{"id":3942,"date":"2022-11-29T16:12:35","date_gmt":"2022-11-29T16:12:35","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/oxfordquaker.com\/newsletter\/?page_id=3942"},"modified":"2022-11-30T18:36:19","modified_gmt":"2022-11-30T18:36:19","slug":"beyond-belief","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/oxfordquaker.com\/newsletter\/december-2022\/beyond-belief\/","title":{"rendered":"Beyond Belief"},"content":{"rendered":"

Dave Dight<\/strong><\/p>\n

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\r\n Editors\u2019 note: An earlier version of this article appeared in the 28 October 2022 issue of The Friend. It had been redacted in ways that disappointed the author, who subsequently asked Forty-Three to publish this version.<\/em>\r\n <\/div>\r\n <\/div>\n

Here\u2019s an evolutionary perspective on the perennial issue of belief in a \u2018transcendent\u2019 God, focussing on belief itself.<\/p>\n

After lengthy evolution, the human brain, possibly the most complex object in the universe, is a composite, flexible and multifunctional organ with a recently-expanded cerebrum, largely due to our being a social species having competed with other hominins \u2013 all now extinct \u2013 in environmentally dynamic habitats. Cerebral function still dominates human cognition: rationality, language, imagination, memory, creativity etc. \u2013 all useful for warfare.<\/p>\n

Belief systems are cerebral frameworks for meanings. Within religious narratives, they confer on believers privileged status, identity, belonging and purpose \u2013 offering coherence to their lives, rules for social organisation (morality) and solutions to existential concerns (like awareness of mortality), by positing a \u2018transcendent\u2019, benign, timeless reality \u2013 only accessible on belief. Hence believers can get upset when their cherished beliefs are challenged or exposed. Beliefs, expressed in language, often aren\u2019t originally our own, some even lazily derived from social media. Language structures and orders thoughts, which are themselves abstractions and only partial representations of reality. Words simplify, confine, compartmentalise and categorise experience; they\u2019re useful in communication but are also cognitive straitjackets: \u201c… the letter killeth, but the Spirit giveth life\u201d, (elders of Balby, 1656, Advices and Queries 1.01).<\/p>\n

Similarly, religious beliefs (contrary to spirituality) define, label and divide people into groups, each sharing a mind-set usually claiming sole access to ‘truth’. Competition between groups over resources amplifies this, reinforcing separation and enmity. War begets war.<\/p>\n

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Photo by SL Granum<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Zen Buddhism radically challenges language, the deeper meanings of words being in the spaces between them. This reality, like life, is impermanent and dynamic: there are no objects, only relationships; no events, only processes \u2013 and no compulsory beliefs. In contrast, attachments cause great suffering, especially the pernicious delusion of being a separate, permanent self. Quakers might say there\u2019s only one Mind \u2013 and we\u2019re all fragments of it. Silently contemplating the \u2018inward light\u2019, receptive minds flow together, beyond beliefs. By definition, this love can\u2019t be adequately expressed, only realised and lived \u2013 countering the corrosive alienation of egocentric, cerebral power-games.<\/p>\n

One might ask if a tree is worthy of reverence, possibly with Charles Windsor in mind. Jesus said: \u201cLift the stone, you will find me there\u201d. Meaning: with effort, surprising truth is revealed. Plants transform sunlight into chemical energy, converting greenhouse gases and water into sugars whilst generating vital oxygen (reversing global warming<\/em>). This process evolved over three billion years, powering all terrestrial life and linking astronomy with biology. It\u2019s but one complex system among myriads in every green leaf. Its host of interacting molecular components, themselves complex and dynamic, are exquisitely regulated, operating harmoniously with daily and seasonal solar rhythms.<\/p>\n

The deeper natural systems (including us) are examined, the more the complexity, intricacy and subtle sophistication of their intimate interconnectivity are revealed. We can marvel at this. Or we can exploit, plunder, pollute, and poison nature (including ourselves), whilst believing we\u2019re the pinnacle of evolution. As the apex predator, we confuse competitive dominance with adaptive fitness. Competition, now within our species, gives new, urgent and self-inflicted existential threats, like weaponry and climate change. Our behaviour is no longer fit for \u2018purpose\u2019, i.e. survival. There appear to be no political solutions to this.<\/p>\n

Jesus also said: \u201cThe truth will set you free\u201d \u2013 from delusion to self-realisation (like Buddhist awakening). We are spiritual beings. To survive and flourish, responsibility must balance power. Spirituality is the development of this integrity, perhaps associated with brain structures \u2018deeper\u2019 than the cerebral cortex and accessible by a range of spiritual practices,<\/p>\n

Beliefs have their place, but not in science. Like children, scientists play with ideas and entertain theories about them, supported or refuted by disciplined experimentation, yet never being proved (nor believed in), only superseded. Theories develop and grow with us. The quest for understanding is endless. Personally, I\u2019d rather my mind is opened by wonder than closed by belief.<\/p>\n

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Forty-Three<\/em> Newsletter \u2022 Number 524 \u2022 December 2022
\n<\/strong>Oxford Friends Meeting
\n43 St Giles, Oxford OX1 3LW<\/p>\n

newsletter@oxfordquakers.org<\/a><\/p>\n

Copyright 2022, Oxford Quakers<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Dave Dight Here\u2019s an evolutionary perspective on the perennial issue of belief in a \u2018transcendent\u2019 God, focussing on belief itself. After lengthy evolution, the human brain, possibly the most complex object in the universe, is a composite, flexible and multifunctional organ with a recently-expanded cerebrum, largely due to our being a social species having competed … Continue reading Beyond Belief<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":50,"featured_media":0,"parent":3908,"menu_order":4,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3942","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/oxfordquaker.com\/newsletter\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/3942","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/oxfordquaker.com\/newsletter\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/oxfordquaker.com\/newsletter\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/oxfordquaker.com\/newsletter\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/50"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/oxfordquaker.com\/newsletter\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3942"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/oxfordquaker.com\/newsletter\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/3942\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4032,"href":"https:\/\/oxfordquaker.com\/newsletter\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/3942\/revisions\/4032"}],"up":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/oxfordquaker.com\/newsletter\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/3908"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/oxfordquaker.com\/newsletter\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3942"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/oxfordquaker.com\/newsletter\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3942"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/oxfordquaker.com\/newsletter\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3942"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}