The "Why" thread

[Grays_1890]

It's hard to argue with any of that. Yet, I've started coming around to the idea that all of these beliefs do come from somewhere, and are not just our human mind's imagination. Einstein received his ideas in dreams, for instance. Da Vinci said his ideas came from inspiration, the same as the ancient greek, inspiration meaning something like "given from GHod" or something like that.

I just think these ideas and systems come from somewhere and not just out of thin air. I don't think Buddhism, for instance, came about from a fluke, and that meditation has proven to be an excellent method for calming down minds and giving practioners clarity. All the books written, ceremonies, rituals, ornamentation, deep archetypical stories found all over the world - all just out of "imagination" as if taking from a blank. What is imagination anyways? We seem to think its just something we come up with out of nowhere. Who knows, but I dont think so.

But again, what the fudge do I know. I have no scientific basis for this, obviously. I just think there is something more or higher incomprehensible to us that is influencing us more than we would like to think.

Hahah yeh I don't know, its just my best guess.

 

[Lost Mango]

It's hard to argue with any of that. Yet, I've started coming around to the idea that all of these beliefs do come from somewhere, and are not just our human mind's imagination. Einstein received his ideas in dreams, for instance. Da Vinci said his ideas came from inspiration, the same as the ancient greek, inspiration meaning something like "given from GHod" or something like that.

I just think these ideas and systems come from somewhere and not just out of thin air. I don't think Buddhism, for instance, came about from a fluke, and that meditation has proven to be an excellent method for calming down minds and giving practioners clarity. All the books written, ceremonies, rituals, ornamentation, deep archetypical stories found all over the world - all just out of "imagination" as if taking from a blank. What is imagination anyways? We seem to think its just something we come up with out of nowhere. Who knows, but I dont think so.

But again, what the fudge do I know. I have no scientific basis for this, obviously. I just think there is something more or higher incomprehensible to us that is influencing us more than we would like to think.

Dreams are your brain’s way of trying to make sense of information. You have thousands of dreams a year. You don’t remember the vast majority. There is no reason for them to be thought of as messages from another realm.

Einstein’s dream was about cows and electric fences and different ‘ Relative’ viewpoints to an event. Can’t buy into an inspirational agent for that personally.

Meditation is the same - it gives the brain breathing space to run through ideas and combinations of thought by eliminating the core override of worrying about the immediate surrounding environments.

 

[LutonSpurs]

I think principles and emotions have to be seperate. Principles are what you believe. Emotions are what you feel.

 

[johnola]

I think principles and emotions have to be seperate. Principles are what you believe. Emotions are what you feel.

Of course they are separate. But emotions can be influenced by both internal and external factors which have no relevance to what the emotion is being applied to.

 

[thfcsteff]

Emotions can certainly be wrong/mis-leading.

Much better to live your life by strong principles than emotions.

I think in big decisions you absolutely have to operate with fact-v-assumption-v-emotions. Vital. I think assumptions are responsible for so many things going wildly off-course in both local and 'bigger' life. There are times when I'm fine allowing emotions lead my life (when Brennan's scuffing goals in during Finals!) but I agree, the better way is to live by principles.

n.b. one of the hardest things to navigate is the dialectic. In nearly every situation there are two truths. Even if there's clearly only one by our own moral code or set of principles, there is someone who simply does not see it the same way and who has their own truth. I've always thought if we could work harder to try and first of all see how someone could view 'said situation' from such an opposite perspective, we might then be able to get on a path of agreement. Trust me, I am very much trying to learn that along with most of us (i.e. not trying to claim any high ground here whatsoever), just sort of throwing out there how alarming such situations can be initially.