Plato'S Demiurge

[TAO]

Log, often, I have found that the brain in the vat analogy causes more problems than it solves. Instead, I'd just say, 'a universe where your senses delude you'.

BTW... I think the possibility of which scenario actually exists is incalculable. So they'd be of even value in assumption, in that regard (ignoring pragmatic reasons for choosing one over the other).

Just trying to help =p.

-TAO

[Chris Smith]

BTW... I think the possibility of which scenario actually exists is incalculable. So they'd be of even value in assumption, in that regard (ignoring pragmatic reasons for choosing one over the other).

When you say "which scenario," you mean Copenhagen vs. MWI?

[Log]

He means the probability of the-pocket-universe-as-brain-in-vat scenario cannot be rationally calculated against the probability of other scenarios.

The fun part is, with MWI in play, so long as the probability of the quantum vacuum vomiting up a brain in a vat is non-zero, the probability calculation literally doesn't matter, because it happens an infinite number of times.

[mfbukowski]

Yep.

Nope.

Yep. The LDS God is a contingent, material entity subject to natural laws, and I don't see anything in LDS theology to indicate whether there is anything ontologically "behind" God, or what that might be.

In fact, HF could easily be an evolved entity. I can't remember if it's the BoA or a sermon of Joseph Smith that says God "found himself" among the intelligences, but whichever it was, this almost implies that God didn't know his own origin.

No, I don't think so.

Quantum physics basically says that the universe exists as a probability function, which is "indeterminate" until an act of "observation", at which point it appears to "collapse" into a particular determinate state. A lot of folks in the humanities have made a big deal out of this concept because they suppose it grants some metaphysical status to "minds" and "observers". But there are a lot of questions surrounding this phenomenon. First of all, there's the question of whether the probability function really collapses into a single state or merely appears to. In the Copenhagen interpretation, observation causes indeterminacy to be actually replaced by determinacy. This does seem to grant a sort of magical power to observation, but even in this view there is the question of whether the observer has to be a mind or can simply be a particle colliding with another particle. Anyway, the more elegant interpretation, in my opinion, is the Many Worlds Interpretation. In this view, all the different probabilities of the wavefunction exist simultaneously as parallel universes, and the act of observation merely answers the question of which universe the observer is in. Other observers in other universes are observing different outcomes. So in this view, indeterminacy isn't actually affected by the act of observation, and therefore no special metaphysical status for observers is implied.

Even if observing minds do turn out to be somehow special, the picture physics gives us of the universe is still overwhelmingly mechanistic and mathematical. So if the Ground of Being is a mind, that mind apparently works far more mechanistically than ours do.

Well, I didn't watch conference and I don't really know anything about Elder Scott. But one of the appealing features of the Many Worlds Interpretation is that it essentially allows for a potentially infinite number of parallel print shop explosions, one of which is bound to produce a dictionary. In other words, the multiplicity of universes explains how a universe could have emerged with the rather unlikely set of characteristics necessary to produce life.

For what it's worth I agree with the whole post.

I think seeing HF as an "evolved entity" as a very real possibility allowing for the linguistic problems in describing him like that. My metaphysical belief is that the entire universe(s) operate on an organic model like a plant growing like an organism interacting with forces now only partially understood. It unfolds according to theoretically knowable principles which we might understand some day if we can become as HF is now

I don't like the word "evolved" though really and I don't believe that "intelligent design" captures it either. For me it is kind of like a directed transformation which is variable according to "environmental" conditions, as perhaps a plant grows differently in different soil types.

I also believe that Jesus' parable of the sower possibly describes this, as do other parables describe elements which are far beyond our usual understanding of what they mean

Edited April 2, 2012 by mfbukowski

[TAO]

When you say "which scenario," you mean Copenhagen vs. MWI?

Actually I'm not sure. I haven't read too much into either theory... so I'm really sorry, but I can't say =p. It probably does relate though.

What I sort of meant (and maybe I didn't explain it well) was that the 'brain in the vat' or the 'all senses delude us completely' theories, makes it impossible for us to calculate probabilities. After all, every observation is based on the senses. If our senses could possibly delude us, we cannot verify anything beyond 'we exist' (Cool Trivia: That's where the common phrase, 'I think therefore I am' came from). The thing is, without any other information... we can't calculate probabilities.

In a sense, the theory actually makes it impossible to calculate any probability... even for something as mundane as flipping a coin. We have to make an assumption that the skeptic's claim is not correct, before we can use probabilities to help us determine the most likely scenario. The problem is, 'brain in a vat' is a skeptic's argument. And we can't dismiss skepticism itself to calculate the probability of a skepticism-based proposition. Otherwise we'd be circling ourselves. So ultimately, because we can't dismiss it, the probability (I think) is incalculable. You'd have to verify that though. 'Tis not my subject. =p.

But I think that's where you have to use pragmatics or other methods to determine the best path.

I hope I explained that well... but yeah XD.

Best of Wishes,

-TAO

Edited April 2, 2012 by TAO

[mfbukowski]

Also to clarify in case anyone cares, I am responding philosophically. I don't know any of the physics stuff or MWI stuff so don't think I'm picking sides on that one

[inquiringmind]

The Many Worlds are simply outcomes of a probability function. So if the probability function is a dream of the Divine Mind (as opposed to, say, a property of "strings"), then the Many Worlds would be part of the dream.

Thank you.

[Chris Smith]

so long as the probability of the quantum vacuum vomiting up a brain in a vat is non-zero

I'm sure it's zero. As I said, the wave function appears to follow rules-- it is deterministic. A quantum particle can't just pop up anywhere. When scientists do a slit experiment, for instance, there's a limited distribution of finite values-- in the shape of a wave-- that the particle can take. This means that not just anything can happen. The Many Worlds would fall within a finite range of possible quantum states (collectively known as the universal wave function). I can't imagine your brain-in-a-vat universe falling within that range.

the probability calculation literally doesn't matter, because it happens an infinite number of times.

In MWI, the universe exists simply as a distribution of possibilities. "Many Worlds" is something of a misnomer, because it's not as if there is a set of discrete worlds. Worlds only appear to be discrete to the observer (due to a phenomenon called decoherence that is somewhat over my head). So I'm not sure it makes sense to say things happen any particular "number of times". It's more like a continuum-of-happening than a discrete number of happenings. As for your claim that "the probability calculation literally doesn't matter," I'm not sure what you mean by this. If you could look at the wavefunction from the outside, then yeah, probability wouldn't matter because all states within the wave distribution are simultaneously realized. But to an observer within the wave function, it appears that particles select a random state from the ensemble of possible values. Thus, probability.

Edited April 2, 2012 by Chris Smith

[Chris Smith]

For what it's worth I agree with the whole post.

There's something you don't see every day.

[Cobalt-70]

...

I'm interested in thoughts on the following questions:

1.) Is it legitimate to compare the Mormon concept of God to Plato's Demiurge?

2.) If Heavenly Father isn't the "ultimate ground" of being, is it still possible that there is some ultimate ground (of everything--including what McMurrin here calls "the fundamental material entities" and "the space and time that locate them")?

3.) Is it possible that God has hinted at this "ultimate ground of being" in the way He uses terms like Intelligence, Light, and Truth?

McMurrin is not the only one to have compared the Mormon God with the Demiurge. The Demiurge is also an element of Gnosticism, and several writers have (e.g., Harold Bloom) have also written about the Mormon God as the Gnostic Demiurge. So it's legitimate do make that comparison. Moreover, I think it's a very good comparison. Unlike the traditional Christian God, the creator god modern Mormons call Elohim is not the "ultimate ground of being." According to 20th century Mormon theology, before this Elohim became God, things still existed. The Mormon creator god merely organized and crafted things from existing matter.

As to what the "ultimate ground of being is," Joseph Smith understood the "ultimate ground of being" as two-fold: (1) intelligence (spirit), and (2) element. Both of these were said to be eternal, not created or destroyed. Moreover, Smith viewed both intelligence and element as existing in material form. Thus, in that sense, Smith's theology was quite different from that of Plato.

[Cobalt-70]

I am always wary of philosophical musings on the nature of God. It shows arrogance and not humility. There may be things tied to the nature of God that we have no conception of that make our musings misguided or even irreverent. Plus philosophical explanations about God seem to contribute to apostasy. Reason will not find God. Only his choice to reveal Himself will. We do not reason from first principles to discover God. He shows Himself to us.

That would sound reasonable, were it not the case that the current Mormon understanding of God was formulated by the philosophical musings of basically just three men: James Talmage, John Widtsoe, and B.H. Roberts. In 1916, the LDS Church just adopted these philosophical musings as the official theology to replace the Adam-God doctrine. So sometimes, these musings are very valuable.

[Cobalt-70]

So if you take ex nihilo to mean what it was originally intended to mean (not that something was created out of nothing, but that nothing in the universe was created out of anything but God), you believe in creation ex nihilo?

The idea that the universe was created out of God is basically pantheism. Creation ex nihilo means that God's will is what sustains the universe from moment to moment.

[Cobalt-70]

Here is another very interesting quote from McMurrin.

Quote

I am aware of the various attempts by Mormon writers to justify this belief--an infinite series of Gods, the God of our corner of the universe, and so on. But it seems to me that none of them makes sense, unless it was Orson Pratt’s attempt to invoke the Platonic universals in his famous statement in The Seer that TRUTH, in all caps, is the ultimate God and that it is TRUTH dwelling in the deity that makes him divine and an object of worship (Vol. 1:2, para. 22). Pratt was severely disciplined for his efforts, as he apparently described the ultimate divine as impersonal. But he was just trying to do what theologians are supposed to do, make some kind of sense of what the people believed. He was quite right in holding that there must be something over and above this process of a being becoming God.

McMurrin was wrong, though, if he intended to mean that Pratt was disciplined because he taught that an underlying principle he called "truth" (but little different from the Gnostic "Unknowable God," I would say) underlied the deity of God and the intelligence of humanity. Rather, Pratt was disciplined because he contradicted the Adam-God doctrine.

Edited April 2, 2012 by Cobalt-70

[Chris Smith]

The idea that the universe was created out of God is basically pantheism. Creation ex nihilo means that God's will is what sustains the universe from moment to moment.

Creation out of God is more panentheism, really. And the line between that and creatio ex nihilo is sometimes pretty thin. In Neo-Platonism, which informed a lot of medieval mysticism, you get both views, but at different levels of the system. Our spirits are created out of God ("divine sparks"), but the material world is created out of nothing (if that's the right way to characterize a non-real shadow of the divine mind). And then in Erigena, Emerson, and Schleiermacher you get a subtle modification of Neo-Platonism, where now the material world gets included along with spirits in the compass of things legitimately created out of God. Bottom line: these terms are a pain in the butt.

Edited April 2, 2012 by Chris Smith

[JeremyOrbe-Smith]

"Bottom line: these terms are a pain in the butt."

Chris wins the thread.

[JeremyOrbe-Smith]

My take on naturalistic, anthropomorphic, material deities of different genders.

As Joseph Smith said:

"If I am right, I might with boldness proclaim from the house tops that God never did have power to create the spirit of man at all. God himself could not create himself. Intelligence exists upon a self-existent principle; it is a spirit from age to age, and there is no creation about it. Moreover, all the spirits that God ever sent into the world are susceptible to enlargement.

The first principles of man are self-existent with God. God found himself in the midst of spirits and glory, and because he was greater, he saw proper to institute laws whereby the rest could have the privilege of advancing like himself - that they might have one glory upon another and all the knowledge, power, and glory necessary to save the world of spirits. I know that when I tell you these words of eternal life that are given to me, you taste them, and I know you believe them. You say honey is sweet, and so do I. I can also taste the spirit of eternal life; I know it is good. And when I tell you of these things that were given me by inspiration of the Holy Spirit, you are bound to receive them as sweet, and I rejoice more and more."

"When the Savior shall appear we shall see him as he is. We shall see that he is a man like ourselves. And that same sociality which exists among us here will exist among us there, only it will be coupled with eternal glory, which glory we do not now enjoy."

As I wrote recently in another thread: Strong Panspermia/Cosmic Ancestry + historical accounts of anthropomorphic visitors from the Heavens above us +

= Pearl of Great Price. Edited April 2, 2012 by JeremyOrbe-Smith

[mfbukowski]

McMurrin is not the only one to have compared the Mormon God with the Demiurge. The Demiurge is also an element of Gnosticism, and several writers have (e.g., Harold Bloom) have also written about the Mormon God as the Gnostic Demiurge. So it's legitimate do make that comparison. Moreover, I think it's a very good comparison. Unlike the traditional Christian God, the creator god modern Mormons call Elohim is not the "ultimate ground of being." According to 20th century Mormon theology, before this Elohim became God, things still existed. The Mormon creator god merely organized and crafted things from existing matter.

As to what the "ultimate ground of being is," Joseph Smith understood the "ultimate ground of being" as two-fold: (1) intelligence (spirit), and (2) element. Both of these were said to be eternal, not created or destroyed. Moreover, Smith viewed both intelligence and element as existing in material form. Thus, in that sense, Smith's theology was quite different from that of Plato.

I don't know if anyone has been following my discussion with Toronto- maybe it was another thread even but Bloom's position is quite close to Rorty's- in fact Rorty is one of Bloom's biggest fans.

When he is in a complimentary mood, toward Mormons, which lately it appears does not happen often, Bloom has been known to have some serious insights into the implications of our position. So combining Rorty with Mormonism is just a little weird- not really totally off the wall!

In fact if you come across this Toronto you might want to check out what Bloom has said about Mormons in the past.

There has been some discussion about a "religion" which is neither theistic nor atheistic, but based on human values and the idea of elevating man to the position of god, based on pragmatic principles- that such a view that god is man can be a useful way of seeing our place in the universe.

Sound a tad familiar?

I of course am a theist and always will be, but it is a much smaller step to Mormon theism if one actually started out with such a belief.

Maybe I better check out the mirror and see if there is anyone like that around here.....

And incidentally, Cobalt, I would love to see ONE quote from Joseph using the terminology "The Ultimate Ground of Being". Good luck on that one. He never believed in such nonsense.

Edit:

This is a pretty cool book incidentally if anyone is interested in this direction things are going- I think Jeremy and Chris would especially be interested in it

http://www.amazon.co...o/dp/0231134940

If you're a broke student, buy the kindle edition and download a free kindle reader. It's a great way to go.

Though coming from different and distinct intellectual traditions, Richard Rorty and Gianni Vattimo are united in their criticism of the metaphysical tradition. The challenges they put forward extend beyond philosophy and entail a reconsideration of the foundations of belief in God and the religious life. They urge that the rejection of metaphysical truth does not necessitate the death of religion; instead it opens new ways of imagining what it is to be religious -- ways that emphasize charity, solidarity, and irony. This unique collaboration, which includes a dialogue between the two philosophers, is notable not only for its fusion of pragmatism (Rorty) and hermeneutics (Vattimo) but also for its recognition of the limits of both traditional religious belief and modern secularism.

Edited April 2, 2012 by mfbukowski

[Chris Smith]

As Joseph Smith said:

"If I am right, I might with boldness proclaim from the house tops that God never did have power to create the spirit of man at all. God himself could not create himself. Intelligence exists upon a self-existent principle; it is a spirit from age to age, and there is no creation about it."

Yeah. I mean, a lot of LDS authors have emphasized that instead of "creating" the spirits, God "organized" the spirits out of raw intelligence. But there's some real question whether Joseph even taught that. "Organized" can mean a few different things in LDS scripture. There's the mechanical organization of matter, but there's also the social organization of people into councils and so forth. So when the BoA says "the intelligences were organized before the world was," is it talking about a mechanical or a social organization? Here's what Joseph said in a couple of his discourses:

1841: "At the first organization in heaven we were all present and saw the Savior chosen and appointed, and the plan of salvation made and we sanctioned it."

1842: "The spirits of men are eternal. ... They are organized according to the priesthood."

[Log]

That would sound reasonable, were it not the case that the current Mormon understanding of God was formulated by the philosophical musings of basically just three men: James Talmage, John Widtsoe, and B.H. Roberts. In 1916, the LDS Church just adopted these philosophical musings as the official theology to replace the Adam-God doctrine. So sometimes, these musings are very valuable.

Citations, please.

[dtorge26]

I don't buy the Multiple Worlds Interpretation.

I believe Intelligence creates, and is the ground of all being.

I used to struggle with MWI, but its making more sense to me the more I consider it. And it does provide a possible bridge between the scientific and religious (Mormon) view of a ground of all being. If MWI creates slices within a pie which defines all things which can possibly exist, then I prefer to consider only the slices which result in laws of physics favorable to life. If there are slices favorable to the emergence of life, then one must consider that some slices should also be favorable to the emergence of God. As a believing LDS, I think we are located in such a slice (or range of slices).

MWI is blowing my mind just a bit as I consider varous LDS perspectives on things like free agency and individual identities. Under MWI, there are multiple versions of myself, each making distinct decisions, presumably some righteous and some not-so-righteous. There would even be slices of reality where I was never born. So, on the one hand, I'm forced to consider that God has far more children then I ever could have imagined. This part of MWI causes me a bit of distress.

However, free will makes more sense to me now though. The MWI interpretation means that no scientific law or principle has the power to determine my fate. Science only defines the range of possibilities, where one could be celestial glory, and another could mean outer darkness. But, as both an observer (in the quantum physics sense) and as a child of God, my personal and subjective experience may ultimately really be up to me. I may really be the master of my own destiny, where the slice I should be seeking out is the one where I live with God in the celestial kingdom, and God is doing all He can do to help me get there.

Thoughts?

[mfbukowski]

Yeah. I mean, a lot of LDS authors have emphasized that instead of "creating" the spirits, God "organized" the spirits out of raw intelligence. But there's some real question whether Joseph even taught that. "Organized" can mean a few different things in LDS scripture. There's the mechanical organization of matter, but there's also the social organization of people into councils and so forth. So when the BoA says "the intelligences were organized before the world was," is it talking about a mechanical or a social organization? Here's what Joseph said in a couple of his discourses:

1841: "At the first organization in heaven we were all present and saw the Savior chosen and appointed, and the plan of salvation made and we sanctioned it."

1842: "The spirits of men are eternal. ... They are organized according to the priesthood."

He meant all of the above, imo.

Social Trinity becomes social Patriarchal Order- the entire family of man, becoming one, culturally developing from raw intelligences much as we evolved into cultural beings physically.

Kind of an Ontogeny recapitualates Phylogeny on a spiritual level as well as physical.

Edited April 2, 2012 by mfbukowski

[tana]

The first principles of man are self-existent with God. God found himself in the midst of spirits and glory, and because he was greater,

Since this appears to be a free-for-all....I guess I'll add my pet position.

But I never see anyone explain how God became, or just 'is' greater. 'Became' would infer linear growth. How could god have gotten a jump on others?

Also, 'Greater' in what way? More wisdom, knowledge, common sense? More grey matter? If god and us are all the same species, how could he have acquired a bigger hard drive?

[mfbukowski]

I used to struggle with MWI, but its making more sense to me the more I consider it. And it does provide a possible bridge between the scientific and religious (Mormon) view of a ground of all being. If MWI creates slices within a pie which defines all things which can possibly exist, then I prefer to consider only the slices which result in laws of physics favorable to life. If there are slices favorable to the emergence of life, then one must consider that some slices should also be favorable to the emergence of God. As a believing LDS, I think we are located in such a slice (or range of slices).

MWI is blowing my mind just a bit as I consider varous LDS perspectives on things like free agency and individual identities. Under MWI, there are multiple versions of myself, each making distinct decisions, presumably some righteous and some not-so-righteous. There would even be slices of reality where I was never born. So, on the one hand, I'm forced to consider that God has far more children then I ever could have imagined. This part of MWI causes me a bit of distress.

However, free will makes more sense to me now though. The MWI interpretation means that no scientific law or principle has the power to determine my fate. Science only defines the range of possibilities, where one could be celestial glory, and another could mean outer darkness. But, as both an observer (in the quantum physics sense) and as a child of God, my personal and subjective experience may ultimately really be up to me. I may really be the master of my own destiny, where the slice I should be seeking out is the one where I live with God in the celestial kingdom, and God is doing all He can do to help me get there.

Thoughts?

Yep. You are the master of your destiny and you are creating your own world as we speak. You just created a chunk of it.

[mfbukowski]

Since this appears to be a free-for-all....I guess I'll add my pet position.

But I never see anyone explain how God became, or just 'is' greater. 'Became' would infer linear growth. How could god have gotten a jump on others?

Also, 'Greater' in what way? More wisdom, knowledge, common sense? More grey matter? If god and us are all the same species, how could he have acquired a bigger hard drive?

It's hard to take this seriously, but I'll bite.

The older you get, the wiser you become, except then your brain starts to deteriorate. Bummer.

But suppose that can be overcome.

Suppose you could master the laws of physics and create your own universe. You kinda create your own world (view) anyway so why not extend that to physical creation?

Suppose you could do your own big bang- do you think you would have more experience and wisdom than those in the universe you created?

And if you get to float around for a few billion years experimenting with other universes waiting for hypothetical universe 1 to evolve beings like you do you think maybe you'd know even more than you did when you did the big bang with universe number 1?

And what if you did this, oh say, "times without number" - do you think you'd maybe you'd be pretty smart by then? Maybe even smart enough to figure out how to store things off your hard drive into the "cloud" whatever that might mean to such a being?

That's putting it on a pretty elementary level, but if it works, it works.

Edited April 2, 2012 by mfbukowski

[tana]

It's hard to take this seriously, but I'll bite.

The older you get, the wiser you become, except then your brain starts to deteriorate. Bummer.

But suppose that can be overcome.

Suppose you could master the laws of physics and create your own universe. You kinda create your own world (view) anyway so why not extend that to physical creation?

Suppose you could do your own big bang- do you think you would have more experience and wisdom than those in the universe you created?

And if you get to float around for a few billion years experimenting with other universes waiting for hypothetical universe 1 to evolve beings like you do you think maybe you'd know even more than you did when you did the big bang with universe number 1?

And what if you did this, oh say, "times without number" - do you think you'd maybe you'd be pretty smart by then? Maybe even smart enough to figure out how to store things off your hard drive into the "cloud" whatever that might mean to such a being?

That's putting it on a pretty elementary level, but if it works, it works.

I'm sorry you're frustrated with me M. I know I keep pounding this same point...but it's the only one I've got. I don't have your acquired philosophy knowledge.

If something is eternal, it cannot change. If you are going to take an object and mechanically add or subtract things/acquired knowledge from it, you must have a starting point. It cannot be defined by its knowledge....It must be something other. An electron is an electron.....it will never be anything different. It will never be greater or lesser than every other electron.

So, a god is greater *because* it has more knowledge? *When* did god gain his first bit of knowledge that then put him an iota above his counterparts? Before he built his first planet, before he was first mortal, before he was born into a spirit body, before he was an intelligence...There is no before intelligence. He must have come as-is un-created and special....HOW? A roll of the dice? The farther back this goes the more it loses both mechanics and intelligence.