When God talks back

[markdohle]

I love TED talks, on all subjects, this is a good one I believe, no matter what you believe.

 

 

 

[XenoFish]

So what are we discussing?

[Podo]

The video can be summed up as "religious people teach themselves to attribute their own thoughts to that of a higher power." Nobody is surprised by this.

[XenoFish]

16 minutes ago, Podo said:

The video can be summed up as "religious people teach themselves to attribute their own thoughts to that of a higher power." Nobody is surprised by this.

A magical placebo effect.

[Podo]

Just now, XenoFish said:

A magical placebo effect.

HOLY DOPAMINE GHOST YEE-TO-THE-HAW.

[eight bits]

Howdy, Mark

Professor Luhrmann is an interesting scholar. Everything she says in the talk is a fair summary of some of her research, but of course, it is incomplete. She's done a lot of work. This 2015 talk reasonably enough focuses on her book of the same or similar title, but unfortunately emphasizes North American Anglophone Christian experience (what the book emphasized).

That is not the whole story. Her dissertation work was the anthropology of modern witchcraft practitioners in the UK. As she mentioned briefly in the video, by "anthropology" she means that she lived among those whom she studied, the British witches in this case, to learn their ways, ideally as if she were born to them. That is where she learned that increased attention to interior mental states induces unusual experiences (including one visionary encounter with ancient druids which she had herself).

If it needs to be said, her UK witches weren't Christians; they would likely describe themselves as pagan or perhaps use some other terminology, but they are not Abrahamic. What she learned from the witches, I think it is fair to say, was recycled in her studies of the charismatic Christians - similar techniques and analogous results. Both antithetical religions pursued communion with the invisible intelligent powers that define each religion, and with similar "success."

Now we fast forward to today. If I recall correctly, what I am about to describe was being studied by Luhrmann and her associates at Stanford, but perhaps unpublished or newly in press at the time of the TEDx talk. Here's the story.

As she says in the talk, she brought her charismatic Christians into the lab, and randomly assigned them to two groups. One group got "wirch training" tapes (with a Christian vocabulary) and the other group got run-of-the-mill pious sermons. The training group got more "visionary" experiences than the other group.

Fine. Then a colleague asked her whether "witch training" (my term, of course, not hers or the colleague's, but that is where she learned how to do this) would work with completely secular subject matter. That is, what if instead of communing with the witches' spirits or the Christians' God, you tried to train Stanford students to commune with Leland Stanford, Jr (a 19th Century Bay Area railroad tycoon, and an early benefactor of the university that today bears his name)?

Similar secular-target experiments had already been done with different but related methods (the "Philip experiment" and "Napoleon Hill's advisors" are searchable terms; "active imagination" as actually practiced by Carl Jung is parallel, too). No surprise, then, that Stanord students were easily trained to commune with Leland Junior, including some who achieved visionary visits from him. I am told that this practice is now a lab component of one of Luhrmann's undergrad courses.

Napoleon Hill got a visit from Abraham Lincoln; Philip is a consciously made-up fictional character, but he visits his devotees, too; ... witches are visited by witchy supernatural beings, Stanford students are visited by Mr Stanford, and Christians are visited by their God.

Conclusion: the interpretation of Luhrmann's results is not necessarily friendly to the truth of any particular religious tradition. I am sympathetic to her problem about frankly discussing what her results say about particular religions, but when viewed in light of her entire career's work, rather than just the one study of these Christians, I'd say her work raises as many questions for Christianity as it answers. I'm being diplomatic.

 

Edited August 23, 2019 by eight bits

[XenoFish]

8 minutes ago, eight bits said:

Howdy, Mark

Professor Luhrmann is an interesting scholar. Everything she says in the talk is a fair summary of some of her research, but of course, it is incomplete. She's done a lot of work. This 2015 talk reasonably enough focuses on her book of the same or similar title, but unfortunately emphasizes North American Anglophone Christian experience (what the book emphasized).

That is not the whole story. Her dissertation work was the anthropology of modern witchcraft practitioners in the UK. As she mentioned briefly in the video, by "anthropology" she means that she lived among the British witches to learn their ways, ideally as if she were born to them. That is where she learned that increased attention to interior mental states induces unusual experiences (including one visionary encounter with ancient druids which she had herself).

If it needs to be said, her UK witches weren't Christians; they would likely describe themselves as pagan or perhaps use some other terminology, but they are not Abrahamic. What she learned from the witches, I think it is fair to say, was recycled in her studies of the charismatic Christians - similar techniques and analogous results. Both antithetical religions pursued communion with the invisible intelligent powers that define each religion, and with similar "success."

Now we fast forward to today. If I recall correctly, what I am about to describe was being studied by Luhrmann and her associates at Stanford, but perhaps unpublished or newly in press at the time of the TEDx talk. Here's the story.

As she says in the talk, she brought her charismatic Christians into the lab, and randomly assigned them to two groups. One group got "wirch training" tapes (with a Christian vocabulary) and the other group got run-of-the-mill pious sermons. The training group got more "visionary" experiences than the other group.

Fine. Then a colleague asked her whether "witch training" (my term, of course, not hers or the colleague's, but that is where she learned how to do this) would work with completely secular subject matter. That is, what if instead of communing with the witches' spirits or the Christians' God, you tried to train Stanford students to commune with Leland Stanford, Jr (a 19th Century Bay Area railroad tycoon, and an early benefactor of the university that today bears his name)?

Similar secular-target experiments had already been done with different but related methods (the "Philip experiment" and "Napoleon Hill's advisors" are searchable terms; "active imagination" as actually practiced by Carl Jung is parallel, too). No surprise, then, that Stanord students were easily trained to commune with Leland Junior, including some who achieved visionary visits from him. I am told that this practice is now a lab component of one of Luhrmann's undergrad courses.

Napoleon Hill got a visit from Abraham Lincoln; Philip is a consciously made-up fictional character, but he visits his devotees, too; ... witches are visited by witchy supernatural beings and Christians are visited by their God.

Conclusion: the interpretation of Luhrmann's results is not necessarily friendly to any particular religious tradition. I am sympathetic to her problem about frankly discussing what her results say about particular religions, but when viewed in light of her entire career's work, not just the one study of these Christians, I'd say her work raises as many questions for Christians as it answers. I'm being diplomatic.

 

Wait?!? Are you telling me that one of my ideas/concepts has been validated? 

[markdohle]

Quote

Eight bits said:"  Howdy, Mark

Professor Luhrmann is an interesting scholar. Everything she says in the talk is a fair summary of some of her research, but of course, it is incomplete. She's done a lot of work. This 2015 talk reasonably enough focuses on her book of the same or similar title, but unfortunately emphasizes North American Anglophone Christian experience (what the book emphasized).

That is not the whole story. Her dissertation work was the anthropology of modern witchcraft practitioners in the UK. As she mentioned briefly in the video, by "anthropology" she means that she lived among those whom she studied, the British witches in this case, to learn their ways, ideally as if she were born to them. That is where she learned that increased attention to interior mental states induces unusual experiences (including one visionary encounter with ancient druids which she had herself).

If it needs to be said, her UK witches weren't Christians; they would likely describe themselves as pagan or perhaps use some other terminology, but they are not Abrahamic. What she learned from the witches, I think it is fair to say, was recycled in her studies of the charismatic Christians - similar techniques and analogous results. Both antithetical religions pursued communion with the invisible intelligent powers that define each religion, and with similar "success."

Now we fast forward to today. If I recall correctly, what I am about to describe was being studied by Luhrmann and her associates at Stanford, but perhaps unpublished or newly in press at the time of the TEDx talk. Here's the story.

As she says in the talk, she brought her charismatic Christians into the lab, and randomly assigned them to two groups. One group got "wirch training" tapes (with a Christian vocabulary) and the other group got run-of-the-mill pious sermons. The training group got more "visionary" experiences than the other group.

Fine. Then a colleague asked her whether "witch training" (my term, of course, not hers or the colleague's, but that is where she learned how to do this) would work with completely secular subject matter. That is, what if instead of communing with the witches' spirits or the Christians' God, you tried to train Stanford students to commune with Leland Stanford, Jr (a 19th Century Bay Area railroad tycoon, and an early benefactor of the university that today bears his name)?

Similar secular-target experiments had already been done with different but related methods (the "Philip experiment" and "Napoleon Hill's advisors" are searchable terms; "active imagination" as actually practiced by Carl Jung is parallel, too). No surprise, then, that Stanord students were easily trained to commune with Leland Junior, including some who achieved visionary visits from him. I am told that this practice is now a lab component of one of Luhrmann's undergrad courses.

Napoleon Hill got a visit from Abraham Lincoln; Philip is a consciously made-up fictional character, but he visits his devotees, too; ... witches are visited by witchy supernatural beings, Stanford students are visited by Mr Stanford, and Christians are visited by their God.

Conclusion: the interpretation of Luhrmann's results is not necessarily friendly to the truth of any particular religious tradition. I am sympathetic to her problem about frankly discussing what her results say about particular religions, but when viewed in light of her entire career's work, rather than just the one study of these Christians, I'd say her work raises as many questions for Christianity as it answers. I'm being diplomatic.

Thank you for an intelligent response.  I have experienced what  Professor Luhrmann talked about on numerous occasions, that come unbidden, and at times when they are needed.   I have found them healing and life-affirming.  I do not look for them, they just come.  As I grow older my experiences of God become deeper, as I grow in trust and am able to allow myself to let go of fear.  I am not concerned with what others think.  We each must make our own way......I am thankful for my faith in Christ, and the deep inner healing that flows from that.

I do believe that these experiences are open to anyone who seeks the truth since God is the truth, as well as love.   As Jesus said, "those who seek will find".  Seekers are happy when the truth is found. The Spirit of God can't be owned or corralled by any religious system.   I am ready to be surprised.  I have met atheists who put me to shame in how open they are to the Spirit, though they may not call it that.  As well as in any group, there are those who are not much different than the most committed, hard fundamentalist. 

Usually, I stay in the blog section.  You are one of the reasons that I do post here from time to time.   Again, thank you for your thoughtful response.  

Peace my friend

Mark

Edited August 23, 2019 by markdohle

[spartan max2]

Bookmarked to watch later 

[spartan max2]

1 hour ago, eight bits said:

Howdy, Mark

Professor Luhrmann is an interesting scholar. Everything she says in the talk is a fair summary of some of her research, but of course, it is incomplete. She's done a lot of work. This 2015 talk reasonably enough focuses on her book of the same or similar title, but unfortunately emphasizes North American Anglophone Christian experience (what the book emphasized).

That is not the whole story. Her dissertation work was the anthropology of modern witchcraft practitioners in the UK. As she mentioned briefly in the video, by "anthropology" she means that she lived among those whom she studied, the British witches in this case, to learn their ways, ideally as if she were born to them. That is where she learned that increased attention to interior mental states induces unusual experiences (including one visionary encounter with ancient druids which she had herself).

If it needs to be said, her UK witches weren't Christians; they would likely describe themselves as pagan or perhaps use some other terminology, but they are not Abrahamic. What she learned from the witches, I think it is fair to say, was recycled in her studies of the charismatic Christians - similar techniques and analogous results. Both antithetical religions pursued communion with the invisible intelligent powers that define each religion, and with similar "success."

Now we fast forward to today. If I recall correctly, what I am about to describe was being studied by Luhrmann and her associates at Stanford, but perhaps unpublished or newly in press at the time of the TEDx talk. Here's the story.

As she says in the talk, she brought her charismatic Christians into the lab, and randomly assigned them to two groups. One group got "wirch training" tapes (with a Christian vocabulary) and the other group got run-of-the-mill pious sermons. The training group got more "visionary" experiences than the other group.

Fine. Then a colleague asked her whether "witch training" (my term, of course, not hers or the colleague's, but that is where she learned how to do this) would work with completely secular subject matter. That is, what if instead of communing with the witches' spirits or the Christians' God, you tried to train Stanford students to commune with Leland Stanford, Jr (a 19th Century Bay Area railroad tycoon, and an early benefactor of the university that today bears his name)?

Similar secular-target experiments had already been done with different but related methods (the "Philip experiment" and "Napoleon Hill's advisors" are searchable terms; "active imagination" as actually practiced by Carl Jung is parallel, too). No surprise, then, that Stanord students were easily trained to commune with Leland Junior, including some who achieved visionary visits from him. I am told that this practice is now a lab component of one of Luhrmann's undergrad courses.

Napoleon Hill got a visit from Abraham Lincoln; Philip is a consciously made-up fictional character, but he visits his devotees, too; ... witches are visited by witchy supernatural beings, Stanford students are visited by Mr Stanford, and Christians are visited by their God.

Conclusion: the interpretation of Luhrmann's results is not necessarily friendly to the truth of any particular religious tradition. I am sympathetic to her problem about frankly discussing what her results say about particular religions, but when viewed in light of her entire career's work, rather than just the one study of these Christians, I'd say her work raises as many questions for Christianity as it answers. I'm being diplomatic.

 

Did she write a book of her witch expierence ?

That would be a nice read. 

[XenoFish]

5 minutes ago, spartan max2 said:

Did she write a book of her witch expierence ?

That would be a nice read. 

Books.

[Kenemet]

17 hours ago, eight bits said:

 

Conclusion: the interpretation of Luhrmann's results is not necessarily friendly to the truth of any particular religious tradition. I am sympathetic to her problem about frankly discussing what her results say about particular religions, but when viewed in light of her entire career's work, rather than just the one study of these Christians, I'd say her work raises as many questions for Christianity as it answers. I'm being diplomatic.

 

Thank you for a delightful, insightful, and educated response.  Ah, Internet Rabbit Hole, here I come!

[+Pettytalk]

18 hours ago, eight bits said:

Howdy, Mark

Professor Luhrmann is an interesting scholar. Everything she says in the talk is a fair summary of some of her research, but of course, it is incomplete. She's done a lot of work. This 2015 talk reasonably enough focuses on her book of the same or similar title, but unfortunately emphasizes North American Anglophone Christian experience (what the book emphasized).

That is not the whole story. Her dissertation work was the anthropology of modern witchcraft practitioners in the UK. As she mentioned briefly in the video, by "anthropology" she means that she lived among those whom she studied, the British witches in this case, to learn their ways, ideally as if she were born to them. That is where she learned that increased attention to interior mental states induces unusual experiences (including one visionary encounter with ancient druids which she had herself).

If it needs to be said, her UK witches weren't Christians; they would likely describe themselves as pagan or perhaps use some other terminology, but they are not Abrahamic. What she learned from the witches, I think it is fair to say, was recycled in her studies of the charismatic Christians - similar techniques and analogous results. Both antithetical religions pursued communion with the invisible intelligent powers that define each religion, and with similar "success."

Now we fast forward to today. If I recall correctly, what I am about to describe was being studied by Luhrmann and her associates at Stanford, but perhaps unpublished or newly in press at the time of the TEDx talk. Here's the story.

As she says in the talk, she brought her charismatic Christians into the lab, and randomly assigned them to two groups. One group got "wirch training" tapes (with a Christian vocabulary) and the other group got run-of-the-mill pious sermons. The training group got more "visionary" experiences than the other group.

Fine. Then a colleague asked her whether "witch training" (my term, of course, not hers or the colleague's, but that is where she learned how to do this) would work with completely secular subject matter. That is, what if instead of communing with the witches' spirits or the Christians' God, you tried to train Stanford students to commune with Leland Stanford, Jr (a 19th Century Bay Area railroad tycoon, and an early benefactor of the university that today bears his name)?

Similar secular-target experiments had already been done with different but related methods (the "Philip experiment" and "Napoleon Hill's advisors" are searchable terms; "active imagination" as actually practiced by Carl Jung is parallel, too). No surprise, then, that Stanord students were easily trained to commune with Leland Junior, including some who achieved visionary visits from him. I am told that this practice is now a lab component of one of Luhrmann's undergrad courses.

Napoleon Hill got a visit from Abraham Lincoln; Philip is a consciously made-up fictional character, but he visits his devotees, too; ... witches are visited by witchy supernatural beings, Stanford students are visited by Mr Stanford, and Christians are visited by their God.

Conclusion: the interpretation of Luhrmann's results is not necessarily friendly to the truth of any particular religious tradition. I am sympathetic to her problem about frankly discussing what her results say about particular religions, but when viewed in light of her entire career's work, rather than just the one study of these Christians, I'd say her work raises as many questions for Christianity as it answers. I'm being diplomatic.

 

Are you telling us that those elite Stanford students can easily be mentally manipulated to have them believing of receiving ghostly visitations? Who visits them, Jr. or Sr. Stanford? I'm glad I did not elect to send my daughters to Stanford. One is enough in the family who receives visitations from the great beyond, me.

Very good expression of thoughts on the matter, and with a nice breakdown for the sake of the lesser gods around here.

[Duke Wellington]

On 8/22/2019 at 9:33 PM, markdohle said:

I love TED talks, on all subjects, this is a good one I believe, no matter what you believe.

 

With the Abrahamic God our purpose is simply to receive pleasure from him.

We have to open ourselves up to all pleasures coming from him, to indulge in them, and to purposefully do so to give God pleasure back. The snake in the Garden of Eden is there to teach us there are light and dark pleasures.

Seek out and enjoy anything that brings pleasure to you!

If watching that new action film would bring you light-pleasure, then indulge. If bullying that negative person would bring you dark-pleasure, then indulge. Just make sure with all pleasures that you partake off, that you do so purposefully to give pleasure back to God. That is the essence of serving God.

The snake in the Garden of Eden symbolises how we are supposed to gain wisdom of good and evil to rise up. Only by gaining that wisdom can we become as God.

That means enjoying both sets of pleasures, learning how they work, and learning when its appropriate to indulge in them during your life. For instance, with dark-pleasure its appropriate to wind-down your window and abuse that idiot who nearly crashed into you. But its not appropriate to shoot him dead!

As a psychologist would say, as you go through life you have to integrate both your light and dark-side:

Seeking only to do indulge in good, or only to indulge in evil, causes a person relationship problems during their life. Likewise, indulging in a light or dark pleasure when its inappropriate too, can bring its own set of problems. For instance, it can end up with the person becoming a doormat or serving a prison sentence.

Now the shocker - God doesnt care if a pleasure he is providing you with is good or evil.

If you think about it carefully then its actually your society who has told you what pleasures are good or evil. This is why what is good or evil varies between nations and civilizations. To God, pleasure is pleasure, your job is to enjoy all pleasures he provides, and to do so to purposefully give pleasure back to God.

As regards your society you have to think is it appropriate to indulge in this or that pleasure? In essence, you have to deny some pleasure provided by God. Otherwise your country would quickly descend into some kind of Purge Film.

But you can deny yourself far less than what you currently are and make huge strides to re-aligning yourself with Gods intention for you. Enjoy all light and dark pleasures provided to you, if your situational or societal circumstances mean its appropriate too. And when enjoying them do so while holding the specific intention in your mind of doing it to give God pleasure back.

Do it all day long, every day, for the rest of your life.

I bet you wont have to wait a whole day before you notice weird stuff starting to happen. You will get the universe sending clear messages to you through other people and your experiences. There will be other odd creepy things that happen too. 

Just be warned it is a one way process! If you stop doing the receiving pleasure to give pleasure you will be given a mauling by God. Once you have entered into a relationship with it, it will expect the same from that point onwards.

Edited August 27, 2019 by RabidMongoose

[XenoFish]

So Slaanesh is the Abrahamic God is disguise?