Actual Freedom ~ Commonly Raised Objections

RESPONDENT: All I’ve even seen in Richards writings is ...... an absolute belief that there is no such happening as God or other dimension besides the human body which he is.

RICHARD: May I demonstrate something basic about egocentric interaction masquerading as mutual understanding and reciprocal communication? Vis.:

Version 1:

• [Person No. 1]: ‘I believe in Santa Claus and that he lives at the North Pole’.
• [Person No. 2]: ‘There is no such entity as ‘Santa Claus’ outside of passionate imagination let alone a ‘North Pole’ home where such a phantasm lives’.
• [Person No. 1]: ‘All I’ve even seen in Person No. 2’s writings is an absolute belief that there is no such happening as Santa Claus nor that Santa’s home at the North Pole’.

Version 2:

• [Person No. 1]: ‘I believe in Santa Claus and that he lives at the North Pole’.
• [Person No. 2]: ‘There is no such entity as ‘Santa Claus’ outside of passionate imagination let alone a ‘North Pole’ home where such a phantasm lives’.
• [Person No. 1]: ‘All I’ve even seen in Person No. 2’s writings is that he does not believe in such a happening as Santa Claus or that his home at the North Pole’.

It is not possible to proceed very deeply at all in a sensible discussion about human suffering with the person in version No. 1 (which is what this Mailing List is purportedly set up for) ... whereas it is possible with person No. 2 (who understands the basic principles operating in regards belief in the metaphysical and the faith required to maintain trust in that which is not physical) and is prepared to investigate. Many, many years ago, when I was but a tyro, a fledgling beginner in talking with my fellow human beings about being happy and harmless through the elimination of malice and sorrow, I was accosted by a self-professed ‘Born-Again Christian’ in a small town main street:

• [Born-Again Christian]: ‘Jesus Loves you’.
• [Richard]: ‘Thank you, but I do not believe in Jesus’.
• [Born-Again Christian]: ‘Do you believe in God, then?’
• [Richard]: ‘No ... I have no beliefs whatsoever’.
• [Born-Again Christian]: ‘So, you believe that God does not exist?’
• [Richard]: ‘Yes, there are no gods or goddesses outside of passionate imagination’ (this is a tyro’s basic error No. 1a; subsection: b.).
• [Born-Again Christian]: ‘Ah hah! So you do have beliefs after all!’
• [Richard]: ‘No, I have no beliefs whatsoever ... there are no gods or goddesses outside of passionate imagination’.
• [Born-Again Christian]: ‘But you just agreed you believe that there are no gods or goddesses outside of passionate imagination’.
• [Richard]: (shocked into silence as the enormity of why mayhem and misery abounds in the religious/spiritual world started to sink home).

I have been talking about these matters for twenty-odd years now, and I have had to hone my skills as a wordsmith so as to pre-empt such sophistry, to such a degree that I am nowadays accused of ... um ... using an Oxford Dictionary for a pillow at night while I sleep, for example (or even that I absorb all the words and meanings which I then altruistically use to razzle-dazzle spiritualists into understanding me).

Golly, someone even said recently, because they think I delight in being the only one of my kind in the world and of all time, that if another person was to understand me then I could no longer be the undisputed ruler and sole owner of all that I know and understand ... or some-such egocentric explanation to a fellow human being expressing an inability to comprehend what I am saying. However, these days I am not at all shocked into silence at the enormity of why mayhem and misery abounds in the religious/spiritual world.

The enormity of why sunk home long ago ... which is why I write as I do.

*

RESPONDENT: All I’ve even seen in Richards writings is ...... an absolute belief that there is no such happening as God or other dimension besides the human body which he is.

<SNIP>

RICHARD: It is futile to take up a challenge wherein the challenger first proposes something (such as a god or a goddess or an other dimension) and then says: ‘prove me wrong’. Needless to say, I do know for myself that there are no gods or goddesses or an after-life outside of passionate imagination.

<SNIP>

RESPONDENT: I’m the one who truly has no beliefs, for I state that I just don’t know.

RICHARD: This position is called ‘agnostic’ ...<SNIP>... For something like twenty five years I was agnostic and it is an apparently satisfying position to be in ... until one day I realised just what I was doing to myself. I was cleverly shuffling all the ‘hard questions’ under the rug and going around deftly cutting the ‘believers’ down to size (which is all so easy to do). But I had nothing to offer in its place – other than ‘it is unknowable’ – and I puzzled as to why this was so. Finally, I ceased procrastinating and equivocating. I wanted to know. I wanted to find out – for myself – all about life, the universe and what it is to be a human being. I now know.

RESPONDENT: I find your stance extremely contradictory when you talk about being the universe experiencing itself as this flesh and blood body, and then deny that there is anything beyond what the flesh and blood body can experience – as if there weren’t anything beyond the flesh and blood body, which is an infinitesimally small part of the universe.

RICHARD: This is what is called a ‘straw man argument’ (whereupon you invent something I did not say then criticise your own invention as if you were criticising what I actually did say). Thus it is your own assumed ‘stance’ which you find ‘extremely contradictory’ and not what I have to say at all. Therefore, as I have never said words to the effect that ‘there weren’t anything beyond the flesh and blood body’ then I am unable to respond to this paragraph.

If you bear in mind that what I do say is that this infinite, eternal and perpetual universe is all that is – and that there is nothing beyond this infinite, eternal and perpetual universe – then the conversation will come back on track to what I do discuss without all the needless distractions you have introduced into what I actually write. Perhaps if I were to take the liberty of providing an edited version to demonstrate:

• ‘All I’ve even seen in Richards writings is ...... an absolute belief that there is no such happening as God or other dimension besides the human body which he is’.

• ‘What is in Richard’s writings is that he says there is no such happening as God or other dimension besides this infinite, eternal and perpetual universe’.

If you find this edited version compatible with what I have actually written, over and again to this mailing list, then you will see that your concerns about what previously appeared as ‘extremely contradictory’ statements only arose because of the ‘all I’ve even seen’ translation. As this infinite, eternal and perpetual universe is experiencing itself consciously, as a flesh and blood human being, then this flesh and blood human being is the experience of infinitude being aware of its own infinitude.

And awareness does not come bigger than that.

RESPONDENT: You just cannot prove, Richard, that there is nothing beyond the blood and bones body which may exist in another dimension.

RICHARD: Hmm ... and as you cannot ‘prove’ that there is ‘another dimension’ then this is a ‘Mexican Stand-Off’, eh? Howsoever, I have responded to you before on this issue:

• [Respondent]: ‘As I’ve stated before, you have no proof that your brand of actuality is really all there is to life.
• [Richard]: ‘I find variations of this line of debate on the Christian versus Rationalist discussion boards (where the Christians challenge the Rationalists to prove that their god does not exist). It is futile to take up a challenge wherein the challenger first proposes something (such as a god or a goddess or an other dimension) and then says: ‘prove me wrong’. Needless to say, I do know for myself that there are no gods or goddesses or an after-life outside of passionate imagination.

All I endeavour to do is to get the other’s head out of the clouds – and beyond – and come down-to-earth where the flesh and blood bodies called human beings actually live. Obviously, the solution to all the ills of humankind can only be found here in space and now in time as matter. Then the question is: is it possible to be free of the human condition, here on earth, in this life-time, as this flesh and blood body? Which means:

How on earth can one live happily and harmlessly in the world as-it-is with people as-they-are whilst one nurses malice and sorrow in one’s bosom?

RESPONDENT: You appear to be a very three dimensional person, and I think that you deliberately complicate and argue the issues so that you can debate them [and win]. LOL.

RICHARD: If you would care to cease cackling for a moment and even casually peruse the sequence (all of the above) and elsewhere you will find that it is the other person that ‘deliberately complicates’ the issue through prevarication and obfuscation ... and not me. ‘Tis you who is prattling on about Mr. Jiddu Krishnamurti’s usage of the word ‘creation’ meaning only ‘no psychological time’ when it is clearly not the case at all ... which case is also evidenced by your ‘you appear to be a very three dimensional person’ and your ‘you just cannot prove, Richard, that there is nothing beyond the blood and bones body which may exist in another dimension’. Whereas I am always out-in-the-open and up-front in my agenda:

It is possible to live in the already always existing peace-on-earth, in this lifetime, as this flesh and blood body only.

RESPONDENT: Now that we have a logical foundation for the existence of God … (snip).

RICHARD: I have snipped the remainder of your e-mail for obvious reasons.

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