which is just another way of saying "engineering a god/guru to fulfill one's insignificant needs interests and concerns" hence the definition is already incorporated in my original explanation of "heading in the wrong direction"
yes, but nothing to indicate how you would know you have avoided this.
Only because they have some clue (based on some body of authoritative knowledge) about what is right for them.
Well, no, see my examples.
For instance its not valid for a patient to sense that Chinese medicine is not good for them because it tastes awful.
It could be a perfectly good intuitive reaction to a specific remedy, depending on how it tastes bad to them. IOW if they had felt fine about other remedies that tasted bad for them, for example. But here they feel their body is telling them something.
IOW valid analysis is contextualized by a knowledge base of what discomforts/reversals one can expect to encounter
Sure, but this does not rule out the above.
perhaps I shouldn't have used the word "doctor". The idea is that the pursuit of health is contextualized around valid issues that can render one's personal needs (like the need for green pills for example) invalid.
You know, green pills is your example, not mine. I find this is a pattern of argument on your part. Choose what you consider a silly, irrational example and then treat it as if it is the other person's position.
IOW personal need only becomes a pro-active contributor to better health when it is dovetailed with the authoritative models of medical knowledge (or stuff that "actually" makes you better)
Again, no. Giving up one's will to one authority is not the only way to validly disagree with another one. We are not ciphers.
Not really.
I am just explaining how it does and doesn't function, much like I did with medicine and cosmology
Well, I want to point out again, that it was your example, what came to mind for you, not something presented by someone else and certainly not me in this context. In your first response above you
which is just another way of saying "engineering a god/guru to fulfill one's insignificant needs
But when you produce an example, it is the rather odd one of a desire for robotic female sexual partners AS IF this was a good example (even though, for example it leaves out all female heterosexuals). So of course I will take this as not really understanding the range of desires and in this case also, the range of fears that can be avoided: iow here the fear of a less than perfect God, or a fear that one cannot really determine whether God has been perfect or not.
Personally I don't think I am incredibly spiritually advanced but even just theoretically understanding that the body is not the final last word of selfhood is pretty elementary stuff.
IOW anyone who takes the body as the final last word in the pursuit of gratification is either a teenager or miserable.
And the person who goes around thinking that he or she can explain how God is really infallible is likely another kind of miserable.
Sure ... thats why renunciation is often explained as operating out of the same frame work as sense gratification .... much like engineering a god based on personal needs operates out of the same frame work as rejecting a god based on personal needs.
Sure, they say that. At the same time if you look at practices, you see renunciation, and often the attendant smugness aimed at those who are less ascetic. You also see a conflation of desire with body desires, missing out all the spiritual desires and denied fears that can affect certainty about God's infallibility and also their ability to know that God is perfect.
So you find them talking about how God really is perfect, how this can be deducted, noticed behind appearance, how it is working, how justice is served, etc. Because not only must they believe that God is infallible, but further that they can explain it.
Despite the epistemological challenge they make categorically to non-theists.
and alternatively there are those who were not willing to give up family, comfort, daily desires, sex, and even their lives to serve. What they were not willing to give up has no bearing on what they were not able to face.
:shrug:
You raised the issue, as if there was a necessary connection. All I needed to show was it was not a necessary connection.
I dismiss them because they base god on what they are ... much like I dismiss taking pills according to what is one's favorite color
Yes, I can see that many people do this so it is a useful example rather than a convenient way not to look at something.
Much like one cannot simply take whatever colored pills one thinks look attractive and expect to get better ...
Its only a problem when they extrapolate from their own ontological state to god's that the problem ensues ... much like if one extrapolates from one's favorite colors to the chemist problems ensue
Man, you love this example. And when theists do precisely the same thing when they explain how really God is perfect and do this in terms they understand?
Whenever we are in any sort of managerial position (Driving in heavy traffic, using chemicals that are poisonous to ingest, etc etc) , everyday life forces us to deal with many ontologically superior elements for the benefit of ourselves and those around us.
IOW we can call upon the categorical authority of a system of knowledge (I say "authority" because many of us who clean the bathroom are not chemical engineers) to put aside our personal needs/interests/concerns ("I sure am thirsty and this toilet cleaner looks like cordial") because we know the pursuit of an ideal translates into benefit ... This is further highlighted by the folly children/intellectually disabled persons get themselves into because they cannot approach the categorical authority of a system of knowledge.
What you do repeatedly is criticize those critical of religions AS IF this explains why theists have the ability to understand how God is perfect and explain this. This is a non-argument, because the inability of non-theists to validly criticise a deity does not entail the ability of theists to understand why this is all OK.
So you keep focusing on the non-theists, using the straw man green pill dislike argument, rather than explaining how theists have this ability beyond their ability to paraphrase scripture and guru or priest.
