Closer To Truth
To consider God seriously, where to start? To try to see the big picture of God, what are the questions? What are the categories? What would be the prime attributes or traits of a Supreme Being, the supposed Creator of the universe? What would be God’s essence and nature, purposes and plans? What can be said for God and against God?
Free access to Closer to Truth’s library of 5,000 videos: http://bit.ly/376lkKN
Watch more interviews on questions about God: https://bit.ly/3jZXJBV
Daniel Clement Dennett III is an American philosopher, writer and cognitive scientist and is currently the Co-director of the Center for Cognitive Studies and Professor at Tufts University.
Register for free at CTT.com for subscriber-only exclusives: http://bit.ly/2GXmFsP
Closer to Truth presents the world’s greatest thinkers exploring humanity’s deepest questions. Discover fundamental issues of existence. Engage new and diverse ways of thinking. Appreciate intense debates. Share your own opinions. Seek your own answers.
Source
People believe in beliefs
"Curiously enough, there's more people in the world who believe in belief in God than believe in God." Robert's facial expression was very appropriate on hearing that statement ( and similar to mine ).
Pastor that don't believe in God is like an oxymoron
That Aztec bat god really exists. The rest are made up.
Unfortunately I'm too skeptical about God and metaphysical matter, but I'm not atheist because nobody can prove God doesn't exist
Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence. C. Hitchens.
Faith is believing what you know ain't so. M. Twain.
"Become one with Jesus."
That is precisely what needs to be delved into.
Let's explore Jesus in terms of what he PREACHED.
1)The Beatitudes.
2)The Sermon On The Mount
3)The Fruits of The Spirit
I postulate that in order to "accept Christ", one must meet the prerequisites of not just understanding and meditating on the lessons within Jesus teachings, but striving towards perfecting each asset of those qualities, like practicing a musical instrument or sport.
We will never perfect any discipline, whether it's the spirituality within the teachings of Christ, or if it's an activity like sports or music….but the idea is to embrace IMPROVING.
As the saying goes….Its not the Destination….but the Journey.
For once i have to agree. Religion is slowly losing its control. And mostly by it's own actions.
Religion is a pandemic no vaccine for that keeps the distance, miles not feet
As a lifelong Catholic who also taught RCIA, I'm always amazed that so many people (including other Catholics) do not realize that the one and only reason to believe in God is to gain eternal life. And the interesting part is that God repeats that theme over and over in the scriptures but people always seem to miss it. You can find references to it in both the Old and the New Testament.
Jesus puts it this way:
"… whoever comes to me I will never drive away. For I have come down from heaven not to do my will but to do the will of him who sent me. For my Father’s will is that everyone who looks to the Son and believes in him shall have eternal life, and I will raise them up at the last day.”
So the next logical question might be what does a person need to do to do the Father's (God's) will? A man asked Jesus that very question 2000 years ago and this is what Jesus said: "if you want to receive eternal life, keep the commandments.”
Then what about all that other stuff the churches require of their followers? Where does that fit in? The answer is this; for most people on this earth, keeping the commandments can be a real challenge. Jesus told us that even looking at a woman with lust is the same as adultery because if given the time and opportunity, we all would probably commit the adultery. So given that temptation is all around us, the churches of the world have come up with a set of rituals and beliefs that are designed to help their followers keep the commandments.
More importantly, Jesus was well aware of the temptations that grab our attention throughout every day so he told us that he died for our sins, so we wouldn't have to pay the penalty. That doesn't mean people can sin with impunity and then expect Jesus to pay the penalty for someone else's sins all the time. What it means is that if a person succumbs to the temptation of the moment and sins, he can ask Jesus (or God) for forgiveness. As long as the person recognizes the sin and repents, Jesus will take the penalty on his own shoulders.
People who have a deep faith will also talk about all the other benefits of becoming a part of an organized religion and that is absolutely true. There are indeed many benefits to belonging to a large group of people who share your own beliefs and practices. But it is important not to take your eyes off the end goal, and that is to gain eternal life as God promised.
Eternal life is an amazing gift, but we have complete freedom to refuse it if we don't want it. God never forces his will on anyone. So the choice is up to every individual. You can live out your 85 to 90 years doing whatever you want, and then, when you die, they will bury your body. What comes after that, no one really knows for sure. On the other hand, you can accept God's gift of eternal life and live in indescribable luxury for ever and ever. And all anyone has to do to get it is to say "yes" to Jesus. And that is the big picture.
God, the famous man-made fictional figure, consumes a large part of human's time. It's an amazing waste of time and maybe only few people realize it.
Considering that there are over 2 billion Christians and almost 2 billion Muslims i would say Dans assertions are incorrect
The "big picture" GOD is simply the "ACTUAL INFINITE" that has always been, is now, and will always be! GOD didn't "create" the universe, GOD IS the infinite universe, there can be ONLY ONE!
„God“ is the life itself („I am the life!“), it is the real „living“, that is able to pull itself even out of the nothing ("from eternity to eternity") and organize itself (i.a. with science, viruses, external things etc.) („Now I want to stand up!“), and which once will be in full glory and greatness („I am what will be!“) (theol. „advent of God“, philos. „arrival of being“) with all the promised capabilities, the life, that created us; but for this, we are something like living „building bricks“, like in Bible explained. So I recommend with Newton: „Be careful with your hasty judgements and conclusions about the future abilities of the mind [or the life]!“ ✌️
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parmenides
Parmenides knew about Being. His concept of Being is similar to Self in eastern philosophy. Self is pure consciousness. We experience a lower form of consciousness called mind. And mind goes outward and is mislead to believe happiness exists outside. When mind is trained to dive deep inside, we experience truth and true joy.
He sounds like genuine, wise man.
Has anyone ever told you that sometimes you look like Albert Einstein? Thanks for sharing, Lord-Jesus-Christ com
Kuhn has been on the god kick and he finally runs into the brick wall that is Dennet.
Ah, Dennett, one of my least favorite thinkers out there.
What would be interesting if Robert included some Muslim philosophers and metaphysicists. I am sure he knows or is aware of many in the academic world.
Muslims are worried about woman being educated? Lol. That itself is an ignorant qoute. I am a muslim and I am worried about future generations including women will be ignorant for not knowing the religious views and knowledges in the first place because we are drifting away from religion for the love of our worldly gain and quick pleasure most of it which is provided by the internet.
I belieVe in god. Here’s the god I believe in—god is a giant pile of mythological nonsense and a major time waster for humans
What a perfect episode to suggest to you to check out a series on Binge called ‘Raised by Wolves’ it raises some future potential issues with religions. More comments here today, interesting
Also interesting is I’m not religious or believe but I do believe a god and heaven would be a great outcome at death but not so much in life… you would get too many idiots thinking that god is preference them, sometimes just because they are a believer and that’s not a great outcome for earth
Anyone else think that this guy looks like god? 😂
I’m probably the only person to notice the chromatic aberration in the windows 😝
. Why believe? Because we do not know. In not knowing you cannot know what you choose to believe is true. Why? Because the reason you believe is because you don't know. Religions and gods, it's all smoke and mirrors hiding the largest pile of bullshit humans have ever concocted! Thank you for this thought provoking series. If you knew that god existed believing in him would make him think you're nuts. You only believe when you don't know, and not knowing negates your belief.
Do you believe in Paris? Yes.
Do you believe in Abe Lincoln? Yes.
Do you believe the sun will shine on Earth tomorrow? Yes.
Do you believe in gods? Yes.
Really? REALLY? Then we need to talk about the meaning of the word "believe."
the word god is a silly metaphor people use to explain reality beyond their comprehension. a force of creation exists, because we can observe the effects. understanding the force should be pursued rationally, rather than dogmatic. the desire for a "traditional" judging god appeals to immature people who want a daddy, people who seek fascism
dan is a very sad Jiva.
Unfortunately the democratization of information includes enough misinformation to reduce scientific knowledge overall and diminish acceptance of it by non-scientists. Leaving us with #flatearthers who happily burn mathematics at the altar of religious dogma. Oh were it all so simple as belief in belief, aka "Churchianity". Which is the deadest luke warm a cup of Christianity as can be. Ref. Revelation 3:16.
Who is the *feeler*, the *experiencer*, in the brain, Mr. Dan Dennett? We know the anatomy and the histology of neurons, so don't tell us that!
Religions cloud the mind with utter nonsense.
fascinating discussion as always
5:10 totally agree , in Muslims majority countries , internet and social media destroy all kinds of protection against questioning religion and spreading scientific and critical thinking .
What's happening is the God question is getting uncoupled from religion and people are more thinking about the universe and whether there is a creator and life after death without a specific ideology attached and this could be because of education and advances in science which are showing traditional religions to be largely nonsense.