Categories
Personal Religion Spirituality

Experiencing a Nonproprietary God

There is no Christian church with a more direct, intimate relationship with the life of Jesus of Nazareth than the one I was born into: the Antiochian Eastern Orthodox Christian Church. Its roots lie in the same ground that Jesus walked on, and are deeper than the written Gospels.  The church, my cultural heritage, and […]

Categories
Brain Foundational Human Mind Philosophy Pre-Human Minds

What Is It Like to Have a Mind?

Introduction If you were to ask a human being and a bat, “What is it like to have a mind?,” you would expect to get unimaginably different answers. What is less expected is that if you asked four different people the same question, you could receive four unimaginably different answers.  In 1974, philosopher Thomas Nagel famously asked […]

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Human Mind Pre-Human Minds Religion Spirituality

Quadrune Mind: A Secular Spirituality for the 21st Century

Introduction To define religion and spirituality is difficult to do. Yet, it is important that we have some understanding of what these words mean for the quadrune mind model of spirituality and this blog. The best definitions of “religion” and “spirituality” for the quadrune mind model come from Bowling Green State University. Spirituality is defined as “the […]

Categories
Personal Philosophy Religion Spirituality

Green Burials: Recycling Matter and Spirit

Recently I was talking with some friends and as we are all of a certain age, the conversation came around to funeral service options. For various personal and religious reasons, several different preferences were expressed. Choices included cremation, a launch to sea on a small boat, donation to a medical school, and my offering, a […]

Categories
Contemporary Issues Foundational

Why We Are Not As Different From Our “Enemy” As We Think

If we look at the conflicts between people reported today in the news and recorded in world history books, we might be able to create a fairly long list of causes. Interestingly, for every cause there is an opposite and equal “re-cause.” Like the song Everyday People says, many people will always look for an […]

Categories
Brain Reptilian Mind

QM, Phylogenetic Regression, and Extreme Aggression

The Reptilian Mind For the infant, disruption of its biological homeostatic balance needed to sustain life is “felt” at a physiological level as life-threatening, which it is. Similarly, for the infantile reptilian-minded “adult,” anything experienced as a threat to the status quo can also be “felt” as life-threatening, as much as asphyxiation would be for […]

Categories
Contemporary Issues Human Mind Religion Reptilian Mind

Why Religious Fervor and Spiritual Consciousness Are Not The Same

(A Comparison of Two Religious Politicians, Josh Hawley and John Lewis, in Light of the Quadrune Mind Model)  Josh Hawley and John Lewis each has lived his life in service to what he believed was right. But does that mean they have both lived spiritual lives? For the quadrune mind, it’s the level of consciousness, […]

Categories
Human Mind Philosophy Profile Religion

QM and the Human Mind of Siddhartha Gautama

Introduction In previous posts we have profiled each of the three pre-Human mentalities: the reptilian mind (as seen in Donald Trump’s behavior), the old mammalian mind (as seen in Temple Grandin’s understanding of animals), and the new mammalian mind (as seen in Tara Westover’s intellectual journey).  These profiles are not meant to demonize anyone, but […]

Categories
Contemporary Issues Pre-Human Minds Spirituality

QM and Moral (But Not Spiritual) Arguments for Killing Other People

Introduction In the quadrune mind model of spirituality, there is no spiritual merit in the killing of another person—ever. In this blog we will describe some moral arguments for killing other people and indicate which level of pre-Human consciousness, as described in the quadrune mind model, best corresponds. We will end with an examination of the circumstances […]

Categories
Contemporary Issues Religion Reptilian Mind

Why Religion Doesn’t Encourage Us to Become Human

The New York Times recently ran an article with the following in bold type: “Modern life is ugly, brutal and barren. Maybe you should try a Latin Mass.” This line caught my eye because the quadrune mind model has a lot to say about exactly why people would turn to Catholicism or Orthodoxy or other religions based in ritual […]