Rational Religion


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The Power of Ten

 

The Decalogue of Rational Religion are not commandments.  There are no "Thou Shalt Not's."   There aren't even many "Thou Shalts"; just the first three, and the First is more of an affirmation than an admonition.

 

At any rate, here they are:

 

 

Decalogue:  

 

1.   Have faith.

               What in, is up to you.  But the closer it is to testable reality, the less trouble you are likely to have reconciling it down the line. 

              

2.  Mind your own business.

               This may be the hardest one.  Not only does it require human beings to do something they may not be genetically predisposed to do... it requires some judgment calls.  It doesn't always apply, and deciding when can be a bitch, especially when the decision must be made in real time.

              

3.  Question everything that matters.

Questions are work; if it doesn’t matter, why bother?  If it does matter, why are you avoiding it?

              

4 .  Philosophy without science is the blind leading the blind. (With apologies to Einstein.)

              

5.  Science without philosophy is a madman without a keeper(Ditto)

              

6.  The Golden Rule makes sense.

              

7.  Truth and beauty are essential to humanity.

And both are matters of individual opinion.       

 

8.  There is no proof that anything has purpose.

There is likewise no proof that everything doesn’t.

              

9.   In the final analysis, everything is physics, *.

               Physics is the mechanism of the universe. Everything, from the heat of the Sun to the electrochemical activity of your individual nervous system, is the interaction of subatomic particles.

              

10.  In the final analysis, everything is metaphysics. *

               The line between physics and metaphysics is blurred.  We must understand both with the same finite central nervous system.  So everything we individually "know" is metaphysical.

              

(*)  (Depending upon which universe we are dealing with; the one outside of or within your skin.)