Welcome to The Codex!

This project aims to help the consumer acquire a good chunk of the knowledge that is important but not usually taught in school.

Organization

The material is arranged in a course like fashion. At any given point, when you find a fork in the road. You can take any path and ignore the remaining paths without affecting your learning process. However, before you go through Topic A, you need to go through all the topics that were presented before Topic A. This is because the material may build on previously introduced subjects.

Pre-requisites

You need to have a basic understanding of mathematics, language etc to follow this course. You should ideally have acquired these skills during your schooling. If you have a secondary school diploma, you should be able to take this course without issues.

Disclaimer

All warranties are disclaimed. Nothing in this document should be considered legal advice. All heresies are unconditionally and automatically disclaimed.

Let’s go

Roman Catholicism

I am going to frame this entire course through the Roman Catholic (or simply “Catholic”) religion. We will learn about frames a little later. Catholic frame appears to be the best frame to view the world through since it has certain properties that leads to prosperity.

Let’s begin by going through the basic structure of the Catholic religion.

The structure of the Catholic religion

There are 4 steps to being Catholic. These steps must be climbed one after the other in a sequential manner. These four steps can be understood in terms of questions. Answering “Yes” at each step allows you to climb to the next step. Here are the four steps:

  1. Does God exist?
  2. Are there three persons in that God? Did second person from that God become man in the form of Jesus Christ?
  3. Did Jesus found a visible church?
  4. Is that church the Roman Catholic Church?

If you answered yes to all these questions, congratulations, you are Catholic.

You will notice that each step above represents a transition from one form of belief system to another. Step 1 transitions you from atheism/agnosticism to theism. Step 2 transitions you to Christianity. Step 3 transitions you to Catholic churches (that is, Anglicanism/Eastern Orthodoxy/Oriental Orthodoxy/Roman Catholicism etc). Step 4 transitions you to Roman Catholicism. Now, let’s examine each of these steps one by one.

Does God exist?

Before asking the question “Does God Exist” we need to ask ourselves: “How can we know something?”

Most philosophers agree that there are 3 ways by which we can know something.

Inductive reasoning

Inductive reasoning is reasoning based by probabilities. For example, if it is cloudy and winds are blowing fairly heavily, you can “know” that it is going to rain. However, this “knowledge” is not perfect, and it’s possible that it may not rain at all.

Deductive reasoning

This reasoning is reasoning from premises to conclusions. For example,

Premise 1: All men are mortal.

Premise 2: Socrates is a man.

Conclusion: Socrates is mortal.

This argument is logically valid. If the premises are true the conclusion follows in an airtight manner. But, how can we know if the premises are true? We can know it only through inductive reasoning. But if we can know the premises, the probabilities from the premises flow to the conclusion in an airtight manner.

Abductive reasoning

This method is reasoning to the simplest explanation. For example, if there is a glass of water in front of you it is possible that the water appeared out of thin air and glass formed around it. But the simpler explanation is that someone poured some water into that glass in front of you. Now, this form of reasoning is also a probabilistic, but it is based on a principle called Occam’s razor. This principle suggests that nature tries to simplify things.

All of these mechanisms can be used to deduce God’s existence.

Inductive reasoning towards God

Any of the church approved miracles helps you reason towards God indcutively. Now, church approved does not mean true but it at least means some of the truly awful deceptions can be avoided by only limiting your investigation to them. Some examples may include

  1. Miracle of the Sun at Fatima
  2. Incorruptible bodies of saints
  3. Various miracles attributed to saints for canonization process etc.

It is possible that all of them are fake, but given the fact that other scientists have looked at it skeptically and not found a naturalistic explanation suggests strongly that it may be of supernatural origin. This implies a strong probability that we are living in a theistic universe and not an atheistic one.

Deductive reasoning towards God

Many of the classical arguments for the existence of God deals with deductive reasoning. Some of these are mentioned in the book “Five proofs for the existence of God” by Edward Feser. I will mention one briefly here.

Consider a rubber ball. If it is heated it becomes a gooey substance. This is because the ball is potentially a gooey substance and that potential is actualized by heating. Now, the heat itself is an actualization of a potential. Maybe the heat was produced by lighting some firewood. Now, the firewood itself producing heat right there is an actualization of a potential. The firewood was not there and it came there because someone cut down some tree carried it to some place where it can be set on fire and so on. We trace this back to the beginning and for something to happen this series needs to have a beginning. This is necessary because the potential by itself cannot actualize itself. For example, if you prod a stone with a stick it moves. The reason it moves is because you have moved it. If the stones moves it can be a deduced that you are at the other end of the stick and is moving it. However, if you simply tie another stick to the end of the stick, it cannot move the stone. If you keep tying it to infinity it will still not move the rock. However, if the rock moves it can be a certain that someone pushed it. Similarly the fact that the Universe exists and that it could could have failed to exist means that there must have been an entity that caused it and continues to sustain it. This entity is called God.

Once you come to accept this you understand the nature of God in the form of God’s divine attributes: his omnipotence, his perfect beauty etc. All of this is a result of omnipotence or the power to actualize all potentials.

Abductive reasoning towards God

There are certain mathematical constants in the universe, and if they were outside a very narrow range, the universe would not exist. For example, during the Big Bang if the force with which the universe was expanding was off by even a tiniest of fractions, it would have collapsed on itself. Now, it is possible that there are multiple universes in this world, but the simpler explanation is that it was engineered by God.

Now, I have given you sufficient reason to believe in God, but at the end of the day you have to choose for yourself if the reasons are sufficient. If not, you have to go forward and seek more.

I hope you have understood by now that faith is choosing to believe in something through force of will in the absence of evidence to the contrary. Faith is not an irrational belief in something. For example, lets say that you invest some money in the bank. This bank has a good reputation and your family and friends have gotten good use out of the bank. As a result, you have come to put your faith in the bank. But if, one day you see people queing up before the bank and see that newspapers are reporting that the bank has failed and depositors have lost their money etc. you have enough reason to overturn your faith.

Faith does require a leap into the unknown. But, leaps into the unknown is required in order to form any worldview.

Divinity of Jesus Christ

Christianity is true because Jesus Christ came back from the dead. I mean this quite literally. There was a man, his name was Jesus or Yeshua or Joshua. He died. By this, I mean his heart stopped beating, he stopped breathing and he stopped moving. Then three days later, he came back from the dead. This is not some sort of metaphor.

We can ascertain this fact by examining history. Most historians agree that on the historicity of Jesus Christ. Most historians also agree on the crucifixion of Jesus Christ. Historians, also agree that his followers became convinced that he cam back from the dead. It is very hard to explain the history of 1st century Palestine without Jesus resurrection.

1 Corinthians 15:3-7 talks about how 500 people saw him at the same time. It is believed that it was written just a few years after the death of Jesus and is considered by many to be historically reliable.

Liars make poor martyrs. Early Christians were thrown to their deaths and therefore it is unlikely that they were lying. It is difficult to reconcile the fact that many people rich, poor, powerful, powerless etc threw all of it away and went to their deaths claiming that Jesus Christ came back from the dead if they didn’t really think this.

Again, it may be necessary to take a leap of faith here also. However, once you do, you can see that everything Jesus talked about with respect to God is congruent with what we already know about God based on reason. Once you accept the divinity of Christ the concept of Trinity follows as he himself taught it and you become a Christian.

Founding of the church

It is clear from the gospels that Christ came to found a Church. He called the apostles, taught them directly and then sent them all over the world to preach the good news. He gave his life as ransom for many, saved humanity from our sins and then asked his disciples to spread this message to the whole world.

Jesus says in Matthew 16:18

“And I tell you, that you are Peter and on this rock I will build my church and the Gates of Hell shall not prevail against it. I will give you the keys to the kingdom of heaven.”

More information
Roman Catholic Church

Since Jesus had founded the church with 11 men and one person at it’s head, even in principle the Christian church can not have more than one leader. We know that the leader was Peter in Jesus’ absence. And once Peter is gone someone else had to take his place. We establish historically that Peter came to Rome and he died at Rome. The first succession happened in Rome. It is possible that a future for Pope can reside in another city, but currently we can follow the current pope and his predecessors all the way back to Peter. This is why the Roman Catholic Church is the one true church. Now the rest of the ideas believed by Catholics follows from the authority afforded to the Roman Catholic Church through Peter.

Common methods of attack on the Roman Catholic religion
“We cannot prove God does not exist only to specifically discuss if Christianity is true”

Remember that the most important proof for Christianity is Jesus Christ coming back from the dead. So before asking the question “Is Christianity true, it is necessary to settle the question of naturalism”. If you deny the supernatural under any conditions, and then if you ask for proof of Christianity effectively what you are attempting is to prove that Christianity is true given that it is false. There is only one way that can go: to falsehood.

“Faith and reason are opposed to each other”

Since reason and application of reason in the form of science has prestige, it may be used as a mechanism to persuade you away from religion. However, faith and reason are mutually reinforcing. Your faith in human capacity for reason can lead to God. This can in turn strengthen your faith in reason since Jesus said he was the truth and reason is human intelligence applied in the pursuit of truth. This can in turn strengthen your faith in God. Eventually, this creates a virtuous cycle and can promote both.

Frames

A frame is a set of ideas through which to interpret the world. Some call frames ideologies. However, this term has a negative connotation. It is important to note that a frame is a necessary thing to survive in this world. Without a frame we cannot function as we are unable to interpret the information and thereby respond to it.

Here we will go through some of the common frames it will be demonstrated that Roman Catholicism is the proper frame through which to view the world.

Marxism

Marxism is based on conflict theory. The idea here is that everything can be explained in terms of conflict between the powerful and the powerless. These conflicts can be in the form of socialism (rich vs poor), feminism (men vs women), racism (white vs black vs han) etc. Any idea that disputes your sides version of the story can be dismissed as lies propagated by the other side. This effectively makes Marxism unfalsifiable and therefore very difficult to overturn.

Liberalism

Liberalism is a kind of a meta frame. This frame holds that we cannot know for sure, which frame is real. Hence, let us not favor any frame. All frames are equal and should be forced to fight each other for turf.

Liberalism has its roots in the Spring of Nations, which was a series of revolutions that sprung up throughout Europe in the 19th century. Liberalism is a precursor to Marxism and is also based partially on conflict theory. Liberals divide the world into themselves and conservatives. Conservatives want to maintain their status quo and their existing power structures since existing power structures have a certain amount of inertia. It is necessary to paint themselves as liberators and their opponents as oppressors. The narrative here is that people who oppose them are from the so-called “Dark Ages” and they are the “Enlightened” ones.

Liberalism has certain properties of being a Ponzi scheme in the sense that earlier liberals gain enormous advantage at the expense of later liberals. This is because once the revolution succeeds the Liberals become conservatives. However, the arena is still divided into liberals and conservatives. New brand of conservatism spring up to defend the earlier systems put in place after the revolution. The new “liberals” are fighting for at least the principles of the original revolution since through that they were indoctrinated.

What this means is that there is a specter of political battle, but regardless of whichever side wins, the war is won by the earlier fraction. This is however excludes the Marxist which is the reason for the liberal hatred for Marxists.

Roman Catholicism

Roman Catholicism is the third and most important frame in the world. However, most people do not recognize it as a separate frame since there is a truce between liberals and Catholic since Vatican II. This is mostly because most sides were more terrified of the Marxists than with each other.

Pascal’s wager

Since both sides promise riches to its adherents we will use Pascal’s wager to undermine both. Imagine that Catholicism is true. If it is, the reward is infinite (eternal bliss in heaven) while the coast is finite (suffering in this world). If any other frame is true instead the benefits are finite. However, if you subscribe to any other idea and the whole system is false your cost is infinite.

Now, there is one way to get out of this. Let us create a religion which favors the opponents completely. Let us assume there is a Supreme Supercomputer of Atheism that sends all theists to hell. In this case, the net benefit of every religion is ∞ - ∞, which is undefined.

It would not help you eliminate Catholicism, but now you have undermined reason and truth seeking. Why? This Supreme Supercomputer of Atheism is basically God (because of omnipotence) and you are being rewarded for your lack of belief in God. So truthseeking and hence reason can no longer be a good thing and it must be denounced. However, if you denounce it, there is no reason to believe you in the first place.

Now since you don’t have a frame you cannot function which means your only chance is to go crazy. Catholicism does not have this problem since it begins with faith and reaches reason from there. Thereafter, it comes back to faith and creates a mutually benefitial cycle. For this reason, the investigation must go as described in previous section.

Investment

Now that we have established the foundation for reason and a proper frame for interpreting information, we can begin with our analysis of the material world and how to navigate it.

The most important thing you need to do to be successful in this world is to make good choices. Once you make good choices, you have to back them up with hard work. In order to do both of these, you need to approach problems in the right way with a desire to solve them, improve yourself and be successful.