GENIUS FORUMS

Elizabeth Isabelle wrote:

Faust13 wrote:If we were one with the universe then how would we be alone?

Not the universe but the Universe, meaning absolutely everything. The only thing we could be is alone because by definition of "absolutely everything" there could be no other to be "with."
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explain

Faust, I'm not sure which part you don't understand, so some of this may sound redundant.

Terminology:

Universe: The Universe with a capital U is the same thing as God, if one defines God as being absolutely everything that exists, from the physical through the conceptual and beyond. In this definition, God is Kevin, you, me, Steven, Laird, the screen you see these words on, the concept behind these words... everything.

Oneness: If we accept that we are part of God, and remove the division that God is parts and consider God to be one Whole, Then not only is God us, but we are God. In that sense, Kevin is God - but so are you, and you are Kevin, you are me, and you are the computer monitor, etc. If God is everything including all of us, and we are God, we are everything, so we can only be alone because we are all that there is.

Alone: Please don't confuse "alone" with "lonely" because those are two very different concepts that don't always have anything to do with each other. As children, we probably only felt lonely when we were alone, so the concept of "lonely" was formed before our full psyches were - and the concept does not naturally change unless we consciously re-evaluate it. Have you never felt lonely in a crowd? I have usually felt lonely at parties. Have you never been alone without feeling lonely? Most people need some alone-time, but they are not lonely when they want to be alone and are.

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I also have an issue with his statement "creator" of the Universe because the Universe was not created, and he knows this. It always was. The only thing I can figure on that was perhaps he meant "creator" in the sense that David described in Wisdom of the Infinite that everything is just a creation in our own minds - we only think we see the monitor, but what we really "see" is a creation in our brains that represents something we call "a monitor." This is a contradictory thought because it makes the inherently existing Universe a creation of a non-inherently existing brain.
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Because of our aloneness in the universe, we are caused to feel lonely.


I don't see how you can accept that the universe inherently exists, doesn't that go against the doctrine "nothing inherently exists"? Doesn't the universe rely on everything in it to exist?

Faust13 wrote:Because of our aloneness in the universe, we are caused to feel lonely.

Because of the illusion of separateness, we are caused to feel lonely.

Faust13 wrote:I don't see how you can accept that the universe inherently exists, doesn't that go against the doctrine "nothing inherently exists"?

The "nothing inherently exists" is explained as the Universe is not a thing.

You may find what looks like a contradiction in my previous statement that the Universe does not exist, or it neither exists not does not exist partially because that would be a duality but also that non-existence is part of the Universe, yet I assign inherent existence to the Universe.

This is a part that seems inconsistent in the QRS philosophy, and others have critiqued it for its divergence from - I think Buddhism - which states that nothing exists, yet the QRS have altered it to nothing inherently existing. To my mind, there is a difference between inherent existence and existence, and my understanding may diverge from what the QRS are saying, although I'd need to have them clarify what they mean to see if it matches or contradicts my understanding.

Inherent existence just means self-caused, and although the Universe was neither caused nor uncaused, I consider it close enough to self-caused to justify the use of the term, although it still isn't 100% precise of a term. It is indeed only relatively true, and I'm glad you noticed the difference.

Faust13 wrote:Doesn't the universe rely on everything in it to exist?

The whole concept of existence is convoluted with a myriad of definitions, but the underlying Reality is clear. To answer your question, I need to know what you mean by "exist."
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Elizabeth Isabelle wrote:This is a part that seems inconsistent in the QRS philosophy, and others have critiqued it for its divergence from - I think Buddhism - which states that nothing exists, yet the QRS have altered it to nothing inherently existing.

If you read Nagarjuna, you will see that he is quite adamant about the point that although nothing exists inherently, things do exist conventionally. He calls this the "Middle Path" between reification (inherent existence) and nihilism (non-existence).

D,

I agree with both of those, but I also hold a third position where on an unconventional level that quantum physics is starting to explain, that nothing really exists at all. That is why I needed to know what Faust meant by "exist" - but thank you for generalizing it.

Reality has many true layers to it. The more truths one sees and can see how they fit together, the more Truth one sees.
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