Monday, April 30, 2018

Pew Research Center — When Americans Say They Believe in God, What Do They Mean?


Nine-in-ten Americans believe in a higher power, but only a slim majority believe in God as described in the Bible.


How does this affect economics?

Assuming homo economicus, not much. Assuming homo socialis, a lot.

Pew Research Center

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

What would be really interesting is if they had asked that 33% did they think that their belief was based on a bunch of concepts they had picked up from somewhere (mind); or based on a feeling that they carried within them? To which they attach a veil of concepts, according to the ‘explanation’ of the day. Even the commercial world recognises there is a feeling within people and they try to hijack it: - ‘toyota, oh what a feeling.’ Yeah, right. Hollywood has been manipulating it for years using sexual and emotional levers. The religions use it to anchor people to their belief system. Governments use it to stir people into patriotism. Businesses use it to promise satisfaction (which never arrives). It is the source of all faith, hope and charity in a human being. But, people use it to manipulate one another. We use it, hoping our endeavours will bring us fulfilment, faithfully following the formulas of the world. When people are about to die, they place their trust back in it (while the mind freaks). We fall in love with everything that cannot requite true love, and ignore the one thing that can. We fall in love with war, when we should be falling in love with Peace. That is the level of our ‘intelligence’ – our (entelechy) knowing.

The 33% are just the ones paying a tiny bit of attention.

One day I (et al) hope more and more people will understand: - consciousness is awareness and the human heart is a door to a universe far more beautiful and fresh than the one on the outside. Through that door you will find your humanity and you. See yourself as you truly are and know what a gift is given to a human being. I will go out on a limb here and make a very strong statement, in that this feeling alone, taking the mind in its grasp, has the potential to change the outer world - which always runs in ruts. Around and around the wheel turns. Revenge follows revenge. A juggernaut, screaming down the tracks lain down by its own unconsciousness. Each Empire lies in ruin. You can spiral down into materialism or up into freedom. Embrace your humanity or embrace your animality. This has always been the promise of self-knowledge, down throughout the millennia, backed up only by experience. Within us is our human sovereignty, and there has never been a nation, never been a Cause on this earth, greater than that. Your beloved Empires come and go and all that remains is dust, and song of the Silence. Even in modern times – ‘Know your self’ ...

GLH said...

Try reading "From Yahweh to Zion."

Anonymous said...

The ‘wandering Jew’ is in many ways a symbol of humanity. Their story is one thread woven into the fabric of the story of humanity on this planet. I am sure even the cave man looked up at the stars wheeling overhead, and wondered who he was and why he was here. He is still wondering – although highly distracted by his digital devices and financial problems.

Billions and billions of human beings have come and gone. They laughed and cried, fought and struggled, suffered and enjoyed; murdered each other and performed incredible acts of heroism. They looked up into the same stars and felt there must be some incredible Power that brought it all into being: - then they began to label that power and give it characteristics in their own image. They recognised there was ‘bad’ in humanity, but there was also ‘good’. We are given the power to choose.

In their minds they dreamed and built cities and nations, telling their stories first around the campfires, then over the www. These stories were populated with villains and heroes, dark and light, passed on to the generations – nowadays they are mostly lies. All of this was created in their ‘mind’ – then through the creative power of desire directed downwards, made material. The battles evolved with the technology; the hatred and love grew more intense; the ideologies thicker. They never thought to question if that mind was a reflection of reality. Conditioned by the world they were born into they played their part; dying out of it to never be seen again. Absolutely unique – but never ever to be seen again. If there was a soul in them that did come back, it would not be in the same form; nor (perhaps) conscious of its reappearance. They all sought meaning in their lives – in the formulas of the world that had failed everyone that had come before.

Ask Tom’s teacher. He too thought it was all grand illusion ..... what the human is looking for, is already within.

I've always liked Helena Blavatsky as an historian, although of course there is no way I can corroborate a thing she says. I just like the story ....