Here are notes for the first in a series of projects for those interested in working to integrate truth, beauty, and goodness in their lives.
I begin with an assignment (created initially for Introduction to Philosophy students). Then comes an organized group of questions and quotations from The Urantia Book, followed by some ideas for additional exercises that may be tried alone or in workshops.
Experience scientific living consciously.
First, reflect on the pre-scientific level of experience. Try to notice yourself engaging in the following mental activities.
· On the most basic level of intuitive mind we have quick perception and react to things instinctively. Compare: even the one-celled amoeba has intuition—facing a particle of food, it advances and surrounds the particle, taking it into itself; pricked by a pin, it withdraws.
· The next level of mind function is understanding—the impulse of co-ordination, the spontaneous and apparently automatic association of ideas. This is the gift of the co-ordination of acquired knowledge, the phenomenon of quick reasoning, rapid judgment, and prompt decision.
· Reflect on how you sometimes use a basic mode of scientific thinking—in the spirit of adventure and discovery, you establish facts with care and explore causes.
Second, take up some project of living more scientifically during the time of this project. We are all already living scientifically to some extent. The project engages us in doing in a more conscious and deliberate and excellent way things that we normally do intuitively. Think about facts and causes more explicitly. Think about the hypothesis you are testing by your action. Think about what you learn as a result of your experience.
Here are some sample projects. Regarding nutrition, exercise, or rest, do you have some scientific knowledge that you would like to put into practice? What can you do to live more harmoniously with the natural environment? If you are thinking of starting a family, consider genetic counseling. How could you use what you are learning in the social sciences to help others? Finally, consider trying the methods some education psychologists have recommended for effective study: Before beginning to read a chapter, bring to mind what you already know and what questions you have; survey what you are about to read; then read and take notes; get active after you have read, explaining it to someone else or creating something or putting it to use in some way; prepare for discussion by formulating a question and relating it to your experience; review and fill in your notes immediately after class; review notes before bedtime so you’ll remember them better; review just before class so you have a fresh sense of the material and are ready to go.
The following is a personal synthesis reorganized with the hopes of whetting appetites and promoting discovery.
What will happen to modern religion if we associate with it the truths of science (among other things)?
The great mistake of the Hebrew religion was its failure to associate the goodness of God with the factual truths of science and the appealing beauty of art. As civilization progressed, and since religion continued to pursue the same unwise course of overemphasizing the goodness of God to the relative exclusion of truth and neglect of beauty, there developed an increasing tendency for certain types of men to turn away from the abstract and dissociated concept of isolated goodness. The overstressed and isolated morality of modern religion, which fails to hold the devotion and loyalty of many twentieth-century men, would rehabilitate itself if, in addition to its moral mandates, it would give equal consideration to the truths of science, philosophy, and spiritual experience, and to the beauties of the physical creation, the charm of intellectual art, and the grandeur of genuine character achievement.
Modern thought is increasingly ready to conceive of God as pattern, law, process, energy, and power (3:6, 53.5). Our concept of God as “the personality of the First Source and Center” (7.9) must keep pace with the frontier of theological probing.
What happens if we integrate science and religion in our lives?
“Consider the Greeks, who have a science without religion, while the Jews have a religion without science. And when men become thus misled into accepting a narrow and confused disintegration of truth, their only hope of salvation is to become truth-co-ordinated—converted.
"Let me emphatically state this eternal truth: If you, by truth co-ordination, learn to exemplify in your lives this beautiful wholeness of righteousness, your fellow men will then seek after you that they may gain what you have so acquired. The measure wherewith truth seekers are drawn to you represents the measure of your truth endowment, your righteousness. The extent to which you have to go with your message to the people is, in a way, the measure of your failure to live the whole or righteous life, the truth-co-ordinated life." (155:1; 1726.1-2)?
The present level of scientific action is somewhere between primitive ignorance, fear, and superstition, and the quality of scientific knowledge and action in an advanced civilization. Think of the sciences mentioned in The Urantia Book: mathematics, physics, chemistry, biology, eugenics; astronomy, geology; psychology, sociology, economics, political science, history (others have been differentiated and synthesized for various purposes more recently).
What framework for a personal integration of science and religion emerges in the new philosophy of living?
The religious challenge of this age is to those farseeing and forward-looking men and women of spiritual insight who will dare to construct a new and appealing philosophy of living out of the enlarged and exquisitely integrated modern concepts of cosmic truth, universe beauty, and divine goodness. . . .
All truth—material, philosophic, or spiritual—is both beautiful and good. All real beauty—material art or spiritual symmetry—is both true and good. All genuine goodness—whether personal morality, social equity, or divine ministry—is equally true and beautiful. Health, sanity, and happiness are integrations of truth, beauty, and goodness as they are blended in human experience. Such levels of efficient living come about through the unification of energy systems, idea systems, and spirit systems. (43.3-4)
How, in the soil prepared by the new philosophy of living, will humankind eventually see science integrated in a revelatory presentation of religion, philosophy, and cosmology?
Transition is always accompanied by confusion, and there will be little tranquillity in the religious world until the great struggle between the three contending philosophies of religion is ended:
1. The spiritistic belief (in a providential Deity) of many religions.
2. The humanistic and idealistic belief of many philosophies.
3. The mechanistic and naturalistic conceptions of many sciences.
And these three partial approaches to the reality of the cosmos must eventually become harmonized by the revelatory presentation of religion, philosophy, and cosmology which portrays the triune existence of spirit, mind, and energy proceeding from the Trinity of Paradise and attaining time-space unification within the Deity of the Supreme. (99:5, 1090.5-9; cf. Jesus’ discourse on the need for science to be integrated with philosophy and religion, 133:5, 1476-77).
The attainment of cosmologic levels of thought includes:
1. Curiosity. Hunger for harmony and thirst for beauty. Persistent attempts to discover new levels of harmonious cosmic relationships. (56:10, 646.6-7)
God is the one and only self-caused fact in the universe. He is the secret of the order, plan, and purpose of the whole creation of things and beings. The everywhere-changing universe is regulated and stabilized by absolutely unchanging laws, the habits of an unchanging God. The fact of God, the divine law, is changeless; the truth of God, his relation to the universe, is a relative revelation which is ever adaptable to the constantly evolving universe. (1126.2)
God acts in accordance with a well-defined, unchanging, immutable law throughout the wide-spreading master universe; but he modifies the patterns of his action so as to contribute to the co-ordinate and balanced conduct of each universe, constellation, system, planet, and personality in accordance with the local objects, aims, and plans of the finite projects of evolutionary unfolding. (56.5)
Whatever the transformations of force in the outlying universes, having gone out from Paradise, it journeys on subject to the never-ending, ever-present, unfailing pull of the eternal Isle, obediently and inherently swinging on forever around the eternal space paths of the universes. Physical energy is the one reality which is true and steadfast in its obedience to universal law. Only in the realms of creature volition has there been deviation from the divine paths and the original plans. Power and energy are the universal evidences of the stability, constancy, and eternity of the central Isle of Paradise. (139.6)
The cosmic-mind-endowed, Adjuster-indwelt, personal creature possesses innate recognition-realization of energy reality, mind reality, and spirit reality. The will creature is thus equipped to discern the fact, the law, and the love of God. Aside from these three inalienables of human consciousness, all human experience is really subjective except that intuitive realization of validity attaches to the unification of these three universe reality responses of cosmic recognition. (195.7)
There are just three elements in universal reality: fact, idea, and relation. The religious consciousness identifies these realities as science, philosophy, and truth. Philosophy would be inclined to view these activities as reason, wisdom, and faith—physical reality, intellectual reality, and spiritual reality. We are in the habit of designating these realities as thing, meaning, and value. (2094.1)
Causation—the reality domain of the physical senses, the scientific realms of logical uniformity, the differentiation of the factual and the nonfactual, reflective conclusions based on cosmic response. This is the mathematical form of the cosmic discrimination. (192)
KEY CONCEPT: FACT
Science is the source of facts, and mind cannot operate without facts. They are the building blocks in the construction of wisdom which are cemented together by life experience.” (1222.5)
How much does it really matter if we skim over facts in order to focus on the things of greater import?
What both developing science and religion need is more searching and fearless self-criticism, a greater awareness of incompleteness in evolutionary status. The teachers of both science and religion are often altogether too self-confident and dogmatic. Science and religion can only be self-critical of their facts. The moment departure is made from the stage of facts, reason abdicates or else rapidly degenerates into a consort of false logic. (103:7; 1138.5)
Can we even have a well-balanced concept of God without facts?
Science is the source of facts, and mind cannot operate without facts. They are the building blocks in the construction of wisdom which are cemented together by life experience. Man can find the love of God without facts, and man can discover the laws of God without love, but man can never begin to appreciate the infinite symmetry, the supernal harmony, the exquisite repleteness of the all-inclusive nature of the First Source and Center until he has found divine law and divine love and has experientially unified these in his own evolving cosmic philosophy. (111:6; 1222.5)
What does Jesus say to us when we refuse to face facts? When do the facts of sin become evident, and what was Judas Iscariot’s attitude toward facts?
My son, stop trying to deceive yourself; settle down to the courageous practice of facing the facts of life . . . . (133:4; 1475.4)
Sin was bewitching and adventurous in the committing, but now must the harvest of the naked and unromantic facts be faced. (186.1; 1998.4)
He did not like to face facts frankly; he was dishonest in his attitude toward life situations. (193:4; 2056.7)
How did Jesus develop his factual knowledge from his childhood forward (127:6; 1405.6)?
As a child he accumulated a vast body of knowledge; as a youth he sorted, classified, and correlated this information; and now as a man of the realm he begins to organize these mental possessions preparatory to utilization in his subsequent teaching, ministry, and service . . . . (127:6, 1405.6)
In what service project(s) are you engaged? Is there any way you more perfectly organize your background knowledge in order to enhance your service?
What facts did Jesus bring to mind while planning the conduct of his mission on earth?
The first thing Jesus did, after thinking through the general plan of co-ordinating his program with John's movement, was to review in his mind the instructions of Immanuel. . . . Rather was this a season for thinking over the whole eventful and varied career of the Urantia bestowal and for the careful laying of those plans for further ministry which would best serve this world while also contributing something to the betterment of all other rebellion-isolated spheres. Jesus thought over the whole span of human life on Urantia, from the days of Andon and Fonta, down through Adam's default, and on to the ministry of the Melchizedek of Salem. (16:4; 1514.3,6)?
What facts about previous epochal revelations imply lessons for today?
KEY CONCEPT: CAUSE
Man naturally tends to believe that which he deems best for him, that which is in his immediate or remote interest; self-interest largely obscures logic. The difference between the minds of savage and civilized men is more one of content than of nature, of degree rather than of quality.
But to continue to ascribe things difficult of comprehension to supernatural causes is nothing less than a lazy and convenient way of avoiding all forms of intellectual hard work. Luck is merely a term coined to cover the inexplicable in any age of human existence; it designates those phenomena which men are unable or unwilling to penetrate. Chance is a word which signifies that man is too ignorant or too indolent to determine causes. Men regard a natural occurrence as an accident or as bad luck only when they are destitute of curiosity and imagination, when the races lack initiative and adventure. Exploration of the phenomena of life sooner or later destroys man's belief in chance, luck, and so-called accidents, substituting therefor a universe of law and order wherein all effects are preceded by definite causes. Thus is the fear of existence replaced by the joy of living. (86:2; 951.L-52.0)
KEY CONCEPT: EVOLUTION
(including personal growth, planetary progress, and cosmic perspectives)
There is a great and glorious purpose in the march of the universes through space. All of your mortal struggling is not in vain. We are all part of an immense plan, a gigantic enterprise, and it is the vastness of the undertaking that renders it impossible to see very much of it at any one time and during any one life. We are all a part of an eternal project which the Gods are supervising and outworking. The whole marvelous and universal mechanism moves on majestically through space to the music of the meter of the infinite thought and the eternal purpose of the First Great Source and Center. (32:5, 362.3)
There is original endowment of adaptation in living things and beings. In every living plant or animal cell, in every living organism—material or spiritual—there is an insatiable craving for the attainment of ever-increasing perfection of environmental adjustment, organismal adaptation, and augmented life realization. These interminable efforts of all living things evidence the existence within them of an innate striving for perfection. (65:6, 737.2)
The story of man's ascent from seaweed to the lordship of earthly creation is indeed a romance of biologic struggle and mind survival. (65:2, 731.5)
The time unit of maturity is proportioned so to reveal the co-ordinate relationship of past-present-future that the self begins to gain insight into the wholeness of events, begins to view the landscape of time from the panoramic perspective of broadened horizons, begins perhaps to suspect the nonbeginning, nonending eternal continuum, the fragments of which are called time. (118:1, 1295.8)
The experience of every evolving creature personality is a phase of the experience of the Almighty Supreme. The intelligent subjugation of every physical segment of the superuniverses is a part of the growing control of the Almighty Supreme. The creative synthesis of power and personality is a part of the creative urge of the Supreme Mind and is the very essence of the evolutionary growth of unity in the Supreme Being. (1268.6)
In the evolutionary superuniverses energy-matter is dominant except in personality, where spirit through the mediation of mind is struggling for the mastery. The goal of the evolutionary universes is the subjugation of energy-matter by mind, the co-ordination of mind with spirit, and all of this by virtue of the creative and unifying presence of personality. Thus, in relation to personality, do physical systems become subordinate; mind systems, co-ordinate; and spirit systems, directive. (1275.1)
Integrating our realization of scientific truth in the broader whole
“Every impulse of every electron, thought, or spirit is an acting unit in the whole universe” (56:10, 647.5).
While in practical application the laws of nature operate in what seems to be the dual realms of the physical and the spiritual, in reality they are one. The First Source and Center is the primal cause of all materialization and at the same time the first and final Father of all spirits. The Paradise Father appears personally in the extra-Havona universes only as pure energy and pure spirit—as the Thought Adjusters and other similar fragmentations. (42:11, 481.5)
How do scientific truths relate to truth?
The truth—an understanding of cosmic relationships, universe facts, and spiritual values—can best be had through the ministry of the Spirit of Truth and can best be criticized by revelation. But revelation originates neither a science nor a religion; its function is to co-ordinate both science and religion with the truth of reality. (103:7, 1138.6)
Truth in the highest sense can only be grasped in living spiritual experience; but we are also taught to integrate truth on scientific, philosophic, and spiritual levels (132:3, 1459-60; 180:5; 1949-50; 103:6-8, 1135-1138).
The successful traversal of [the psychic circles] demands the harmonious functioning of the entire personality, not merely of some one phase thereof. The growth of the parts does not equal the true maturation of the whole; the parts really grow in proportion to the expansion of the entire self—the whole self—material, intellectual, and spiritual.
It is to the mind of perfect poise, housed in a body of clean habits, stabilized neural energies, and balanced chemical function—when the physical, mental, and spiritual powers are in triune harmony of development—that a maximum of light and truth can be imparted . . . . By such a balanced growth does man ascend the circles of planetary progression one by one, from the seventh to the first.” 1209.3-4
Science, knowledge, leads to fact consciousness; religion, experience, leads to value consciousness; philosophy, wisdom, leads to co-ordinate consciousness; revelation (the substitute for morontia mota) leads to the consciousness of true reality; while the co-ordination of the consciousness of fact, value, and true reality constitutes awareness of personality reality, maximum of being, together with the belief in the possibility of the survival of that very personality.
Knowledge leads to placing men, to originating social strata and castes. Religion leads to serving men, thus creating ethics and altruism. Wisdom leads to the higher and better fellowship of both ideas and one's fellows. Revelation liberates men and starts them out on the eternal adventure.
Science sorts men; religion loves men, even as yourself; wisdom does justice to differing men; but revelation glorifies man and discloses his capacity for partnership with God.
Science vainly strives to create the brotherhood of culture; religion brings into being the brotherhood of the spirit. Philosophy strives for the brotherhood of wisdom; revelation portrays the eternal brotherhood, the Paradise Corps of the Finality.
Knowledge yields pride in the fact of personality; wisdom is the consciousness of the meaning of personality; religion is the experience of cognizance of the value of personality; revelation is the assurance of personality survival.
Science seeks to identify, analyze, and classify the segmented parts of the limitless cosmos. Religion grasps the idea-of-the-whole, the entire cosmos. Philosophy attempts the identification of the material segments of science with the spiritual-insight concept of the whole. Wherein philosophy fails in this attempt, revelation succeeds, affirming that the cosmic circle is universal, eternal, absolute, and infinite. This cosmos of the Infinite I AM is therefore endless, limitless, and all-inclusive--timeless, spaceless, and unqualified. And we bear testimony that the Infinite I AM is also the Father of Michael of Nebadon and the God of human salvation.
Science indicates Deity as a fact; philosophy presents the idea of an Absolute; religion envisions God as a loving spiritual personality. Revelation affirms the unity of the fact of Deity, the idea of the Absolute, and the spiritual personality of God and, further, presents this concept as our Father--the universal fact of existence, the eternal idea of mind, and the infinite spirit of life.
The pursuit of knowledge constitutes science; the search for wisdom is philosophy; the love for God is religion; the hunger for truth is a revelation. But it is the indwelling Thought Adjuster that attaches the feeling of reality to man's spiritual insight into the cosmos.
In science, the idea precedes the expression of its realization; in religion, the experience of realization precedes the expression of the idea. There is a vast difference between the evolutionary will-to-believe and the product of enlightened reason, religious insight, and revelation--the will that believes.
In evolution, religion often leads to man's creating his concepts of God; revelation exhibits the phenomenon of God's evolving man himself, while in the earth life of Christ Michael we behold the phenomenon of God's revealing himself to man. Evolution tends to make God manlike; revelation tends to make man Godlike.
Science is only satisfied with first causes, religion with supreme personality, and philosophy with unity. Revelation affirms that these three are one, and that all are good. The eternal real is the good of the universe and not the time illusions of space evil. In the spiritual experience of all personalities, always is it true that the real is the good and the good is the real. (102:3, 1122)
1. Select some problem that you would like to work on. In this workshop, you will be doing some writing and working toward some discoveries. Although we will invite sharing and discussion, no one should feel pressured to share any of this with others. Self-revelation is voluntary. The important thing is to explore truth in a way that is helpful for you.
The first step is to face the facts honestly. Take a minute or two to write down a factual account of the problem you would like to work on this afternoon.
[At the end of this exercise there is an example with brief sample answers for the various steps of the exercise.]
2. Then work toward a scientific understanding of the facts. Read and consider the following thought. We will not discuss this quote at this time.
“Science is the source of facts, and mind cannot operate without facts. They are the building blocks in the construction of wisdom which are cemented together by life experience.” (1222.5)
To look at facts scientifically does not require a Ph.D. in physics. Rather, it requires reflection that brings together whatever we can recall from what we have learned in the past about sciences that are relevant to our problem. Just drawing on what The Urantia Book says about these scientific areas is already a good start.
3. To gain a scientific understanding of the facts, begin by writing down a list of the sciences that seem to be most relevant: biology, psychology, sociology, history, and so on. Take a minute to do this.
4. Next, consider what each relevant science just listed might add to our understanding of the causes contributing to the problem in question. Take a few minutes to get this analysis of causes started. You may well find yourself sketching the main lines of the analysis in phrases rather than writing it out in full.
There is a further aspect of your causation analysis that we will not take time to do here: later, when you are considering action alternatives, estimate the consequences of each alternative course of action.
5. Take a minute or two to reflect on the causal understanding you have begun to put together. There is no writing to be done at the moment. After we have completed the exercise, we can come back to discuss the following quote.
“Exploration of the phenomena of life sooner or later destroys man's belief in chance, luck, and so-called accidents, substituting therefor a universe of law and order wherein all effects are preceded by definite causes. Thus is the fear of existence replaced by the joy of living. (951-52)
(After we have finished the entire exercise and are ready to discuss it as a whole, one question to discuss is this: Does your consideration of causes actually enhance your joy? Explain.)
6. Then bring to mind the magnificent picture of evolution in order to gain perspective on the problem at hand. Think in terms of origin, history, and destiny. Take a few minutes to write down your enhanced grasp of the emerging meanings and evolving values of your situation. Here are a few questions to help you get started.
Are there dimensions of the problem that originate in the acts or decisions of the Creator?
What can we estimate about the animal origin and planetary history of some of the factors in the problem at hand?
What is the divine destiny for the individuals involved and for the larger context of planetary progress?
7. Now discuss your findings with others—if you feel comfortable doing so.
[Facilitator: you may return to any of the questions or quotes in this exercise to help get the discussion going.]
[Here’s a sketchy example of what might be jotted down for the exercise.
How can we integrate our cosmic mind capacities of causation, duty, and worship (16:6; 192)? The full passage suggests an interesting exercise: explore how to (1) integrate our mind’s intuition of causation with our intuitions of duty and worship, (2) integrate our intuition of duty with our intuitions of causation and worship, and (3) our intuition of worship with our intuitions of causation and duty.
Cluster 1. [General discussion, 15 minutes.] How is science shaping our thinking about things today? What different images of reality do we get from science, or from different sciences or branches of science or interpretations of science? What questions about science do people need help with today? Outside The Urantia Book what sources of scientific information do you find helpful? To whom should this philosophy of living appeal?
Cluster 2. [Personal writing, 10 minutes, then group sharing 20 minutes.] Do you draw consciously on science in your daily life? Examples? Are there particular or general truths of science that make a difference in your life? Realistically, what do you get that blesses your way of living from cosmology, physics, chemistry, biology, psychology, sociology, history, and other sciences?
Cluster 3. [Study group for remaining time. No pressure to complete anything.] How does the picture of science given in The Urantia Book help you in your own philosophy of living? What are your favorite quotes about science? How can you explain and supplement the ideas in the following passages to articulate this new and appealing philosophy? 1222.5 (science as the source of facts); 951-52 (the joy of understanding causation); 1209.3-4 (the physical aspects of balanced growth); and 2082.9-83.0 (the social, moral, economic, and political reorganization of the world). Why is science often mentioned first in the series “science, philosophy, religion”? 1222.5; 1138.5; 1405.6. What is the place of science among the levels of truth? 1122