>We have nothing to lose here, but delusion. Embrace the truth that God is as real as you, and that you are most definitely real.
Wait, why? Why not accept we are not real? You gave a lot of arguments why we don't exist, and then you suddenly turn around and say that we exist? Why? We obviously do not exist, you yourself proved it. That is what Buddhism says, too. Why not give up secular humanism and be nihilists?
> Some even reject the problem entirely by rejecting the existence of consciousness
I believe you are referring to illusionism?
I mostly reject illusionism too, though I wouldn't rule out that people who claim not to be conscious are, in fact, not conscious.
> Embrace the truth that God is as real as you
This doesn't logically follow from anything above it.
I suspect that all consciousness is essentially the same thing, with the only important difference between two units of consciousness being its physical housing. Thus, the differences in ability, knowledge and personality between "Einstein", "me", "you" and "'you-with-brain-damage" lies entirely in differences between these four brains, not differences between the consciousnesses within them. Let's call this "Prop 1".
But the word "God", which you left without a definition, is widely understood as being "higher" in some sense. But if Prop 1 is correct, there is no consciousness that is "higher", and thus no God.
God is also widely understood as being extremely powerful and extremely knowledgeable, but the only evidence of such beings are in old stories. But all the old stories of different religions (including native Americans, African tribes and so on) disagree with each other and are incompatible with each other. I see no basis for concluding that any specific one of the stories is correct, but even if we could somehow know that a true religion exists, that doesn't seem useful or meaningful without knowing which specific religion was true.
(We may also reasonably suppose that somewhere out in the universe there are extremely powerful and knowledgeable being(s), beings capable of wondrous creations, which, however, don't even know Earth exists. Let's call this "Prop Stargate Season 9". Calling such a being "God", however, seems like a pointless exercise.)
Now, generally, people who believe in God believe in a specific God, e.g. they'll believe in one form of Christian god, and importantly, also *disbelieve* in all the African, Native American, and ancient Greek Gods. Given this reality, there is an *implicit* motte-and-bailey fallacy here. You are defending a motte, something like "there is at least one God, in some very loose sense of the word God". But anyone reading this essay (and maybe you yourself) will, in practice, use it as a way of affirming their faith in the bailey ("Christian God is real but the ancient Greek Gods are myth").
As a former Christian I have a simple reason for rejecting my religion: those who created it were liars. But that's another story.
You are applying systematic thinking to things that were never made to be understood systematically, because the highest truths cannot be systemized. Yes, systemizing has limits (https://metarationality.com/stem-fluidity-bridge).
I am not interested in providing a definition of God, though I suppose I believe the highest God to be the Atman, with the Abrahamic God being Isvara. And possibly, YWHW of the Old Testament is actually Yaldabaoth and not the Father of Jesus.
> this doesn't follow
It does. The common arguments against God also disprove your own existence, and one has to twist oneself into pretzels to argue how God is not real but one is, in face of these arguments.
Shoulder angel: hmm, we should find a counterargument to this...
Shoulder devil: let's not and say we did!
> A "semantic stopsign" is a meaningless, generic explanation that creates the illusion of giving an answer, without actually explaining anything. Semantic stopsigns destroy curiosity, giving surrogate answers and stopping the search for truth prematurely. They can preserve incorrect beliefs for a long time, insisting on following a cached thought without rethinking anything. It is a tool of the dark arts and an important part of any anti-epistemology.
"These things were never made to be understood systematically" is just such a semantic stopsign.
It is a stop sign, but not meaningless, because it is true that the systemizing, analytic approach has limits. E.g. try to figure out a quantitative, scientific approach that guarantees a Good Life (tm) for everyone on the planet. Oh, I know scientists and philosophers have tried, but I note they find it impossible to figure out how to get everyone to buy into it.
How does one define the limits of systemizing? It is the same as trying to see the exact limits of your visual field. Or describing the color blue to a blind man. Though in the latter case, the barrier is the limits of language, and you will note systemizing and analysis are subsets of language.
Also, as the philosophers show, inquiry never ends. Philosophy is a neverending yarn or tall tale. That's all well and good for philosophers, but the rest of us laymen don't want to spend our entire time listening to stories and writing stories.
God is not known through language. All language can do is point at Him, but the individual then has to try to look at Him, instead of complaining the finger is ordinary meat and bone.
Very well-thought-out essay.
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>We have nothing to lose here, but delusion. Embrace the truth that God is as real as you, and that you are most definitely real.
Wait, why? Why not accept we are not real? You gave a lot of arguments why we don't exist, and then you suddenly turn around and say that we exist? Why? We obviously do not exist, you yourself proved it. That is what Buddhism says, too. Why not give up secular humanism and be nihilists?
Eh, it's my very first post. Nihilism is a very difficult stance to maintain, I suggest you check out https://meaningness.com/
> Some even reject the problem entirely by rejecting the existence of consciousness
I believe you are referring to illusionism?
I mostly reject illusionism too, though I wouldn't rule out that people who claim not to be conscious are, in fact, not conscious.
> Embrace the truth that God is as real as you
This doesn't logically follow from anything above it.
I suspect that all consciousness is essentially the same thing, with the only important difference between two units of consciousness being its physical housing. Thus, the differences in ability, knowledge and personality between "Einstein", "me", "you" and "'you-with-brain-damage" lies entirely in differences between these four brains, not differences between the consciousnesses within them. Let's call this "Prop 1".
But the word "God", which you left without a definition, is widely understood as being "higher" in some sense. But if Prop 1 is correct, there is no consciousness that is "higher", and thus no God.
God is also widely understood as being extremely powerful and extremely knowledgeable, but the only evidence of such beings are in old stories. But all the old stories of different religions (including native Americans, African tribes and so on) disagree with each other and are incompatible with each other. I see no basis for concluding that any specific one of the stories is correct, but even if we could somehow know that a true religion exists, that doesn't seem useful or meaningful without knowing which specific religion was true.
(We may also reasonably suppose that somewhere out in the universe there are extremely powerful and knowledgeable being(s), beings capable of wondrous creations, which, however, don't even know Earth exists. Let's call this "Prop Stargate Season 9". Calling such a being "God", however, seems like a pointless exercise.)
Now, generally, people who believe in God believe in a specific God, e.g. they'll believe in one form of Christian god, and importantly, also *disbelieve* in all the African, Native American, and ancient Greek Gods. Given this reality, there is an *implicit* motte-and-bailey fallacy here. You are defending a motte, something like "there is at least one God, in some very loose sense of the word God". But anyone reading this essay (and maybe you yourself) will, in practice, use it as a way of affirming their faith in the bailey ("Christian God is real but the ancient Greek Gods are myth").
As a former Christian I have a simple reason for rejecting my religion: those who created it were liars. But that's another story.
You are applying systematic thinking to things that were never made to be understood systematically, because the highest truths cannot be systemized. Yes, systemizing has limits (https://metarationality.com/stem-fluidity-bridge).
I am not interested in providing a definition of God, though I suppose I believe the highest God to be the Atman, with the Abrahamic God being Isvara. And possibly, YWHW of the Old Testament is actually Yaldabaoth and not the Father of Jesus.
> this doesn't follow
It does. The common arguments against God also disprove your own existence, and one has to twist oneself into pretzels to argue how God is not real but one is, in face of these arguments.
Shoulder angel: hmm, we should find a counterargument to this...
Shoulder devil: let's not and say we did!
> A "semantic stopsign" is a meaningless, generic explanation that creates the illusion of giving an answer, without actually explaining anything. Semantic stopsigns destroy curiosity, giving surrogate answers and stopping the search for truth prematurely. They can preserve incorrect beliefs for a long time, insisting on following a cached thought without rethinking anything. It is a tool of the dark arts and an important part of any anti-epistemology.
"These things were never made to be understood systematically" is just such a semantic stopsign.
It is a stop sign, but not meaningless, because it is true that the systemizing, analytic approach has limits. E.g. try to figure out a quantitative, scientific approach that guarantees a Good Life (tm) for everyone on the planet. Oh, I know scientists and philosophers have tried, but I note they find it impossible to figure out how to get everyone to buy into it.
How does one define the limits of systemizing? It is the same as trying to see the exact limits of your visual field. Or describing the color blue to a blind man. Though in the latter case, the barrier is the limits of language, and you will note systemizing and analysis are subsets of language.
Also, as the philosophers show, inquiry never ends. Philosophy is a neverending yarn or tall tale. That's all well and good for philosophers, but the rest of us laymen don't want to spend our entire time listening to stories and writing stories.
God is not known through language. All language can do is point at Him, but the individual then has to try to look at Him, instead of complaining the finger is ordinary meat and bone.