The Lord of the Rings Challenge

Day 1 complete! No urges today, but in another day or two I reckon the chaser will kick in.

@Slider8 Thank you for the movie quote! That was surprisingly powerful.

I'm curious to know where the line at the beginning of your post comes from. Since it's in quotations I assume it's a quote from another source.

The part which I bolded confuses me. Are you saying that God is something we made up in our attempt to explain everything through logic? Would that mean that God is logical, or simply that our logic is flawed? Incidentally, we (I use the term "we" loosely) do believe God to be logical. After all, He created it along with every other kind of reason and intuition. He gave us a logical universe in which to live.

To say that God made man in His own image and likeness doesn't mean that we're equal to God. Of course one human can't oversee billions of humans and trillions of cells and gazillions of atoms. However, God created us as beings who imitate some of His characteristics: the aforementioned reason and logic, but also things like love and agency.

The fact that we're all here at NoFap is enough proof we can't handle our own brains sometimes, haha. But don't you think that's weird? If we evolved intelligence and judgment as tools to help us survive, how would traits that make us go against our better judgment and shut out our own intellects have survived in our populations for at least the length of recorded history? It would seem to point to a deeper flaw, a deeper cause.

Sorry, that was a lot. But as a committed religious believer as well as a biology student, I couldn't help myself.

 

Day 9 Check In!

 

day 2

 

Thank you. Even though it’s only day 4 for me, I can see my streaks are getting longer so I must be getting stronger. Nice to know I’m not alone (best thing about joining this site)

 

Good luck buddy, you can do this!

 

It’s okay, you haven’t failed until to stop trying. And YOU ARE HERE. Stay strong Bob!

 

A debate!

I think this meme explains well:

Edit: I don´t know why it appears so little, but in the end it´s better.

First, logic doesn´t evolve trough time, its rules don´t vary. The same logic applies to a 3000 years old man as for an actual man. Inductions, deductions, syllogisms, analogies ...
Anyone who has studied Logic knows this.

Second, precisely the arguments in favor of the existence of God use logic. It is enough to see the 5 ways of Saint Thomas Aquinas, the ontological argument of Saint Anselm, the immobile engine of Aristotle or the Supreme Good of Plato.

First, what science? Biological science? Political science? Linguistical science? Physical science? Legal science? There is no "Science", but many sciences for every aspect of reality.

Second, the greatest sages in history have been believers and have demonstrated and defended the existence of God - that even if no one said it would continue to exist. Socrates, Plato, Aristotle, Cicero, Seneca, Boethius, s. Augustine, Alcuinus of York, Avicenna, Sylvester II, Maimonides, Averroes, all the scholastics, where stand out s. Buenaventura, s. Albert the Great, s. Tomás de Aquino and Duns Escoto; Descartes, Jerome of Ayanz y Beaumont, Galileo, Copernicus, Pascal, Newton, Mendel, Gilson, Lemaitre, Ramón y Cajal, Einstein, Lejeune... And a lot more.
All of them found the creative and caring hand of God in reality.

We can know all of reality much better from belief because we do not eliminate any aspect of it. Without God, without the transcendent, without metaphysics, our knowledge could not overcome the material and hardly know something, because precisely knowledge is immaterial.

"I want to do good, but I end up doing evil." It is a terrible moral experience that we all experience. Evil is a fact that cannot be denied. And there are two types: physical evil and moral evil. The first is when man is physically harmed, such as a volcano, a flood, or a disease. The second when man is harmed from freedom.
Moral evil only exists within each one and makes us responsible for our actions. Original sin is the cause of the existence of evil in all men, a first evil so great that it has damaged human nature (which is good), but has not destroyed it.

@Gallade_Templar has already answered you this part well. God is very different from us. And it is almighty, omnipresent, omniscient, perfect, simple, one, High Good, High Beauty, High Truth ... That is why it is God.
The fact that he has made us in his image and likeness means that we are rational, we can know the good and love it. God is the greatest Good, and the good, the better it is, the more it communicates. That is why He shows himself to man and offers him to participate in the greatest Happiness that exists. Man is a "frontier animal", he is between the material and the spiritual (s. Thomas), "between the angel and the beast" (Pascal).

If we can't handle our brains, why do we have to use them to get a better life?
Yes, we can handle our mind, but we know that we will fail many times even if we don't want to. Thanks to our reason we can know the good and also the Highest Good -which is God, and Great Beauty and Great Truth. But it is not enough to know it, you have to do it. As in NoFap, try continuously and get up after each fall.
As man cannot by his own strength, he needs the Grace of God. "Grace does not replace nature, but perfects it."

 

Daily checking.

Holy Virgin Mary, intercede for us.

 

You have to learn to be with yourself, to entertain yourself in a positive ways especially on holyday. Don't run from yourself into work or some pointless activities that take you somewhere just to waste your precious time. Have guts to face yourself as you are ,learn and study about yourself only then there will be a chance of gaining self-control for you can't control something you are not aware of and even afraid to start.

 

Better humility than pride.

 

day 43

 

Jiddu Krishnamurti, from a series of talks he had with Dr. Allen W. Anderson. Although, I am pretty certain that he has said that in other places and in other talks.

Logic is brought about by the human mind through evolution. Logic isn't everything. It is an attempt to understand the complexities of nature. Also, yes, our logic is flawed when it comes to the the big man upstairs, and many other things. Someone made up the idea that he was there and later on down the road someone else, probably not fully understanding what the previous guy was saying, comes along and tries to make sense of it then he says he must look like me, act like me, talk like me, etc. But, there is no man upstairs. It is just a logically flawed failed attempt to make sense of existence. I mean, it's nice to see that humans are capable of large feats of imagination, but people have just been repeating things over and over.

Well if "in his image and likeness" doesn't mean equal they should really change up those words a bit. I mean, myself and probably many others would say that, "in his image and likeness" means "the same thing".

Love is a part of us because that is what keeps the generations going, it need not be injected by a mysterious being. And why would someone do that? "You only get some of my characteristics...just because." That sounds like a human to me. Hence, "man has made God in man's image."

Yes, you are getting somewhere here. The thing that makes this evolved intelligence useless is the prison of religion and "education". Societal and religious influences have totally dismantled the capabilities of man. Instead of stopping and being attentive to the life before us we are stuffed with recycled information from a very young age that changes every time someone repeats it. Tell me how many stories you have read (they need not be religious) multiple times, only to discover that details were changed in some form or another. It happens all the time.

 

There are a couple ways, at least from my standpoint, that we can look at this. The first is that logic evolves as the human brain evolves. That is our understanding of nature gets better. Logic was nowhere to found before this. It was simply, action and response, or instinct. Even though our understanding increases, it will never know all.

The second way, and if you would allow me to change "evolve" to "morphs" (or some other similar word), is among people. A simple example: your logic says that God has made man. My logic says that man has made God. Logic is subject to the person using it. It is not absolute. It changes with people. There is only truth, but logic will not get you there. An infinite sense of attention will.

Yes, this literally says that man has created God through logic. I am glad you stated this.

Your last sentence here is precisely what I am talking about. I am not referring to a particular science. I am referring to the nature of science. Does science not evolve? Science is based on observation and logic. Does that not imply logic evolves as well? Once some individual discovers a new truth our understanding changes. For instance: consider a time before Newton, "you throw something up and it comes down"; after Newton, "you throw something up and because of gravity it comes back down". Try saying that latter statement in times before Newton, people would look at you like you've gone nuts.

Yes, they are all human, but just because they believe doesn't mean that everyone should. At least, I think that is what you are implying. They were attempting to make sense of the existence with their brains which is what the brain does, how it is evolved. You look at all their accomplishments and you will see that each step they were dwarfed by the next great discovery. And each one had their own motivations as to why they believed in God. Again, they are all human as well. I can appreciate their scientific discoveries, which I do, but there will always be a new discovery so long as man keeps proving into the existence for existence is infinite.

"Knowledge is immaterial." That means reading books from other people from the past is immaterial. Therefore anything written down, and passed on to the next generation is immaterial. So, anything you have read about God, or what others have said about him is immaterial. You will have to dismantle all of this and shed this immaterial in order to perceive what is here. Everything you have read about God doesn't mean anything based on what you said here. Of course that is the logical understanding that I have, which may be different than yours

Again, there is only action and consequences of those actions. They need not be labeled. Some of them make us feel sadness, anger, depression, and others make us feel happy, joyful, and loving. These are the nature of mammals. So there need not be "evil". Some natural disaster happens, that is simply a play of atmospheric forces. Some things happen as a consequence. That is simply it. Ockham's razor is very useful! When it comes to humans committing something I know it is much harder to swallow, but it isnt evil either. They are just a response to how they were raised, for they were not taught to use their mental capabilities as they were growing up, that is the imposition of education. What you call as "moral evil", when dealing with humans, is continued into "physical evil". They are one thing, one motion.

We have to learn how to handle our brains. It is not impossible, it is just that probable anymore. Education in all its forms make it very hard. There are things I can mention but I don't want to be callous. That is not my intention here.

Your grace is developed from within, it is a part of you. You just have to create a little distance between your thoughts and your body.

I do believe in something bigger, but it need not mean that that bigger thing be a human personification.

 

Checking in. Going on sick day number two, but so far handling it just fine. It’s hard to give my body permission to just relax and recover, but I‘m making the best of it

 

day 10
Today was the best! Couse, I set up with my work colleagues to meet today in the office and work together. That was really great! I feel high because of all endorphins. Interacting with people is what I really need and it makes me happy. I think it is the key to get out of addiction, I am recommending it!