Themis wrote:Irrelevant to what i said, which is that they had no desire to learn certain knowledge they will undoubtedly be learning from being forced into jail.
The big difference is what is sharable. We go by what works, and things that are shareable, we tend to have much more agreement on.
You can check things out for yourself easily enough. Scientific facts can be checked out yourself. You may notice that in university science classes usually have labs with them. This is so one can go through many of the experiments themselves to confirm how it works, and that it does work. Now I don't know Egyptian, but then no egyptoligists, including LDS ones, is disputing that the papyri does not translate into the Book of Abraham. There are plenty of ways to evaluate evidence without using much faith in it's validity.
Every expereince has to be interpreted. I don't question the experience, but whether the interpretation is accurate. When it comes to the spiritual it is all over the place, and agreement about what it means is not really there.
Not just perception, but interpretation, which is hugely affected by our environment. LDS tend to interpret it according to LDS beliefs. Same for other religious groups. I think it is very unrealistic to think each group as a whole is having very different expereinces, but certainly very different interpretations. To me this suggest that most if not all interpretations are probably not accurate.
I am not talking about the influence our thoughts have on our life, but your idea that reality is what ever we think it is. If this was true, then this world would be every different. There are many things beyond our control or influence.
This assumes that if I have had the same experience I would have the same interpretation.
Angels, aliens or reality independent of of what we think or perceive.
I would say yes to all. The past is the key to reality. There are many things that were not perceived or thought of, but were later found to exist, and had existed the whole time. I think this is good evidence that there are things we yet to learn about or have knowledge about. Maybe after many thousands of years of not finding anything new then maybe start thinking we know it all. :)
Hi Themis!
If I could add two thoughts that are interconnected. One is a lack of understanding of our desires and what they invoke. A simple picture might help. Suppose I desire to play in the freeway. I want to run and skip and do cartwheels in the same place that cars are speeding by at 70 mph. Perhaps I don't even see the cars, or don't think that they could hurt me. Maybe I believe I am faster than the cars. When a car hits me and kills me, others will think what a fool! Her desire to do something foolish brought about her death. Even if it was ignorance on my part, it was still brought around by my desire to do something that would result in my death.
This is what I am saying about doing evil. When we seek after a self alone desire it is like we are playing in the freeway, even if we are ignorant to this reality. Just because we cannot see the freeway or the cars does not make it unreal. When we eventually learn about the unseeable freeway and cars we will stop doing evil, in some life, at some time. This is the purpose of the law.
Those who fill our prisons suffer from ignorance. They can't see the consequences. Actually, I took a criminology class in college that taught that most criminals do not have the developed ability to see into the future, to judge consequences, they can only see the right now. So the threat of jail does not hinder their desire to do harm. But their ignorance does not make them free from consequences, just like our ignorance does not make us free from consequences. This is the evolution, the learning of the soul, to learn about consequences, to learn what we are really desiring.
I think we agree that for those in jail, their ignorance regarding what they are desiring landed them in jail. I offer that the same applies to our doing evil. There are consequences which flow from our desire. Which are part of our desire. I mean can't you see someone saying to a criminal:
Why are you robbing a bank? Do you want to go to jail? Because in my reality, wanting to rob a bank is equivalent to wanting to go to jail.
The other thing I would offer is this:
Ecclesiastes 1
9 That which has been is what will be,
That which is done is what will be done,
And there is nothing new under the sun.
10 Is there anything of which it may be said,
“See, this is new”?
It has already been in ancient times before us.
1 Corinthians 2:9
Eye has not seen, nor ear heard,
Nor have entered into the heart of man
The things which God has prepared for those who love Him.
As you said there is nothing new. According to what man can perceive and create out of his own mind. The spiritual realms are not comprehendable, imaginable to the human mind whose experiencing can only be gifted out of Grace. And so with regards to the spiritual, we are talking of something that is beyond man and his reason and logic. We are talking of something new.
And there is a shared experience of this new. It is not among the masses though. Only very few among humanity have evolved to the point of being able receive these gifts of spirit, of Godself, to enter into such experiences. But there are some, and though there are uniquenesses there is indeed a sharing of experience occurring. When our spiritual senses begin to awaken (and our desire for them to awaken can hasten this) we will be led to make contact, we will be driven compelled to make contact with those sharing in the same experiences. And so among these, all this is shared and proven.
Such individuals will speak to the masses, having learned from much experience, and share that if we desire to see and to know what is new, it will be opened to us. Seek and we will find, knock and it will be opened up to us.
It is all according to our desire. Our entire display of life! We are invited to step out of ignorance into true knowing.
Shalom!
Sheryl