From: J.Hale@latrobe.edu.au
Newsgroups: soc.religion.christian
Subject: Reality and sense (was Re: Problem of pain etc)
Date: 30 Aug 92 05:00:40 GMT
Organization: VAX Cluster, Computer Centre, La Trobe University

In article <Aug.28.02.38.15.1992.500@athos.rutgers.edu>, 
	ricko@ee.uts.edu.au (Rick Jelliffe) writes:
> Someone who actually doesn't believe their senses is strictly mad. (With the
> obvious exception of recognising when sickness of tiredness makes
> you disregard some particular sense data as hallucinatory.)
Interesting definition, but not helpful. Many people are fooled by their
senses. Try out a few optical illusions for yourself. There are similar
"illusions" for our other sensory organs. These "illusions" come about, in part
from our nervous system (and brain) trying to make sense out of the sensory
input [pun not intended]. This making of sense, for the most part is learned.
It is also fairly in flexible. For example the "old woman/young woman" optical
illusion. Here you can see either an old woman in the drawing or a young
woman [which you see first is another matter]. Once both have been pointed
out to you, you can see one or the other but not both [at the same time].
We determine the interpretation of the information. So in a sense [that word
again] it is not really our senses we should be talking about but our
interpretations or perceptions that we make from them. Returning to the pain
example. If you check some of the literature on pain you will find that it
is not simply a response to a sensory input. The state of mind plays an 
enormous and as yet, not fully understood part in how and if it is perceived.
However we are getting a bit off track.
> 
> Something is not unreal just because it is transitory. Certainly as far as
> both having being, the brick and the eternal God share the same order
> of reality.
> 
How? The brick was not before God, and will be dust long before God is. Well
He won't be dust at all will He? He is outside of the laws of the physical 
universe, at least as far as we know them. He is outside of time itself.
How can He possibly share the same reality as the brick?
>>> But because the universe is hard, I don't need to wonder if it's real
>>> or not: all my knowledge is founded on that fact. And because I
>>> know the universe is real, the analogies God has placed in it
>>> to demonstrate himself are also knowable.
>>This is the problem. How do you know? If all the "senses" that tell you of
>>its reality are part and parcel of its reality then the argument becomes a
>>little circular to say the least ;-)
> 
> The problem isn't "how do I know": how can anyone credibly deny they know?
> Any knowledge we have is founded on sense data: whatever we have came in
> from the outside. Even "faith comes by hearing". To deny sense-able reality
> is a ridiculous armchair speculation IMHO: sense-able reality needs no proof.

Comes from outside? Has your faith come by hearing? Did you hear a voice
through your aural organ? Or did you "hear" something inside your mind?
Well, if you heard it via the first way then you would be a good case
for a psychiatrist, you know hearing voices.
If you "heard" it the second way then it didn't come via your sensory system
did it? As to whether it came from outside, well that in itself is a whole
topic for discussion. Has not God placed within you His messanger, the Holy
Spirit? If so then It has come from within. The question then arises, within
what. But that is for another post.

In Christ

James
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James Hale     			Lincoln School of Health Sciences
Computing Unit			La Trobe University,Bundoora, AUSTRALIA
                                
James.Hale@Latrobe.Edu.Au
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"The grace of God rests gently on forgiving eyes,
and everything they look on speaks of Him to the beholder.
He can see no evil, nothing in the world to fear,
and no one who is different from himself."
						Text, P 418
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