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    Carmelics

    A reasoning platform. Break down any belief into clear reasons, explore both sides, and weigh the evidence honestly.

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    LoyalLoyalJusticeJustice
    Made withinDC&Austin
    Statements
    321,452
    Perspectives
    108,905
    Topics
    42
    Home/Original/inverse
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    Inverse View

    It is not the case that The feelings of awe which people feel towards God can be, and often are, applied to the universe itself.

    ?Set your confidence on the premises below to see your aggregate.

    Reasons For

    2 perspectives
    Reason for 1 of 2
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    • 1.Otto explicitly argues that the numinous requires an encounter with a being that is wholly other (totaliter aliter), possessing personal agency and will.
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    • 2.The universe, as a totality of natural processes, lacks the personal agency that Otto identifies as constitutive of the mysterium tremendum et fascinans.
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    • 3.Transferring numinous awe to the universe therefore misapplies Otto's framework by stripping the phenomenological object of its essential intentional structure.
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    Reason for 2 of 2
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    • 1.William James argues in The Varieties of Religious Experience that genuine religious awe involves a felt sense of presence of a distinct, responsive personal reality beyond the self.
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      Think about whether this reason is strong or weak

    • 2.Awe directed at the universe as a whole is more accurately classified as the sublime in Kant's sense—a response to magnitude overwhelming rational comprehension—than as religious awe.
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    • 3.Conflating the Kantian sublime with religious awe collapses a distinction that tracks a real difference in intentional content and existential orientation.
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    Reasons Against

    1 perspective
    Reason against
    ?
    • 1.Rudolf Otto's framework characterises the holy or numinous on the basis of non-rational, non-sensory experience rather than objective features of the object.
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      Think about whether this reason is strong or weak

    • 2.People feel feelings of awe towards God under Otto's framework.
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      Think about whether this reason is strong or weak

    • 3.The same experiential orientation that produces awe towards God can be directed towards the universe as a whole.
      ?

      Think about whether this reason is strong or weak

    Next step

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    Strongest counterpoint
    Explore the most compelling reason on the other side.