["Followup-To:" header set to alt.philosophy.]
> .... He is faced with a basic choice: follow
> reason, or follow the herd, and he chooses to follow reason.
Whose reason would that be? If his own, would he not be aiming "to negate
the world and retreat into the self under the guise of escaping
self-domination"? If other than his own, would he not be like the fatalist
who, "as part of the process of being alive", is not "tasked with the goal of
finding meaning and order in the universe"? It would have to be someones
reasoning, not his own, but at the same time not just anybodys', not just
anybody his body is in contact with, as that would be the fatalist position.
Who could this someone be? Would it be the same one for everyone? In so far
as everyone should be given a fair chance to recognize Him, it follows that
once this is accomplished, His role is assumed by another One, lest we "lapse
into well-meaning Absolutes, designed to make us feel better about life".
Otherwise, the nihilist is in danger of making the terms he uses to reason
into Absolutes, into well-meaning Absolutes designed to make him feel better
about life, "but is not that a presumption that life itself is bad?". This
is what seems to have happened to the followers of Buddha and Christ, but
in our own age another Buddha and Christ has arisen.
--
"The world of existence is an emanation of the merciful attribute of God."
Abdul-Baha
http://www.costarricense.cr/pagina/ernobe
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