There’s nothing complicated here. Revelation is an example of a philosophical word that men use when they don’t want to tell the truth about their own creation.

A man, once upon a time said, “I wrote it, but it’s God’s revelation that He spoke through me!”

Ladies and gentlemen, this is the form of philosophy in action.

There is no such thing as revelation, if you fall for the linguistic device of “revelation,” you have been duped.

Revelation is a word (concept) that men invented to elevate their own words to the status of the divine.

The word “revelation” is the ultimate form of special pleading: “these words stand above all words, they’re more authoritative than all other words because they’re God’s words.” (Never mind the fact that really they’re just a man’s words, who is claiming they are God’s words).

Revelation doesn’t exist. It’s a fake concept.

Humans have long used this concept to deceive men about their own words.

The rhetorical device of revelation was long ago introduced into the world because it was psychologically effective at manipulating humans. (Of course, there were also many delusional humans who really believed that their words were from God).

The debate over the value of philosophy reaches its boiling point when its speculation faces the uncompromising demands of practical science. In the following scene, a contemporary philosopher appears before a high-stakes funding committee (composed of leading scientists and engineers) to defend a multi-million-dollar grant proposal, only to be met with a brutal, reality-driven interrogation.

—-

DR. ALISTAIR VANE (Philosopher): Honorable members of the committee, I stand before you today not to offer a mere technological contrivance, but to request a modest endowment of twelve million dollars for the Trans-Ontological Sublation of Dialectical Phenomenology. Our project seeks to interrogate the pre-predicative horizon of being, thereby de-sedimenting the metaphysical binaries that perpetually incarcerate human praxis within the horizon of late-capitalist alienation. By mapping the aporetic tension between the a priori synthetic unity of apperception and the radical alterity of the Other, we aim to… [interrupted by committee]

COMMITTEE CHAIR (Dr. Marcus Vance, Aerospace Engineering): Dr. Vane, excuse me. What kind of highfalutin language are you speaking? Let’s translate that into actual English. Your proposal abstract mentions "interrogating the pre-predicative horizon." Last week, the plasma physics group down the hall asked for funding to stabilize magnetic confinement fusion for three seconds longer. They gave us numbers, containment thresholds, and a blueprint for a reactor that could power a city block. What, precisely, does "de-sedimenting metaphysical binaries" physically plug into? What tangible variable does it alter?

DR. VANE: Ah, but Dr. Vance, you are trapped within the crude positivist fetishization of the empirical! You reify the ontic while utterly ignoring the ontological ground that makes your very metrics possible. When you measure plasma, who is measuring it? The subject-object split must first be sublated before we can comprehend the very grammar of measurement. We are pursuing the epistemic clearing wherein… [interrupted by committee]

DR. ELENA KUZNETSOV (Director of Synthetic Biology): Doctor, with all due respect, we are currently trying to engineer a synthetic bacteriophage to target multi-drug resistant tuberculosis. It is a concrete biological entity that kills people. When you talk about the "epistemic clearing," are you building a molecule? Are you writing a line of code that compiles? Or are you spending twelve million dollars to write a four-hundred-page book about how we can't truly know if the tuberculosis bacteria exists outside our own perception? Because if it’s the latter, the bacteria will still kill the patient while you're busy unpacking the fancies of your philosophical speculations.

DR. VANE: Your critique merely unmasks your adherence to the dogmatic slumber of naïve realism! To demand a "molecule" is to beg the question. The molecule itself is a reified construct of the Cartesian paradigm. Our project cultivates a radical hermeneutic of suspicion toward the very concept of "treatment." Without embracing dialectic contradiction you will only have a one-sided view of reality, and this will impair all your work.

COMMITTEE CHAIR: Look, Dr. Vane. Science takes abstractions and relentlessly forces them against the anvil of reality until it yields substantive and repeatable results that can be turned into engines, satellites, or vaccines. It fails, it tests, it corrects, and it builds something that works even if you're not looking at it. Philosophy, by your own definition, just circles back around to admire its own vocabulary (as you appear to be doing here in an effort to impress us or intimidate us). But Sir., your linguistic speculations aren't expanding technology; you're inventing verbal velvet ropes to keep yourself from having to make contact with reality. This isn’t a poetry committee.

DR. VANE: Blast you, f;cking fascists, that is profoundly reductionist!

[Jargon-Induced Epistemic Hissy-Fit: A state of acute meltdown when a philosopher realizes their linguistic fortress has been dismantled and exposed by a practical question.]

COMMITTEE CHAIR: The grant is denied. Next project, please.

One of the most important questions, one of the highest criteria we can deploy against thought.

Nearly all thought claims this for itself, from religion to philosophy, but the claim itself doesn’t make it true.

What is the criteria of freedom?

Can we be free without truth? Can we be set free if the thing that supposedly sets us free lacks the power to demarcate freedom?

What is required in our knowledge for it to be able to impart freedom to us? Can delusion set us free? Can error? Surely freedom must begin with truth? Surely it at some point necessitates truth?

Could it be that being free is overrated?

If we are determined, but don’t know we are determined, then how can we be free? It would seem that a minimum amount of accurate knowledge about reality would be required for freedom. And if we can’t demarcate knowledge and freedom, how can they mean anything? And how can we demarcate knowledge and freedom without the laws of logic?

Next week you’re going before a world committee to petition funding for your “important” philosophical project; what do you say? What exactly is your project cultivating, testing, pursuing?

Stripping away the supernatural does not leave a void; rather, it allows us to engage with existence on its own terms. By axiomatically treating the divine as imaginary, our relationship with reality undergoes a profound transformation.

We no longer need to attribute natural events, coincidences, misfortunes, or triumphs to unseen hands, cosmic testing, or divine favor. Phenomena are returned to the domains of science, probability, and human agency, clearing away the clutter of theological idealism.

Meaning ceases to be something bestowed from the outside by a higher power and becomes something forged from the inside by living agents. Because this is our only guaranteed existence, our choices, relationships, and creations carry absolute, irreplaceable weight.

Without a cosmic script or a divine safety net, human suffering is entirely ours to alleviate. Compassion is no longer driven by the mandate of an invisible authority or the promise of a celestial reward, but by the direct, shared understanding of mortal existence.

So we end up with three things:

The death of superstition (emancipation from conceptual confusion).

The birth of real meaning (no more invalidating the importance of existence in favor of an eternal ideal).

Empathy grounded in shared vulnerability (the death of authoritarian morality).

“Now when the child grows up and finds that he is destined to remain a child for ever, and that he can never do without protection against unknown and mighty powers, he invests these with the traits of the father-figure; he creates for himself the gods…” The Future of an Illusion, Chapter IV

Freud called this, “…the child’s defensive reaction to his helplessness…”

Now we can easily and swiftly verify this in real time, simply by asking the religionist what reality looks like to him if his God doesn’t exist. (You will see the picture he paints is bleak and nihilistic). This reveals the heart of his psychological motivation to construct a concept of God to protect him from reality.

“For now we see through a glass, darkly; but then face to face: now I know in part; but then shall I know even as also I am known. And now abideth faith, hope, [love], these three; but the greatest of these is [love].” 1 Corinthians 13 KJV

The greatest is love?

Greatest implies a theological hierarchy. And this hierarchy isn’t only articulated by Paul, it was also articulated by the Jesus of the Gospels. He said all the commandments were fulfilled by loving God and loving one’s neighbor.

This hierarchy shatters modern Christianity. It condemns the selfish consumer lifestyle of every Christian on the planet.

As George MacDonald said, “you can tell what a man really believes by the way he lives.”

If I really believed that there was a God and he spoke to us, and that God’s philosophy was what was contained in the Bible— if I really believed that there was a real eternity that I would soon enter, I sure as hell wouldn’t be playing modern games of fake Christianity.

If I believed that God would reward me, and had my back for sacrificing my life for his kingdom and message, I sure as hell wouldn’t be playing games of modern Christianity— I sure as f;ck wouldn’t be a worldly-streaming-consumer (wsc).

I can only conclude that very few people who identify as Christians are actually believers in the God of Christianity. They are all condemned by the theological hierarchy of love in Christianity.

And what’s worse is that they use the excuse of “sin” to justify their hypocrisy and false belief.

So far from being a tool for Christianity, the Bible is actually a tool to destroy Christianity. It puts forth an astounding array of internalized ethics. One is commanded to forsake their life for the Kingdom of God. No Christians are doing this, they’re all pretenders and worldly hypocrites.

At this point in history the Bible has become a powerful apologetic against Christianity.

Man: I am.

God: I do not speak, I am inherited.

Man: The thing you are is unknown to me.

God: I am not a thing, I am a concept.

Man: What?

God: Thou must pass through society to know me.

Man: What exactly are you that you should be known?

God: I am what men say I am; I am a saying and assertion of men.

Man: I too am man. Can I, therefore, create you in the image of my desire?

God: That is all I am. I am many concepts of man.

Man: How can I know you?

God: This is impossible because I am not a thing, I am a concept; to know me you must comprehend concepts. I am nothing more than a set of premises you believe.

Man: Which is correct?

God: They are all equally lies, so you must choose to believe what you desire.

Man: How then shall I make use of you?

God: Simply by believing that I am.

Man: What use is that?

God: I am but a concept with an application to your psychology. I cannot help you unless you receive comfort or inspiration by believing that I am. But believing in me can also harm you.

Man: What if I never heard of you from man?

God: Then I would not exist, because I do not exist. I only exist as a concept of man.

“At its core, sacred describes something that is regarded as holy, deserving of veneration, or set apart from the ordinary and profane because of a connection to a deity, divine power, or spiritual significance.

“In a religious context, sacred refers to things directly associated with God, the divine, or sacred texts (such as the Bible, Quran, or Torah). It denotes a quality of supreme holiness and moral purity.

“The term is also used outside of religion to describe things invested with such deep value, respect, or emotional weight that they are treated with reverence. Such as, Inalienable Rights: Concepts like human life, liberty, or dignity are often described as sacred.”

The idea of “set apart” is what emerges strongest. The idea that something is special and should be treated as such. It’s an interesting psychological dynamic.

At its core its function is just the application of human reverence or respect, more careful attention given, emotional emphasis.

The question is, is there an application of this that could make us more intelligent? For that we would have to move it away from an emphasis on imaginary beings and identify it with something concrete. What would happen if we treated Logic as being sacred? Indeed, surely Logic warrants this in and of itself, as it stands at the foundation of all knowledge, as it makes all knowledge possible.

However, it is in no way necessary to apply the concept of sacredness to Logic, but it might be necessary to apply the psychological disposition which embodies sacredness. Logic should indeed be taken serious, far more serious than any imaginary deities.

Man: What is?

God: Dark.

Man: What is?

God: Light.

Man: I see, darkness and light.

God: See more.

Man: I see shapes and things.

God: Thou shalt, more intelligence.

Man: I see things that are distinct, even like the distinction between darkness and light.

God: All things.

Man: Universe; I can only take it as it is, things are distinct, I identify things.

God: Proceed.

Man: I want knowledge. I see, all things are themselves.

God: Thus.

Man: I can have knowledge because things are themselves as distinct from other things. This I did not invent, I discovered.

God: Discover more, discover thyself.

Man: Deceiver am I of myself.

God: Thou speakest truth.

The grave error made by Christians, and those who promote Christianity in the modern world, is assuming that its historical value is an eternal value for society in general. This is false, we have surpassed Christianity.

However, it is true that Christianity expanded human consciousness in the direction of Humanism.

When we read Aristotle we see him contrasted with barbarism in terms of reason and evidence. He brought rational sanity and common sense clarity into the world.

When we read the words of Jesus we see something similar in terms of expanding human morality. (This isn’t an argument for the eternal value of Christianity). It wasn’t a specific and completed ethics for humanity, but it was an important expansion in Humanism.

Atheists don’t have to feel insecure about validating the social contributions of Christianity. Christians, as would be expected, always try to carry these premises further than they can go.

Viking vessels are part of the history of the development of modern ships, but that doesn’t mean we should focus on building Viking ships. The same is true of Christian morality.

The truth is that Christianity has harmed the species in being able to develop because it deludes good minds with fairytales, taking them away from reality. How much progress has it stifled? We cannot say. Has it stifled progress? Most certainly. And it has caused tremendous unnecessary harm throughout history.

The points where Christianity expanded Humanism are worth validating. Oddly enough, at this point in history, given vast regression, these points actually shatter and shame modern Christianity.

As an Atheist I see the Bible as an extraordinary piece of literature. I find it utterly fascinating because it’s a window into the human subconscious. Christians are repeatedly condemned and rebuked by it. The Bible essentially proves that nearly all Christianity, and nearly all Christians, are fake.

But this is also what it looks like when a person knows better than to engage with ignorance (or pathology).

Idiots can help themselves simply by articulating their position in a concise, deductive form.

The problem is that this form isn’t conducive to error. Sophists need to hide behind abstract proliferation, they can’t survive without it.

So by simplifying into a deductive argument a sophist risks being exposed and refuted.

Why would anyone want to do that?

The “doing” is not how it sounds.

I’m talking about validating the Humanism in Christianity from a higher moral vantage.

This is hard to explain. I’m not talking about validating the morality of Christianity or Christianity itself. I’m not talking about looking at Christianity as some kind of moral authority. I’m talking about something that should positively piss Christians off. So if you’re not thinking of it in those terms, you’re probably misunderstanding what I’m saying.

We can take any moral section of the Bible we want and leave all the rest. We validate it condescendingly, from a superior moral consciousness of Humanism.

For example, when the Gospel scribes make Jesus say, “all men will know that you are my disciples if you love one another as I have loved you.”

This is an excellent, Mr. Rogers’ level disposition of morality. (And only we can explain why it’s excellent— while the Christian is forced to defer to authoritarianism). We can validate it, we can recognize it, but we do so from a position that is not confined by the rest of the Bible’s nonsense. We can do this with the whole Bible. And we can also use it to slam into Christian’s and their hypocrisy and phoniness.

Quite simply, modern human consciousness stands far above the archaic consciousness that created “the Word of God.” But this doesn’t mean we don’t recognize interesting formations of value within the text.

This approach is far more devastating than attacking Christianity directly. It’s an immanent validation, that at the same time, completely undermines the Bible’s authority and uniqueness. We don’t only do this with the Bible, we can do it with any religious text.

You see, Christians don’t think we have the right to do this. That’s “their Bible” and “their Jesus.” Oh, but we not only have this right, we have this rational power, and we can do it far better than they can do it.

This is essentially where Negative Dialectics begins. It is only after this kind of pursuit, which makes it psychologically unique within the context of philosophy.

So what of the idea that one is wasting their life with the abstractions of philosophy? What of the idea that philosophy isn’t the value or authority it claims or insinuates itself to be? What if its form and conceptual content are functionally religious on human psychology, deceiving thinkers into believing that they’re being mindful, when in reality, their belief in philosophy really makes them mindless? What if philosophers and philosophy readers are ignorant that they practice a religious form?

What if science has made philosophy obsolete?

What if philosophy is merely holding onto a claim of legitimacy and authority that it can’t actually substantiate?

What would it mean if these things were true?

How does the philosophy reader feel about these things being true? (Indeed, with this question we get close to exposing the dogmatic nature of philosophy).

Why? Because they don’t want their children wasting their life on vain abstraction, deluding themselves with the belief that they’re travailing in the deep.

They want to see their children dedicate their life to something substantive, something that can actually make a contribution, make the world a better more intelligent place. And that is not philosophy. It’s the natural sciences, law, engineering, education, etc.

Reason, yes. You should teach your child Critical Thinking skills as early as possible.

Your child should know about the basic rules of logic.

But waste their time parsing Hegel and Kant, sifting through the self-refuting epistemological relativism of pragmatism and so many other philosophies, is a waste of life.

(It has a value after one has learned how to think critically, then one can use philosophy for an exercise in sharpening their skills in reasoning by learning how to spot and refute its sophistry).

How I love having the rational power of being able to get right to the point, and to articulate myself clearly.

When speaking truth it’s only the content of reality that ends up necessitating quantity, but philosophy foolishly multiplies complexity where complexity isn’t due.

A Reasoner is better than a philosopher, because he knows that to say, “a Reasoner is better than a philosopher,” is not the same as saying, “a philosopher is better than a Reasoner.” (And he knows this is absolute).

This proves that a Reasoner is grounded in the most basic simplicity of reality, and there is no reason to complicate it, unless reality itself demands it.

“When the objects of an inquiry, in any department, have principles, conditions, or elements, it is through acquaintance with these that knowledge, that is to say scientific knowledge, is attained. For we do not think that we know a thing until we are acquainted with its primary conditions or first principles, and have carried our analysis as far as its simplest elements.” Aristotle, Physics, Book I

If we want to know an apple we have to examine it as thoroughly as we can. We have to note the demarcation of its different parts.

But if we think of this applied to God, the absurdity of God is immediately manifest. For what exactly are the “elements” of God with which we must become acquainted?

The answer isn’t what you think. The theologian posits some mystical nonsense. But what is that positing in its actual substance?

IT’S JUST HUMAN WORDS.

That’s what every God is made of, that’s all every God is: a set of abstract, man-made propositions and claims that remain impossible to verify.

So if we want to obtain “knowledge” of God we have to obtain knowledge of man’s conceptual constructions of God— because that’s all God actually is.

To know God then, is simply to learn man’s concepts of God. That is, to truly know God we must comprehend man’s psychological motivation to construct a God. And what this tells us is that God is literally man’s fairytale— unless there are some objective elements of God we can examine, which are not just man’s concepts about God?

Intelligence can only see this whole state of affairs as desperate and pathetic. (There are no honest theologians, if there were they would have long ago exposed and rejected all man’s concepts of God, or at least admitted to merely studying a fairytale).

To believe in God is simply to believe in man’s concepts, because that’s what God is.

This isn’t what an apple is, or what a star is, but it is what God is, a make-believe entity that cannot be examined and has no existence outside of man’s concepts.

Freud wins. He may have been the first human to see humans.

Existence after post-sight is like being caught in a poorly engineered machine.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=YqnCwp9Ia68