me to explain the concept behind your favorite number:

a. You have an Apple
b. You eat your one Apple
c. You are left with ZERO Apples

No mystery here.Abaris, perhaps as a natural number there is nothing special about zero. However, there are a lot of properties to the null value that other numbers do not have. For example it is the only number that is neither positive or negative. And as shown below, in the function y=1/x, as x approaches infinity, y approaches zero, and vice versa, thus the statement above that zero is the twin of infinity.
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/4/43/Hyperbola_one_over_x.svg/300px-Hyperbola_one_over_x.svg.png

[abaris]

the_Aphid

Abaris, perhaps as a natural number there is nothing special about zero. However, there are a lot of properties to the null value that other numbers do not have. For example it is the only number that is neither positive or negative. And as shown below, in the function y=1/x, as x approaches infinity, y approaches zero, and vice versa, thus the statement above that zero is the twin of infinity.


TheAphid,

you interpret to much into this. You see, y=1/(x-1) approaches infinity for x=1, in a more general form, y=1/(x-n) approaches infinity for x=n where n is any possible number does that make any number special?

Numbers stand for quantities, nothing more nothing less, and as soon as you detach those quantities from physicality, as soon as you detach them from physical units, such as apples and oranges for example, you can do the darnedest things with them. A bit of numerology and you can see a mystery in any arbitrary series of digits. That doesn't mean a thing.

[vicente]

Zero is a number, same as any other number; and there is nothing special about it at all. If you want to go "deep" and risk driving yourself mad, then talk about infinity. But I will not be joining the conversation.:)


Most people cannot see beyond their beliefs. The following goes way beyond the ordinary persons (Long Pather) ability to comprehend. I have little interest in the Long Path. http://wisdomsgoldenrod.org/notebooks/23/2#section2


Both Christians and the priests of science need the concept of oneness to keep their beliefs palatable. As such, except as a "place number," they abhor discussing the nature of zero, let alone its spiritual significance. Zero upsets their flawed logic and both their theism and atheism. The companions of zero—causelessness, nowness, timelessness, unconditionality, undivided light, and love—along with everything that encourages our direct experience of reality, is frowned upon within the current social structure.

Undivided light is the zero dimension, the razer (or undoer) of object-ive logic, and the holder of the whole. Through the clear light of original mind (unborn/unindoctrinated) conscious, the illusion of motion, space, and time is evident.

Several ancient symbols, such as the swastika and enneagram, contains fundamental information about nature. Some, like Gurdjeiff, said that everything can be interpreted through Nine. I concur with that statement regarding those universal symbols, because nine is the first and only reflection of zero. Let me repeat....9 is the first and only reflection of zero.

If all knowledge can be viewed through a swastika or enneagram, then understanding these nine-grams necessitate some attention from those fascinated with the real and the certain. The enneagram shows how to accumulate/compact and to dissipate/uncompact life force. The Mahasiddha Tilopa could not have brought a fish back to life without understanding the essence of nine. We are talking about universal laws, not imaginary or illusionary magic.

Spiral-in winds lightwaves (time forward) whereas spiral-out unwinds them (time reverse). A key to Conscious Magick, the magick of the Mahasiddhas, would be to recognize the reverse flow of forward moving things, yet that recognition can only be understood from Zero-centricness.
Many become so frightened considering the about Zero beyond a place-number, that historically they attempted to kill anyone who discusses it. For myself, I've never been fearful of Zero,...however, something that helped me embrace its Nowness was the Heart Sutra.

"The burden of the Heart Sutra
Is not the nature of objects
But the seeing of them
Which is what they are."

Understanding Zero then, is not about a concern regarding what objects are, or are not, but in the "seeing" of objects from Zero's point of view, which is by the way, the point of view of an opened-Heart. In other words, we cannot understand Zero without seeing objects the way Zero sees. Just as we cannot understand undivided light outside of undivided lights own point of view.

Another aspect of this barrier to recognizing Zero is the God concept. I agree, God is an invention of duality (that which is not real). God is founded on the ego need for Oneness. Yet there is no One without a Many, no Center without a Boundary, no Here without a There.

The failure of science and religion to understand that the power of all phenomena originates from the undivided, stillness of zero is the single greatest obstacle to world peace. In other words, through the belief that the source of power is in the motion (has energy), the law of attraction or "as within, so without" reflects back a world in discord.

Real enlightenment arises through the awareness of nine, which is the first reflection of zero. Oneness is part of separation and duality; for there can be no "one" without a "many." Zero is synonymous with the wholeness left when the duality of oneness and many is recognized. One and many, all the numbers conceived by mathematicians, are within Nine.

As we accept the spirituality of zero on the inside, the outside will reflect back a clearer picture of reality. Zero is the fulcrum from which divided light, thus fragrance, color, sound, objects, etc., manifest. Oneness is the divided lever through which duality effects its motion. Zero brings a reflection of undivided presence, whereas the reflection of one is always division, and the past.

I became fascinated with the culture of the Mesoamerican Maya and its zero-based cosmology in the 90's. I lived for long periods in that region of the world. Unknowingly, each adventure appeared to be leading me, or narrowing my focus, towards the spiritual value of zero.


JV Marco

[Thomas Knierim]

Zero is a number, same as any other number; and there is nothing special about it at all.

Well... as long as you don't use it as a divisor. If you do, then computer programs throw exceptions, equations produce singularities, and satellites come down crashing. :lol: Besides, zero has a tendency to mess up algebraic structures in abstract algebra, if I remember my math classes correctly.

Gurta said, "none are more hopelessly enslaved than those who falsely believe they are free."

Wasn't it Goethe who said that?

Could you describe the third kind of atheism that you think is different from weak/strong atheism in more detail?

Also from my point of view, science and mathematics very much needs to be identified as the belief system it is,...fundamentally no different than any other beliefs.

You keep saying that, but you have not really explained what makes mathematics a belief system. The claim strikes me as odd, because saying that mathematics is a belief system is a bit like saying that 'Spanish is a belief system'. It is a category error, because mathematics is not concerned at all with making statements about the physics or metaphysics. Mathematics deals with counting, set theory, logic, plane geometry, and everything else is developed from there. The only statements it makes are statements about itself.

When you say that mathematics describes an illusionary world, it appears that you conflate mathematics with theoretical physics. The latter uses mathematical language to describe the physical universe (which may be seen as illusory). But a computer scientist will interject that it does not matter whether you deal with the real world or with a computer-simulated world. The mathematics are the same, or at least the simulated world represents a subset based on reasonable abstraction of the former. Mathematics does not entertain any philosophical notions of real vs. not-real.

---

Still more astonishing is that world of rigorous fantasy we call mathematics. ~Gregory Bateson

Geometry is not true, it is advantageous. ~Henri Poincaré

Pure mathematics is, in its way, the poetry of logical ideas. ~Albert Einstein

Cheers, Thomas

[the_aphid]

You see, y=1/(x-1) approaches infinity for x=1, in a more general form, y=1/(x-n) approaches infinity for x=n where n is any possible number does that make any number special?You are confusing the variable for the significance of a zero denominator. The whole point is that as the denominator approaches zero (not 1 or 2 or 75) the function approaches infinity. Yes, you can change the variables to x-n if you wish, but with x=n you are still talking about zero.Numbers stand for quantities, nothing more nothing less, and as soon as you detach those quantities from physicality, as soon as you detach them from physical units, such as apples and oranges for example, you can do the darnedest things with them. A bit of numerology and you can see a mystery in any arbitrary series of digits. That doesn't mean a thing.I am not talking about numerology, such as the significance of the number 23 or 911. I am not detaching the number zero from the quantity it represents, which is nothing. Where every other number represents quantity, zero represents the absence of quantity. The function I referred to is not a far-fetched notion with mystical meaning, it is really quite simple; as the denominator approaches zero, the function approaches infinity.

Nonetheless this has gone entirely off topic...so if you wish, I will conceit, nothing is just another quantity.;)

[abaris]

theAphid,

I don't think we drifted off topic. Zero, like any other number, letter or word, is an abstraction and so is "God", "Enlighment", "Samsara", "Energy" or "Mass". Our thought deals with abstractions and abstractions only. Not with the "Real" - another abstraction- world.

The reason for that is pretty simple, our Cognitive apparatus works on information about physical reality, not on physical reality itself - we are no "Gods"after all. We go around and collect information by chatting, reading, hearing, seeing touching feeling and out of that information our brain creates a virtual reality that is centered, of course, around its creator, which is the self. Now that esoteric universe does in many respects resemble the "Real Universe" but it is not bound to the laws that govern the real thing. This esoteric universe is our own build-in computer game. In it we dream, we imagine and do the unimaginable, here each of us is the main character in a game of his own making. The problem is, that sometimes we mistake this esoteric universe for the real thing. We are the center of our inner cosmos and so we tend to think that we are at the center of the Universe and that we are there for a reason. Our thought comes before, creates our esoteric cosmos, thus we assume that some higher thought came before the Real Cosmos. That's where the God delusion has its origin.

To put thought before existence that's the fallacy of the deists. When Descartes said "I think therefore I am" he formulated the antithesis of True atheism. A true atheist just says: "I Am" no matter what I think or do not Think. There is no purpose for or forethought to my existence, I'm here today, a causal product at the end of a unique infinite chain of random events. The atheist accepts the gift of existence gladly while the Deist seeks reassurance, from God, for the worth and purpose of what is given. And yet it is the Deist who fears death, he can not part from this life, the miseries of which he never tires to lament, without "The Promise" of a better, never ending afterlife. That's all that is to it so lets not lose yourselves in abstractions people. Stick to whats real.

And that brings me back to the issue with the zero.

The Aphid,
let me give you another example. I promise it will be the last. Imagine

you have 20 apples and 2 bins.
you divide the apples among the 2 bins (20/2) and you get 2 bins with 10 apples each

You have 20 apples and 1 bins
you divide the apples among the 1 bin (20/1) and you end up with 20 apples in one bin

Now lets say you have 20 apples and 0 bins
you divide the apples among the bins you don't have (20/0) and that leaves you with 20 apples on a pile and no bin. You'll certainly wont end up with an infinite number of apples, no matter what the abstract magic of the Zero says.

The conclusion here is that 20/0 is not infinity. It is just undefined because the operation is invalid. And that's actually how mathematics treats division by zero. Abstractions are certainly an essential element of thought but they should not be blindly trusted.

[the_aphid]

Now lets say you have 20 apples and 0 bins
you divide the apples among the bins you don't have (20/0) and that leaves you with 20 apples on a pile and no bin. You'll certainly wont end up with an infinite number of apples, no matter what the abstract magic of the Zero says.

The conclusion here is that 20/0 is not infinity. It is just undefined because the operation is invalid. And that's actually how mathematics treats division by zero. Abstractions are certainly an essential element of thought but they should not be blindly trusted.Firstly, I am not suggesting that 20/0 is equal to infinity, I am aware of the indivisibility by zero, it is simply another thing that makes the number unique ;) I am talking about what happens to the function y=1/x, as x approaches zero.

Secondly, I feel that maybe my position in this thread is being misunderstood, so allow my to make myself clear. If you are getting the impression that I am supporting vicente's 'abstraction' of the number zero, than you are mistaken. My comments are simply in response to schrodinger's statement that essentially zero is just another number and infinity is the real 'pickle'. I simply see things differently, as I see the two very closely related. This is why I feel this is getting off topic, since I don't feel this pertains to the discussion of God or the absence of God, per se.

Now, back to the apples...It is not an abstraction to talk about fractions, however by referring to whole objects such as apples and bins I feel you might be overlooking this possibility. The possibility of fractions of apples and fractions of bins. And secondly you are equating the apples with the entire function, rather than the 1 within the function. Essentially I am talking about zero when used with rational numbers rather than simply natural numbers.

For example, if instead of jumping straight from 1 bin to 0 bins, you had half a bin to shove your 20 apples in, and they all fit in there perfectly. Then it would not be an abstraction to conclude that you could therefore fit 40 apples in 1 whole bin. Correct?

Now you are on the path of accurately demonstrating the referred function correctly with real objects. If 20 apples will actually fit in 1/100th of a bin (assuming now that your 'bin' is a dump truck), then obviously 2000 apples will fit in the 1 whole 'bin'.

Basically all I have done is this:
let y represent the number of apples that can fit in 1 bin,
let x represents the fraction of the bin that can contain 1 apple

therefore, as x approaches zero, y approaches infinity.

Or am I missing something here...I am a little tired and math isn't exactly my thing. :think:

[Deine]

Like 2 mirrors facing each other?

Sorry, can't explain it clearly myself.

[schrodinger]

As usual, this discussion is revolving around meaning, which is understanding, which is subjective. The intellectualisation is an attempt to extricate us from this mire, but it only has the effect of making the pit deeper.

It is quite clear the each indiidual here is approaching the issue from their own ego perspective. It is also quite clear that no concensus is going to be reached.

Is there anything to be learned frrom this?

I don’t see anything wrong with a bit of intellectualizing about zero. After all, despite the name of the thread, we are not going to prove or disprove the existence of any Gods here, now are we? The thing about zero is, it is tangible and quite naturally understandable. I have zero elephants in my back yard, at the moment, anyway. (Some years back, I could not say that, but that is another story!) Zero is very clear, totally unlike the very unclear “infinite”. How much is infinite? Or should I say how many?

The Babylonians got along just fine without the need for zero. They in fact discovered the Pythagorean theorem, long before Pythagoras was born. They managed this by simply leaving a space where there is none of something. They had no symbol for zero!

Think about that; just an empty space. I find that to be so much more appropriate than creating a symbol for nothing. Of course, this would have created confusion when the space (zero) was to come at the end of a number. Was that a 1 or a 10? The Babylonians got around that neatly by using fractions. Their “unity” was 60, and they had a symbol for that. To write a 10, they just wrote 60/6. Of course they used their own symbols, not our Arabic numerals.

I say zero is the same as any other integer because I think of the number scale as a sliding scale. You can slide the scale five places to the right, and the number five becomes the new zero and the old zero becomes -5 without any difficulty.

However, you cannot slide infinity on to the scale at all! It is just out there somewhere in theory, but we can’t quite wrap our minds around it. I disagree that zero is the equal and opposite of infinity. The only equal and opposite of infinity is negative infinity!

Oh well, so much for intellectualizing and egomania. But it shows we can all learn something; even an egomaniac such as I!:lol:

[Michael]

OK, so what's the sum of this thread?

And even when jesting I'm always most serious.

[schrodinger]

39? Doh! :duh:and still counting........

[schrodinger]

For example, if instead of jumping straight from 1 bin to 0 bins, you had half a bin to shove your 20 apples in, and they all fit in there perfectly. Then it would not be an abstraction to conclude that you could therefore fit 40 apples in 1 whole bin. Correct?

Now you are on the path of accurately demonstrating the referred function correctly with real objects. If 20 apples will actually fit in 1/100th of a bin (assuming now that your 'bin' is a dump truck), then obviously 2000 apples will fit in the 1 whole 'bin'.

Basically all I have done is this:
let y represent the number of apples that can fit in 1 bin,
let x represents the fraction of the bin that can contain 1 apple

therefore, as x approaches zero, y approaches infinity.

Or am I missing something here...I am a little tired and math isn't exactly my thing. :think:

Well, all you are really saying is that you can put an infinite number of apples in an infinitely large bin. You can say that without ever mentioning zero at all; so you have not proved any relation between zero and infinity.

40 and counting.

[Michael]

Well, all you are really saying is that you can put an infinite number of apples in an infinitely large bin. You can say that without ever mentioning zero at all; so you have not proved any relation between zero and infinity.

40 and counting.

An infinite inside an infinite? That sounds like a lot of the conversation we have around here.

[abaris]

theAphid

Firstly, I am not suggesting that 20/0 is equal to infinity, I am aware of the indivisibility by zero, it is simply another thing that makes the number unique I am talking about what happens to the function y=1/x, as x approaches zero.

...

For example, if instead of jumping straight from 1 bin to 0 bins, you had half a bin to shove your 20 apples in, and they all fit in there perfectly. Then it would not be an abstraction to conclude that you could therefore fit 40 apples in 1 whole bin. Correct?

Now you are on the path of accurately demonstrating the referred function correctly with real objects. If 20 apples will actually fit in 1/100th of a bin (assuming now that your 'bin' is a dump truck), then obviously 2000 apples will fit in the 1 whole 'bin'


You are missing the point. All that abstract mathematical speculation you are getting into doesn't change factual reality. You still got 20 Apples on a pile and no bin.

Of course you can speculate that if the ratio of the volumes Vapple/Vbin approaches Zero the number of apples that would fit in the bin would approach Infinity.

But here is the thing: There is no such thing as an Apple with Zero volume nor is there such a thing as a bin with infinite volume and neither do you have an infinite number of tiny apples. You only have 20 regular delicious apples and no bin to put them in. Abstract Mathematical Idealizations do have their uses but they do not Change Reality, they only produce predictions which sometimes, not always, match reality.


Vincente:

Zero upsets their flawed logic and both their theism and atheism. The companions of zero—causelessness, nowness, timelessness, unconditionality, undivided light, and love—along with everything that encourages our direct experience of reality, is frowned upon within the current social structure.

--

The failure of science and religion to understand that the power of all phenomena originates from the undivided, stillness of zero is the single greatest obstacle to world peace.


So Vincente,

why don't you just demonstrate those awesome powers of the Zero. Just place the worlds resources atop the "Holly Nothingness" and there will be an infinite store of Goods for all of Humanity. No more war no more Hunger no more Suffering. Is that how you Imagine the Zero bringing "World Peace"?

[brother alan]

To paraphrase the sage--
In pursuit of knowledge, each day something is acquired.
In pursuit of reality, each day something is dropped.

We all "know" more than we have courage to believe, to wit: that all these manifestations and forms around us emanate from the formless, and indeed being arises from non-being. In the face of such knowledge, the "How?" of science and the "Who?" of religion are not so different questions.

[the_aphid]

You are missing the point. All that abstract mathematical speculation you are getting into doesn't change factual reality. You still got 20 Apples on a pile and no bin.Apparently I am missing the point, since I can no longer see what any of this has to do with the topic at hand. You keep talking about reality as apples and bins, distinct physical objects, and suggesting that this is reality. Within this reality, zero means one simple thing, the lack of something, such as having zero bins in which to place 20 apples. Alright, I'll grant you that. In this 'reality' of apples and bins, zero is just another number. In set theory, zero is simply the empty set. However, I don't feel that is a true representation of reality myself, and furthermore I feel you are severely limiting the understanding that mathematics can yield by doing so.

I feel that an equally reasonable understanding of zero comes about from comparing it to infinity. Such as one would experience when approaching absolute zero. We can quite logically come infinitely closer to, within a billionth of a degree of 0K, but never actually reach it. We seem to be encountering precisely the same thing in the 'material world'.

Perhaps the reason I feel this way is because I am reacquainting myself with the Pre-Socratics, and tend to find the Parmenidean Way of Truth a more reasonable representation of 'reality' when compared to Democritean Atomic view. Ex nihilo nihil fit comes to mind when discussing the topic of 'zero'. For example, to what decimal place can one go before being closer to zero than they are to 1? Every other number the answer is obvious, 1.500001 is closer to 2, while 1.499999 is closer to 1. However, zero is unique in this respect. Take 0 to as many decimals as you want, but if there is a number at the end of that infinitely long line of zero's, than you are closer to 1 than you are to 0.

This is the reason I do not agree with reductionism, it is the reason I do not believe that those apples and bins are composed of fundamental particles, and maybe this is not the interpretation of zero you were discussing, but in my opinion it is an equally valid interpretation of zero. If you are to suggest that I am talking about 'nothing' and not 'zero' than perhaps you could distinguish between the two? And therefore I stand by my assertion that zero is not 'just another number'.

[brother alan]

high degree of predictability

if empirical inquiry means anything at all, the patterned predictability it reveals is an aspect of the universe, and a damned scary one, if the implications are not to be ignored.:o

[abaris]

The Aphid

Perhaps the reason I feel this way is because I am reacquainting myself with the Pre-Socratics, and tend to find the Parmenidean Way of Truth a more reasonable representation of 'reality' when compared to Democritean Atomic view


Ah! Parmenides, my favorite Philosopher besides Heraclitus. His take on the impossibility of non-being, nothingness, is quite interesting:


Come now I will tell thee-and do thou hear my word and heed it-what are the only ways of enquiry that lead to knowledge. The one way, assuming that being is and that it is impossible for it not to be, is the trustworthy path, for truth attends it. The other, that not-being is and that it necessarily is, I call a wholly incredible course, since thou canst not recognise not-being (for this is impossible), nor couldst thou speak of it, for thought and being are the same thing.

It makes no difference to me at what point I begin, for I shall always come back again to this.

It is necessary both to say and to think that being is; for it is possible that being is, and it is impossible that not-being is ; this is what I bid thee ponder. I restrain thee from this first course of investigation; and from that course also along which mortals knowing nothing wander aimlessly, since helplessness directs the roaming thought in their bosoms, and they are borne on deaf and like-wise blind, amazed, headstrong races, they who consider being and not-being as the same and not the same; and that all things follow a back-turning course.

That things which are not are, shall never prevail, she said, but do thou restrain thy mind from this course of investigation.

And let not long-practised habit compel thee along this path, thine eye careless, thine ear and thy tongue overpowered by noise; but do thou weigh the much contested refutation of their words, which I have uttered.

There is left but this single path to tell thee of: namely, that being is. And on this path there are many proofs that being is without beginning and indestructible; it is universal, existing alone, immovable and without end; nor ever was it nor will it be, since it now is, all together, one, and continuous. For what generating of it wilt thou seek out? From what did it grow, and how? I will not permit thee to say or to think that it came from not-being; for it is impossible to think or to say that not-being is. What thine would then have stirred it into activity that it should arise from not-being later rather than earlier? So it is necessary that being either is absolutely or is not. Nor will the force of the argument permit that anything spring from being except being itself. Therefore justice does not slacken her fetters to permit generation or destruction, but holds being firm.

(The decision as to these things comes in at this point.)

Either being exists or it does not exist. It has been decided in accordance with necessity to leave the unthinkable, unspeakable path, as this is not the true path, but that the other path exists and is true. How then should being suffer destruction? How come into existence? If it came into existence, it is not being, nor will it be if it ever is to come into existence. . . . So its generation is extinguished, and its destruction is proved incredible.


Thats the most convincing argument against creation ex nihilo ever made.