letsbefriends, I had the same reaction to the term spiritual just a few years ago. I have since let go of my animosity. Looking at the night sky sights through my telescope is a spiritual experience for me. Heck, sometimes playing dominoes can be a spiritual experience.
letsbefriends, I asked you what spiritual beliefs are, because I think spirituality has nothing to do with what you believe: it is a matter of how you believe. Note that nearly every religion has its spiritual corners, so only this fact already makes it difficult to connect spirituality to certain belief-contents. So I think spirituality is that you do not just want to believe what your religion tells you, you want to experience it. In montotheism, you strive to see God, in Hinduism one wants to get 'behind' Samsara, in Buddhism one wants to reach for Nirwana. They all have in common that somehow people want to see what reality really is behind the scenes. Now the question is if such a project makes sense in a modern scientific world view. I think it perfectly does. In a modern world view, we know we are 'just' complicated chemical reactions, that quite incidentally came into existence in a universe that doesn't care one bit about our existence. But we do not live from these truths: - we live our lives as if our selves are real, and not illusions created by the brain - we feel that we are separated from the universe as individuals, where in fact we are part of it, even created by it - we feel as if we have libertarian free will, where we in fact are caused, just as everything else So we do not live according what our 'true teaching' says. So spirituality in a modern world view is perfectly possible, and in no contradiction with it.Agreed with much of what you wrote - though I think spirituality can still be mixed with both the what and the how. I think you can call the Buddhist belief in a cyclical universe of death and rebirth with subsequent karmic connections - and the practice of meditation to escape this cycle - spirituality. You'd just need to specify between beliefs and their prescribed (or actual) practices.
Sorry for the spam, guys - someday I’ll learn how to ‘quote’ different people within one message and just send one big reply as opposed to several. But for anyone following this thread interested in the original query: I have recently found Google Scholar to be an excellent resource in staying abreast of new research in the cognitive psychology/neuroscience side of beliefs. You just need to play around with the terms you use which could be part of new titles - or follow a particular scholar (like Pascal Boyer!).
I think you can call the Buddhist belief in a cyclical universe of death and rebirth with subsequent karmic connections - and the practice of meditation to escape this cycle - spirituality.If you take these beliefs literally then it is superstition, just as any other unfounded ideas about life and the universe, and therefore has nothing to do with spirituality.
I think you can call the Buddhist belief in a cyclical universe of death and rebirth with subsequent karmic connections - and the practice of meditation to escape this cycle - spirituality.If you take these beliefs literally then it is superstition, just as any other unfounded ideas about life and the universe, and therefore has nothing to do with spirituality. Herein lies the conundrum of using a commonly accepted religious term in a secular manner; even secularists get lazy and slip into the religious connotation. As I said above, looking through a telescope is a spiritual experience for me. This has nothing to do with religion and everything to do with the sense of awe I feel when gazing at celestial objects. When it is cloudy I get my spirits out of a bottle. ;-)
Herein lies the conundrum of using a commonly accepted religious term in a secular manner; even secularists get lazy and slip into the religious connotation.Yes, that is a bit of a problem. But it is the best word for what is meant. Should we find a new word?
As I said above, looking through a telescope is a spiritual experience for me. This has nothing to do with religion and everything to do with the sense of awe I feel when gazing at celestial objects.Hmmm. I have to think about it. Harris does not think that feeling awe is enough to call an experience spiritual. But I forgot his reasons. I'll try to find the passage again.
When it is cloudy I get my spirits out of a bottle. ;-)Every cloudy day? :bug:
No, just the cloudy nights when I’m with friends outside.
Herein lies the conundrum of using a commonly accepted religious term in a secular manner; even secularists get lazy and slip into the religious connotation. ;-):lol: I know what you mean, I personally love: "The good lord willing" to indicate that just because I'm planning on doing something tomorrow doesn't mean it's necessarily going to happen, who knows what can happen between now and then. And yes the concept of "Lord" for God repulses me, since it make me think of slave owning lords of the manor and I know many Gods are precisely such miscreants - But, you know, Good Providence Willing, just doesn't have the right ring to it. :cheese:
Herein lies the conundrum of using a commonly accepted religious term in a secular manner; even secularists get lazy and slip into the religious connotation. ;-):lol: I know what you mean, I personally love: "The good lord willing" to indicate that just because I'm planning on doing something tomorrow doesn't mean it's necessarily going to happen, who knows what can happen between now and then. And yes the concept of "Lord" for God repulses me, since it make me think of slave owning lords of the manor and I know many Gods are precisely such miscreants - But, you know, Good Providence Willing, just doesn't have the right ring to it. :cheese:And DV (Deo Volente) to mean 'Determinism Willing' doesn't really work does it?
I have since let go of my animosity. Looking at the night sky sights through my telescope is a spiritual experience for me. Heck, sometimes playing dominoes can be a spiritual experience.I promised to cite what Harris has to say about it. He delivers no immediate arguments, I am afraid his book as a whole is the argument, i.e. his explanation what spirituality is. This is what he says about 'awe':
Authors who attempt to build a bridge between science and spirituality tend to make one of two mistakes: Scientists generally start with an impoverished view of spiritual experience, assuming that it must be a grandiose way of describing ordinary states of mind—parental love, artistic inspiration, awe at the beauty of the night sky. In this vein, one finds Einstein’s amazement at the intelligibility of Nature’s laws described as though it were a kind of mystical insight.
As for Sagan, I'm aware he felt awe for the universe. Slapping the term spirituality onto that again just proves my point the term is nonsensical. If one feels awe for the universe, one describes that as awe.But it's more than just "awe". When I think of "spirit" I think of all the things that motivate me emotionally and mentally -- love, compassion, humanity, curiosity, stubbornness, even logic and reason. These are all intangible things, but they are certainly real and certainly not mumbo-jumbo. If I could think of a single word that encompassed them all as well as "spirit", I would consider using it. But this isn't worth getting into a big argument about.