–CONSTRUCTION– Construction Things

Parts Man

Parts Man

The Purpose for Man's Existence

The Purpose for Man's Existence

 

 

 

The choice

In this work we postulate the following thesis as a presumed purpose for man's existence: ‘Confronting the enigma of the universe man, part of the enigma, has a choice between belief and disbelief in an external finality, a creator-cause.'

 

Meaning an Directionality of Sense 

We propose to study in this article the sense-reference of this choice.  Sense is expressed in two manners. The first considers ‘sense' in terms of ‘meaning' referring to explanation that man is led to work out with relation to his confrontation with the universe. The second, ‘sense' is considered in terms of ‘directionality' of explanation in a two-optional alternative effectuated between ‘belief' and ‘disbelief'. The motive of choice postulates that through man's confrontation with the universe, and in order to explain it, a total lack of evidence for the presumption of either option, the individual is obliged to refer to his faculty of belief and deliberate a free and a voluntarily choice between the two options, namely: to believe in a creator-cause or not to believe in an external finality; a creator-cause: a God.

Aim of this study

We will attempt to present the hypothesis of the ‘choice' and test it against the texts of monotheistic religions and in the thought of certain philosophers, scientists and ideologists, in order to establish grounds for collective attitude patterns as well as individual ones.

 

The notion of choice

For the purpose of our work we propose to study the choice in its own proper term and then in terms of religious connotations in order to establish its probable validity in this realm. The hypothesis of the ‘choice' will be examined next according to the attitude of certain philosophers (Buddha, Aristotle, Leibniz, Spinoza, Kant, Nietzsche, Sartre, Russell)(1), certain scientists like (Pascal, Descartes, Freud, Einstein, Hawkins) and ideologists like (Karl Marx), in order to establish the grounds for the decision of the choice in the thought of these thinkers.

Belief and Disbelief

The basic foundation for the notion of the ‘choice' comprises a decision of preference by the individual person between two options. This study focuses on a presumed two options represented in one alternative namely,

a. To believe, or,

b. To disbelieve, in: An external finality-identified here as a creator-cause: God.

According to the attitude of every individual the ‘choice', in case of belief, may be spontaneous, immediate, clear and direct (faith), or can be a thoughtful ‘choice' produced by subjective justification of ‘reasoning', or can be a combination of the two. Or, it can be a choice of rejection of belief (disbelief) which is produced by an immediate terms depend on man's convictions. We are in a con chance, such resentment or a prolonged intellectually reflective decision. Thinkers like Aristotle, Pascal, and Sartre considered the ‘choice' in the same manner revealing the same mechanism in defining the ‘choice' as a logical process of choosing between two options of the same alternative.

Inborn Curiosity for Knowledge and the problematic

We are assuming that man's curiosity motivates him to pursue knowledge through thought. The natural need to know is the starting point that instigates the process of awareness of the universe and oneself. We have proposed the idea that the objective of thinking and acquiring knowledge, whether scientific or otherwise is to explain what is. Knowledge in our perspective has a directional finality, to enable man to make his choice. The enigmatic presence, nature, structure, origin and functionality of the universe, are the key questions where knowledge tries to figure out. Whether life is the product of an overall order-plan or the result of hazard-chaotic absurdity demands explanations. Our world offers us problematics that propose causality as part of the hypothetical explanations. The pursuit of knowledge confronts us, at every instance, with a possible hypothesis of a designer, or several, since we did not contribute ourselves to such phenomenon. The lack of evidence for or against such hypothesis imposes the choice as the only alternative.

Knowledge and Perception of it

Science (Latin: sciré: to know, to be acquainted with, to recognize: based on evidence) and arts (another approach of perception, to recognize, to discern, to identify, to be conscience of, to be aware of, to captivate and to represent) are the bases of perceptible reactions. Psychological or spiritual apprehension is equally decisive in perceiving knowledge. Every one is confronted with the same object, phenomenon or thing, but reacts to it differently. These reaction-attitudes can be classified into conception-expression means of communicative decisions. We presume that despite all scientific, aesthetic, moral, psychological or spiritual experiences and discoveries we are unable, until now, to discover answers to ‘ultimate knowledge'. Man we are assuming is at the present state of knowledge is in a state of ignorance with regard to ‘ultimate knowledge'.

Ultimate Knowledge

At the present time the presumed ‘ultimate knowledge' produced by the confrontation of man with the universe is inaccessible. Man, facing this inaccessibility, recoils to his faculty of conjectural speculations, in search for explanations and lack of evidence to his faculty of belief and disbelief. The alternative of choice imposes itself as an obligation. The choice between belief and disbelief in a creator-cause becomes the only option that confronts the individual. Endowed with the mind, tool of reason, freedom of will and free arbitration, man deliberates his choice in accordance with his own personal convictions. The mechanism of this presumption can be reduced to the followings notions:

A. Confrontation between man and the universe.

B. Astonishment and natural curiosity as inborn aptitudes.

C. The need to explain the world.

D. The incapacity of individual, or even the collective

intelligence, to explain the presence, the origin and finality of

objects constituting the universe, as well as the nature of these

objects, until the present time.

E. The emergence of hypotheses of non-verifiable causes.

F. Total lack of proof, reference, index or even solid argument

for these hypotheses.

observing, examining, analyzing, comparing, synthesizing and

 G. The emergence of a hypothesis of a creator-cause, or

many.

H. The forced confrontation of two-fold alternative of a

choice:

The inevitable obligation of making the choice between the

two options:

A. Belief or

B. Disbelief, in an external finality, a creator-cause: God

 

K. The finale and inevitable decision of the choice before

death.

L. Death seals the choice.

Confrontation between man and the universe can be examined

at different levels of encounters:

1. The physical encounter, where the object (a butterfly, a tree, a planet, a galaxy) is perceived through our senses. Here the observer exercises curiosity which sets off reaction in terms of questioning. (Physical experience)

2. The aesthetical encounter: Here, the object emanates something which set off a sentimental psychological reaction, whether of admiration or rejection, in the observer. (Aesthetical experience)

3. The ethical encounter: The ethical attitude is related to a sense of duty, a moral responsibility, or morality reaction, a necessity for ethical interpretation of something, a state or an action. (Ethical experience)

4. The intellectual encounter: where the observer resorts to reason. Here, the faculty of reason is employed, namely, concluding concerning the presence, nature, structure and form of an object: constituents, origin and finality of an object perceptibly and the intelligibly. (Reasoning experience)

5. The spiritual encounter: Where the observer seizes the object directly and without the intermediary of the intellect. Here the observer captivates an object or an event through a faculty different from his other faculties. (Spiritual experience)

6. The encounter of the whole: We can, perhaps, add another experience to these five principle ones namely, what is considered as the sixth sense, where a feeling of extra physical, psychological, mental, ethical, esthetical or spiritual perception, e.g. sensing an object or an event without the intermediation of any of these five means. We can consider that in every experience, or a combination of experiences, the individual confronts a phenomenon and this interaction instigates a reaction to whether or not there is causality.

These six encounters, or means of awareness, can be considered as indivisible entity experience, as in Buddhist meditation.

Inevitability of the Choice Lack of Proof

In our perspective we are always postulating that the absence of proof, for or against the existence of causality, renders the choice inevitable. The uncertainty of metaphysics as well as of religious speculation concerning evidence, does not offer us enough support to settle the question of belief and disbelief which remains a suspended decision. (2) The absence of something tangible, or even a solid argument, denoting such causality gives freedom to think in deliberating the choice.

Free arbiter and fatalism

It is in this individual liberty that every person finds expression of his choice. Although man is obliged to choose between one of the two options he has the freedom to make his choice between the two. In the choice responsibility of individual freedom grants the individual his value as a human being. We do not consider fatalism and predestination as valid criterion for the decision of the choice, since it bereaves him from his freedom and his will and renders him not responsible for his decisions. Without such freedom he is reduced to an irresponsible mechanical robot. We assume that the idea of the choice is founded on the freedom of the individual to make his own choice as he wants. No other person can share with him in the final decision in the making of his choice. Although persuasive and dissuasive means of influence, whether familial, societal, psychological, religious or ideological, are endless exercising maximum pressure, in either way and in favor of either option, it is up to the individual himself to make the choice. He alone is responsible While freedom of decision is the criterion of the choice the individual determines the outcome of his final decision. Every individual person can thus envisage the world, interpret it and explain it in accordance to his own convictions.

Vacuum of Ignorance

As was discussed earlier, the impossibility to conclude from universal phenomena, whether empirical-sensible or intelligible-spiritual, the hypothesis of the existence of causality emerges as a probability where evidential knowledge is unattainable. Knowledge in itself, and at its present state, is unable to provide with such explanative answers. Accessibility to ultimate knowledge is needed to acquire evidence. It is when we realize our incapacity to attain ultimate knowledge that personal convictions are prompted by belief or unbelief. Confronted with this state of ‘inaccessibility' creates a vacuum where man becomes aware of his limitations and where knowledge is unable to provide answers that the choice is imposed.

Oscillation

Although choice is free and willful, but inevitable, it is restricted to two options. No third option is possible. To believe or not to believe, in a creator-cause is a forced decision where one can alternate indefinitely until death where the final decision is taken. Rejection of the choice indicates already that a choice has been taken. A skeptic, the indecisive who doubts or who oscillates between the two options, even the nihilist, can be considered as one who has chosen to reject belief, as long as he did not make his choice to believe. One cannot be a believer and unbeliever at one and the same time. He is either one or the other. He can alternate between the two options as much as he desires but once he makes his choice he is classified in one term or the other.

As is in the case of other major forced human aspects such as form, shape, color, constitution, systems, motivations and needs; eventualities, such as birth, development, aging and death (where man has no choice but to accept and endure), the choice is another forced phenomenon upon man. The term ‘forced' means ‘obliged to accept and has no choice in the matter'.

Forced Existence

Forced existence refers to the fact that he did not choose to be in his form, his size or possessing systems constituting him physically, mentally, psychologically, ethically and spiritually( for those who believe in the soul). He is forced to go through a life cycle, entering from one door, passing duration of time and then dying. He has no option in all these, not even in the color of his eyes. Nobody asks him whether he likes to come into this life or to age or to imposed and man has to choose. Man is forced into this then find no evidence for ultimate knowledge? Why specific form? Why should man confront the universe?

 Nobody takes his opinion whether he would like to have two arms, two legs, a trunk and a head. He undergoes the process of aging and cannot retard it for a moment. He is submitted to all these processes without the least choice. Similarly, man is forced to interact with the universe whether he likes it or not, for survival and knowledge acquisition. He is forced to think and cannot stop thinking. In the same way we consider the choice as a forced decision that the individual has to take before his death.

Uselessness of Proof

We consider that according to the perspective of the choice any possibility of a proof or disproof for causality renders the decision of the choice void and renders life meaningless with no goal to achieve. For, indeed, why the mystery and why the enigma? Why should man strive for knowledge and undergo a specified duration of time .

Causality

 Man undergo life and death? Why should man have no saying in all these things? The way is indicated, the alternative is situation of choice. Although the decision of the choice can be verified it is next to impossible to verify why man should make the decision of the choice. Maybe the answer is suggested in religious texts. We assume in this work that it is precisely the ‘absence of proof', for or against a creator-cause, represents the meaning for man's existence. We consider the choice as the corner- stone for such directionality of meaning. The perspective of the choice provides sense, order and aim for man's transitory existence where specific conditions are indispensable: a life- cycle i.e. birth, maturity and death; a mind to think; the need for confrontation with an enigmatic universe; the need for an explanation and that this explanation is sterile, the emergence of causality; absence of proof or disproof for such a causality, i.e., a creator-cause and freedom of will to deliberate the final decision.

In this way we consider any individual, whether a philosopher, a scientist, an artist or man of letters, or any person who attempts to establish a proof, or disproof, for such causality practices an exercise in futility. Many, like (Buddha, Aristotle, St. Paul, St Aquinas, Pascal, Descartes, Leibniz, Kant, Nietzsche, Freud, Russell, Sartre or Picasso) have attempted such an enterprise, namely to give proof for or against the existence of a God, but their Endeavour ended up in pure conjecture.

What is interesting in this attempt is that each of these thinkers had to make up his own choice, despite the lack of proof or disproof.

We emphasize the fact that no religion, among the three principle monotheistic religions (that asserts the thesis of the existence of one God), or among other belief-systems (Hinduism, Zarathustraism, Magus, Sikhism or Baha'ism), advances substantial evidence for its claims.

Purpose of forced phenomenon

In our study we do not attempt to deal with an answer to the ‘why' question of having to make the choice. In other words: Why should man make a choice between belief and disbelief in an external finality? Or, what is the purpose of this forced phenomenon? For we do not pretend to any argument in the direction of this problematic. Another question which is equally important is: Being so important as a decision, are there any consequences for making the choice? There is no way to verify the validity of such an inquiry.

A third question emerges as well that is related to: who takes the decision of choice within us? Is it our reason? Is it our sentiment? Is it our natural intuition? Our soul? Or is it the other person within? It is very difficult to provide with answers. But one thing is certain; we have to face the universe and we have to choose.

As long as man remains a mystery and as long as the universe and its constituent phenomena remain also as enigmas, yielding no evidence or proof, choice between belief and disbelief in finality, internal or external, is unavoidable. Reason and belief remain as the only resorts in deliberating our decision of the choice.

Viability of collective choice

Although all these questions are important with respect to the choice, we are limiting ourselves only to the notion of choice as a decision between two options. The decision of choice can be observed on an individual level as well on a collective level. Example of a collective choice can be observed in the Jewish People's attitude displayed in the Old Testament as well as in the New Testament and the Qur'an. The attitude of Christians and Muslims towards belief can be traced in the New Testament and the Qur'an respectively. A collective choice of a whole community can be verified for example in a Synagogue, Church or Mosque. The attitude of people in communist countries during and after the dominance of the USSR in the world particularly in the Soviet Union, or in China, North Korea and other rigid communist countries in the twentieth century, manifest a collective rejection of faith and belief, due to the ideological Marxist system. This collective choice can be empirically verified.

Collective choice representative of individual choice

But we consider that collective choice is nothing but an assembly of individual choices taken separately by each individual person, where personal responsibility is total, owing to the freedom and will of the individual. Despite the colossal influence of the collectivity the individual person has always the total freedom and the will to decide his, or her, own choice. Marxist ideology did not eradicate religious belief throughout the seventy years of dictatorship in the ex Soviet Union.

The individual choice is easier to verify with a simple questionnaire where the individual declares his decision or indecision. Communal choice is more difficult to trace than the individual decision. Statistics of people's belief or ejection of belief are not applicable with precision in the great majority of present world societies. In previous world societies these statistics cannot be verified precisely because of the individual or group freedom on the one hand and the nature of the privacy of the decision on the other. These statistics are unavailable.

Agnosticism and Gnosticism

The choice can be concretely assessed between Gnosticism and agnosticism. Oscillations can be established, without over generalizing or over charging factual evidence with undue interpretations, in the Scriptures. Monotheistic beliefs have been a precise measuring criterion between belief and disbelief in one creator-cause until the present time. This criterion leads to a clear two-fold classification grouping attitudes into two distinct perspectives. According to this criterion of identification individuals are classified either as believers or disbelievers following their choice with regard to a creator-cause. In the twentieth century, and especially in the post modernity, these characteristics became more trenchant and the world population is more and more distinctively divided up between believers and non-believers.

Historical Applicability

The perspective of the choice can be applicable to all epochs throughout history. Fluctuations between the two options can be traced in all Scriptures. While the Middle Ages witness to the tension between the Church and science, later epochs disclose the influence of science and the gradual minimum Union in 1981 and the rise of religious fundamentalism gave role of metaphysics. In contemporary history religious belief can be clearly distinguished from atheistic disbelief on a mass level. This fact has dominated the world scene in the 20thc:

Two-fold Trends

Atheistic Marxism (predominantly disbelievers: about two billions) versus religious belief (predominantly monotheistic: about two billion believers). The break down of the Soviet momentum to the already rising revivalist religious reaction worldwide. Religious revivalism has culminated in the clash of civilizations religiously oriented among different cultures especially in post modernity. Traditional monotheistic movements on a transnational level emerge to constitute a religious rivalry on a world level. Religious revivalism was already in the making during the twentieth century as a reaction to Marxist materialist atheism and to the materialist values of capitalism. The reason for religious revivalism is not that both ideologies whether socialism or capitalism, failed to give a clear meaning for human existence, but rather the dictates of the choice between materialism and the spiritual outlook that decided between the two.

Notwithstanding the strong societal influence over the individual decision in the choice the final decision belongs to the individual himself. No other person, group, community or society can be held responsible for one's own decision. An individual born and brought up in a Mormon environment, for example, is likely to choose Mormonism as a belief-system in preference to Buddhism, Hinduism or atheism. But the choice of a Mormon of his belief-system in reference to others is not an obligatory choice. Many adherents of one creed or another have left their belief-systems and have chosen others or have rejected belief altogether. Likewise examples can be cited of those who were atheists and chose to believe in one religion or another, or a certain philosophy. Whether religious teachings of certain belief-systems do not permit a change of a belief-system, every person in reality has the freedom and will to do so.

Choice of ‘reason' and choice of ‘faith'

The fundament in choice is lack of proof for the existence, or non-existence of a creator-cause. The choice is not founded on a hazardous conviction of the individual. It can resort to ‘reason' or/and to ‘faith' for its own justification.

If reason can be described as deliberate awareness of mental apprehension process (as in the satellite dilemma which  requires justification), faith can refer to direct decision (as in the aesthetical experience of a rose which may prompt a rose- conceptor, or simply it presumes a creator-cause as act of faith), or reject all metaphysical explanations.

Both reason and faith lack evidence and are founded on personal conviction. It is not within the domain of logical speculation to assign reason to the mind and faith to the heart (for the simple reason we cannot identify any of these proof. Both stem up from the perceptible and both phenomena), as some religions depict. If reason is a deliberate systematic awareness of phenomena based on facts, faith can be presented as an immediate criterion of judgment based on feelings. The former may result in the latter lack for factual end up in conjecture. This is where the choice becomes a forced obligation.

If we accept these criteria (reason and faith), and for the sake of the argument, as means of deliberating the choice, we can proceed to examine the notion of choice in belief-systems of monotheistic religions and then in the thought of a selection of thinkers.

We believe that the idea according to which any belief- system, whether religious (which can be considered as the invention of man's own thought, or by divine inspiration as proclaimed by religion), or any presumptive philosophy, is brought about by man's confrontation with the universe.

Empiricism as the separating line

Science and metaphysics are separated by empirical criterion. Although both are expressed by symbolic expressions of communication, both are short of evidence to provide support for belief or disbelief. While scientific empiricism can lead to disbelieve, metaphysical thought can be achieved through the very lack of evidence. All depends on one's personal reaction to phenomenon. The universe offers the choice for both parties. Each party justifies its own preference depending on its choice.

When Napoleon asked Laplace, why there was no mention of God in his works; Laplace (an ardent believer himself) retorted to Napoleon: ‘Sire, I do not need this hypothesis for my theory.' creator-cause.

The Encounter

The encounter of Laplace with the universe, and in order to interpret it with scientific rigor, he reduced it to mathematical formulas. It is exactly at this very point where mathematical interpretation is established we can separate belief from disbelief. According to the attitude of the individual person, here a scientist-mathematician, we can classify the person according to his belief or disbelief.

Mathematical interpretation of the universe does not permit access to verifying the existence or the non-existence of ultimate truth. At the point of the encounter with the universe the six-level dimensions of experience is set off immediately, intuitively and directly. These experiences are means of assisting the individual to conclude his final decision.  Departing from the same phenomenon, the thinker can opt for one option or another. The same phenomenon can lead the individual into opposite directions.

Theosophical Examples of the Encounter

For example, Nietzsche chose to reject the idea of a God-cause while Leibniz chose to believe in this cause. Both thinkers, looking at the same phenomenon-the universe- did not change their attitudes. Kant, as another example, encountering the idea of what is ‘moral' concludes the necessity of the existence of God, ‘God is a moral necessity'. Nietzsche, by rejecting the moral, rejects God. He further considers that the universe is the product of hazard and chaos. Leibniz considers order and organization as references denoting the necessity of God's existence. The choice between belief and disbelief vis-à-vis the existence of an ‘external finality' or ‘cause-creator' may be considered as ‘crisis of doubt' or as ‘crisis of soul' or even as ‘crisis of conversion' and ‘crisis of situation'. It is certainly a conflict within man as well as without. pretend to neither truth nor to reality. These are s by its very nature, tends to search for truth ,

The Dilemma

 It is an inner conflict between identification and truthful reality. It is the doubt in the authenticity of one or the other. The mind stands as a judge, but in the choice it is impossible to establish its findings. The choice is an obligation as long as ultimate knowledge remains a mystery, unverifiable. Crisis of decision can be permanent without preferring one option to the other and can remain so until death. Here the indecisive individual oscillates permanently between the two options without any decision. The skeptic suspends his decision of judgment permanently for reasons of lack of proof. The annihilator annihilates the decision on the grounds that the reality of the decision cannot be attained. The doubtful is indecisive and alternates between the two decisions convincing himself one time of one option and another with the opposite option. In all these cases lack of evidence suspends decision. But indecision belongs to non-belief as long as the individual does not choose belief.

The nature of faith and religious belief

The departing point for this question is a difficult one, i.e. distinction between faith and confidence in reason. A definition of belief can denote, ‘to captivate one's intelligence under the authority of God', and faith, which presupposes the point of view of motivation, such as ‘the divine authority, accepted purely and simply; it is the respect that submits before superiority', considering the divine authority as ‘the guarantee for revealed truths, is not only the motive for belief, but it becomes the cause'. The difference between the two is that ‘the act of faith is founded ontologically, but not logically, on preliminary certainties'. In one way we can perhaps assume that faith as certainty of belief without proof is superior to knowledge because it goes beyond it (notwithstanding contradiction in terms), ‘it is the immediate can be produced, but this is not the case. There is water atom.

Experience versus conjecture

We have no accessibility to what is the comprehension of a supra-sensible reality', without the intermediation of reason, a sort of ‘illuminated intuition', ‘understanding the unintelligible', a ‘trust' that ‘vanishes by demonstration'. We can consider that, the act of intelligence that precedes and prepares the act of faith, and works on the motivation and credibility leading to adhesion, which is the conclusion of an inquest and an adhesion of science. The inquest which satisfies the mind is concluded favorably. It is an act of faith in the supernatural, but is of a natural order. Belief is a thought of the possibility of the existence of a thing that lacks proof for its existence. Despite the limitations of this definition of belief, belief remains open to human imagination. Belief seizes to be belief if a proof can be produced. We can not assume the validity of a thing by an empiric scientific proof: our knowledge according to which a particle of water is formed of two atoms of hydrogen and one atom of oxygen is dependant on atmospheric conditions (chemical-physical criteria) conducive to the formation of the structure of this atom of water, its origin, its presence or its purpose. Our knowledge is limited to its artificial presence in terms of life element. But ‘why should it be?' is difficult to reply.

Responsibility of the choice

Being forced into having to deliberate one's choice the individual has the responsibility of his choice in as far as his choice is unavoidable. There is no evidence for the presumption of responsibility. But the fact that the choice is inevitable renders man this responsibility. If such responsibility can be proven then evidence for either option, no reference indicating this responsibility and lesser still any evidence that the choice is an obligation, except that one has to make it. Confrontation between man and the universe is a Nevertheless; an underlying sense denotes implicitly these two assumptions namely, the inevitability and responsibility.

The inevitability can be indicated by the fact that every individual has made his choice or is deliberating his choice. The presumption of responsibility stems from the fact that every individual must take the decision.

The choice is individual and universal

Universality of the Choice

Within the perspective of the choice we assume that every individual person, sane and adult who has the faculty or judgment (reasoning), the liberty (to decide between the offered two options), the will (to deliberate) ought to choose: individual interaction where the individual experiences consciousness of what exists. Life with its vicissitude imposes on man dissuasive and persuasive effects in as far as the choice is concerned. Not only the mere confrontation of mind-universe has decisive element on the choice but also life experience becomes a determinant factor. Every individual person is subject to his immediate environment, small or large, and ultimately exposed to the whole world. All events, whether birth and death, good and evil, love and hatred, health and illness, gain and loss, are phenomena of thought and reflection enabling man to determine his final decision.

The choice as an inner conflict

Subjectivity of Finality

The conflict is an external-internal strife within man to deliberate the final choice. As an internal conflict we consider that the choice between belief and disbelief is in paradoxical opposition in every individual. The two opposite, just like life and death instincts, are innate and the decision rests subject to one's subjective convictions. In this perspective we do not consider the dialectical process as valid mechanics of explanation, for the the conflict becomes more acute where indecision or vitalist-finalist ones in explaining the universe. We make reference to the natural impulse of reason. Choice involves two alternatives of which the actor is allowed one solution and not a synthesis: an individual is either a believer or a disbeliever. He alone can produce the final decision. Natural instincts, as well as interaction with the universe, persuade and dissuade man to choose either way.

Paradoxical opposition

As long as the enigma of existence remains as such and the universe is inexplicable in terms of how and why, we are confronted with belief and disbelief in causality. Inner-external interactions, whether opposite or congruent, are directed to give the individual grounds for choosing. The subjectivity of decision explains extremes of attitudes throughout history ranging from absolute rejection of belief in a ‘God' (militant atheists) to convictions of certitude of belief (unison with God: ascetics, mystics, Sufis). We consider the choice as a universal phenomenon since every individual, adult and sane, is subject to the confrontation with the universe and is obliged to make a decision. While the choice is an inescapable decision during a life-time, death seals the choice.

The choice is an external conflict

Here the conflict lies in the inclinations of the individual, while deliberating his choice, towards mechanicist arguments is created to make a choice, for example, the skeptic, the doubtful, and the nihilist. Oscillation between one option and the other indicates clearly this conflict.

 

The choice is non transmissible

The choice is restricted to the individual himself. It is purely an unshared personal experience. Interaction with the universe is an individual and personal activity that cannot be communicated nor transmitted. As the experience is personal and subjective the decision of the choice cannot be transmitted from one person to another. Prescription of feelings and thoughts of personal convictions can be communicated but the experience itself cannot be shared by two persons. The decision depends entirely on the attitudes of every person, his personality and his personal reactions and decisions. The process of deliberating the choice is the result of infinite confrontations between man and the universe. At every encounter the individual is confronted with the decision itself. i.e., observing natural phenomenon.

Throughout history and under different types of pressures the choice was subject to influence, e.g., religious, societal, political, economic, educational, ideological. While influence can be enormous the decision itself remains the free will of the individual. Only when the individual himself decides on his choice the decision is made.

The individual choice and the collective choice

Collective choice is the assembly of individual choices. Whether the individual or the collectivity is subject to societal influences, this does not deprive the individual from his liberty to choose. Here we do not share the opinion advanced by Henri Lacroix of ‘dominance of authority' and ‘the absence of liberty and will' with regard to the decision of the choice whether through ‘personal faith' or ‘collective choice'. We do not approve either that ‘authority', whether ‘implicit or explicit' and ‘submission to the notoriety, ‘imitation, ‘habit' or ‘automatism', ‘collective excitation' or ‘ecstatic cult' replace the personal decision of the individual. These factors, individual himself. No other person, a collectivity, as mentioned above, can have influence on the individual's decision of choice but the final decision belongs to the can take away the freedom of the individual, for individuality is a particularity for every human.

Societal syndrome

In a society we observe the two opposite choices in coexistence. The choice itself can be a group identification of adherence, in separation and in concert. It can be also a criterion for harmony and dispute, conflict and war. It has direct impact on political, social and economic relations and structures of the adherents of belief or disbelief. Entities, or collectivities, belonging to either option can also decide the form and group conduct. It establishes criteria for national, regional and international relations. It is, in fact, a basic feature of individual identification and collective behavior. Conflicts and wars as well as peace and rapprochement are direct results of opposite choices. Crusades and Church inquisitions are but few examples.

Collective choice according to religious belief

In ancient history influences can be observed in the deliberation of communal decisions. The influence on collective choice is often the influence of certain individuals. For example, the influence of the individual decision of Akhenaton and his wife Nefertiti, the Egyptian Pharaohs (1352 BC), to abolish polytheism and establish monotheism, limiting deity to one god: Ateni the god of the sun, was decisive in the Pharoanic society. The influence of Moses (according to the Torah), of Jesus-Christ (according to the four Books of the Evangel) and the influence of Muhammad (according to the sources of Islam: Qur'an and Tradition) is of verified importance. On the other hand, the influence of disbelief practiced by certain individuals like Buddha, Nietzsche, Freud, Karl Marx, Fredrick Engels, Lenin, Mao Tse Tong, is massively observed. much as deciding on one option.

 

Most political influences are imposing influences where the masses are subjected to choice pressures by indoctrination, pressure, temptation, education and other dissuasive and persuasive methods. But the choice remains always subject to individual free will.

The choice is free and voluntary

We discussed above the choice as a personal and individual decision. Jean Jacque Rousseau, in Oeuvres, expresses his personal choice throughout the different phases of his life: ‘I believed in my childhood by authority, in my youth by feeling, in my adulthood by reason; now I believe because I have always believed.' It is more likely for a Mormon brought up in a Mormonism community to be a Mormon, a Jew to be a Jew within his community, a Muslim to be a Muslim within his, or an atheist to be an atheist if he is brought up in an atheist environment. But there is always the freedom of change of belief to another belief system or to the rejection of belief. If the decision is individual and free, indecision can be, and often is, a reason for adjourning the final decision. It is up to the individual to fluctuate between the two options.

The Determining Will

The will is considered here as the determination to affirm an idea or a sentiment and passes to action. The role of freedom is to enable man to choose between the two options, it is the final concluding act of the individual's freedom. Determination of decision by the will can be temporarily or can be permanent. The temporary decision is a decision that is subject to change. The permanent is a determinant and irreversible final decision. The permanent decision can seal the choice once and for good until death.

Spinoza, Kant and Sartre Positions  

Spinoza considers the will as ‘the capacity to place oneself outside the chain of causes and effects', but this denotes impartiality of decision. If the will can liberate itself from this, it acts independently of it. Descartes considers the will as ‘not really free but only when it is illuminated by understanding'. On the other hand, such a will indicating ‘human power to choose', is not admitted by Spinoza. For Descartes, man has the power ‘to do or not to do'.

This choice does not implicate any arbitrariness. Descartes considers the ‘indifference' which produces oscillation from one side to the other, without inclining towards one or to the other, is the basest degree of freedom. He considers understanding illuminates freedom and hence the decision of choosing is taken perfectly ‘in knowledge of cause'. Spinoza, on the other hand, does not situate freedom in free judgment but in free necessity. For Spinoza, ‘man does not have the will to do or not to do'. Man considers himself, and wrongly so, is above the laws of nature, assumes a finalist prejudice making him believe that all in nature is made for him. For Spinoza man is free when he knows that he exists and acts in a determined manner as all accomplished beings in nature.

Kant in the Critique of Pure Reason presupposes the double character of man. If man, by his sensitive character, is subordinated to natural determinism, he is entirely free by his intelligible character and imputable of his actions.

Sartre, in L'Etre et le Néant, assumes that man is ‘condemned to be free'. In the case where he is ‘first project' of himself, man chooses entirely his life: ‘there exist no values a priori susceptible to justify his acts'. From this freedom, without foundations, ‘man can not be conscience except in ‘anguish'.' He denied the existence of God.

Mechanicists versus Vitalist-Finalists 

In our perspective we consider that ‘choice' is an effect produced by the confrontation between the mind and the world, and hence ‘understanding' is always free. Otherwise, man becomes a mechanical robot void of reason and have no ‘reason of being'. The value of man consists in this very freedom to think, act and feel as he likes. The choice between the mechanicist-atomistic-physical explication and the causalist-finalist-extra-physical explication is an important indication of the liberty of the individual.

The biased choice

Nietzsche and Leibniz

The biased choice indicates that the individual does not need to confront with the universe in order to make his choice. In fact, he can choose between the two options prior to his interaction with the universe, or outside the confrontation, for other reasons than the confrontation with it. Nietzsche has decided very early in his adolescence to disbelieve in the existence of God and was a militant atheist all his life; he was simply angry with God. Leibniz, similarly and early in his adolescence, decided to believe in this cause and defending it; he loved God. In the case of the two philosophers, they both confronted with the universe and concluded their opposite attitudes drawing support from the same phenomena for each one's position.

We ought to specify here that a great number of persons choose between the two options with reference to the same phenomena, motivated by various reasons other than their confrontation with the universe. For example, there are those who reject the idea of the existence of a God because of personal dissatisfaction, or hatred or anger against God; there are those, on the opposite side, who believe in the existence of God for psychological satisfaction and dependence, or out of fear and hope. This choice can be identified as the ‘biased choice', being prior to the actual reflective confrontation with the universe. The decision is then taken ‘outside' the confrontation with the universe but the universe and experience serve to consolidate the arguments of each party. The pivot point of difference is always lack of evidence for either position.

The choice is empirically verifiable

Finally, we consider that the notion of the choice can be empirically verified. Every individual, mentally healthy and adult, has either already deliberated his choice between belief and disbelief in a creator cause, or he is deliberating this choice. This decision, whether already taken or in the process of being taken, can be actually identified. We have assumed that, as the forced presence of man's being, the imposed life-cycle, form and structure, motivations and needs, as well as his development, aging and death, considered to be programmed or non-programmed, he is obliged to make the choice.

Confrontation with the universe, whether for the purpose of survival or for acquiring knowledge, is inevitable. Man in his actual state as presence, structure and functioning is already endowed with natural instincts to confront and interact with the universe. He has to think and acquire knowledge. The obligatory interaction between man and the universe necessitates comprehension and explanation. This is the basis of acquiring knowledge. The need for an explanation instigates the idea of a cause, but lack of evidence for such a cause leads to the choice between belief and disbelief.

______

1. Assuming that the first Buddha (6thc BC) and Aristotle (4thc

BC), unlike other thinkers, were not exposed to monotheistic

religious awareness, such as Judaism (13thc BC, written 7thc

BC).

2. Henri Delacroix supposes that natural religion opposes

revealed or positive religion, because natural religion cannot

be reference of human nature, heart and reason. He claims that

natural religion treats positive religions as reason and

unreason, confusion of the mind or spirit, predominance of

imagination, the weakness of the critical mind explains

sufficiently the strangeness of religious myths. He considers

natural religion as preceding revealed religion. Henri

Delacroix, Religion et la foi, Librairie Félix Alcan, Paris,

1922, p. 163.

 

 

About the Author

Guys, help me to understand what kind of pressure you want on your man parts?

I hear that woman are too gentle. I can understand that because I always try to be gentle. I don't want to hurt you.

But I hear that when men touch themselves, they are very rough. How do I know how hard I should squeeze? And when going up and down... how do I know what os too much?

It varies from individual to individual! You have to me very gentle on the balls but we like quite firm grip on the penis. It doesn't mean that you have to jerk it vigorously. Firm grip but slow stokes. You can even clench your grip over the penis from time to time.

Lightly scratching the balls also feels awesome.

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