There are only two kinds to make the question straight-forward. Can you personally think of anything more profound than A. Our predicament in The Cosmos and B. Our predicament upon The Earth? I agree, that is only two things.

It's a big choice though! What do you think??

EDit* Just as a reminder: Do you think you feel this predicament or Not?

Hmm.. how I explained it to my dad the other night was this: Either we are ALL (as in, everything from trees to that ant you just steppd on to bears and the grass and everything) spiritual beings or NONE of us are. The wiccan texts I've read relate to everything being spirtual (or thats how I've interperted them anynow, so thats me. I'm not sure I believe in the spiritual though. So, therefore... the whole agnostic bit

I'm just not into the whole human superiority complex that most other religions/people seem to have...

I can see that it is possible for you to answer the question yourself. You might try to define where you draw the line between where physical ends and spiritual begins. If you get to a point where you can't see the line or the join...............this to me would indicate progress. Have fun!!

I believe they can treat that nowadays

Our place in the cosmos isn't explained or understood by simply defining ourselves as being "spiritual". It's such a vague term that it means anything at all. Is it self-consciousness, reflective ethical thinking, belief in an afterlife, the postulation of one-ness (presumably not with anything else ), or can it mean anything we choose. If we can redefine it anytime we like, it means nothing and is therefore a useless term.

The place of humans in the cosmos is a very tiny insignificant one - just the sheer scale of the universe tells you that. It's not profound simply to wonder... what is profound is getting towards an understanding of how the cosmos ticks, how galaxies are formed and evolve, how planets are created, how the physical laws of the universe are played out, that's profound. Calling yourself a witch is a schoolyard game in comparison.

Oh and there are many many profound questions. For example, where is consciousness in the brain and how does it arise? Is the universe expanding or pulsating? At what point does a collection of biological chemicals shows evidence of life? Why do otherwise rational people delude themselves with beliefs in supernatural beings? Somehow calling yourself at one with Gaia, trees, life forces, or whatever doesn't even come close to starting on the profound. There are plenty of really profound questions to ponder without creating some vacuous ones. The real world is much more interesting too.

But hey, don't let me spoil the fun. Empty vacuous phrases are entertaining but remember what Carl Sagan said: "You should open your mind but not so much as to let your brains fall out!" I hope in the real world none of the good folks on this forum trust anything important to beliefs in supernatural beings/powers.

Doesn't that indicate that you can't tell the mental from the physical, in which case start to worry?

If you think you have spiritual energy try to demonstrate that something is done with it - i.e. cause a demonstable effect, oh and pick up the Nobel Prize while you're at it

I am well aware that there is no such thing as "spiritual", however, perhaps you could explain where your feelings begin and your body ends?

There is no such thing as "spiritual", As I said, there are two kinds of people in the world "those that see our predicament within the Cosmos, and those who don't."

They are not necessarily separate IMO. Emotions affect the physical body as much as the physical body affects emotions, sometimes people imagine an illness and show naturally produced symptoms of their imagined illness.

Like I said, there are those who appreciate our predicament. and those who do not.

So you might agree that things exist which we cannot see, yet it would not make sense to call them "spiritual?"

This seems like a bit of a copout. Just because things are related, doesn't mean they are not separate and each can not be defined as such. "Consciousness" is clearly separate from the physical "central nervous system" which we use to perceive and manipulate it. Perhaps a parallel of sorts is that a combustion engine is separate from the energy it produces. Each is inextricably linked to the other, and one would not even exist without the other, but they are separate things.

To me, spirituality is an aspect of consciousness, but separate again. To an atheist, there might be no difference between spirituality and consciousness. Personally I hold beliefs which although they are not in line with mainstream religion, or dedicated to some all-powerful deity, do include the existence of certain energies that connect everything in the universe as we know it. So to me spirituality is about connection to those energies. Believers of mainstream, deity-worshipping religions see spirituality in that sense - about a relationship with the God they believe in.

In short, spirituality is an aspect of consciousness about one's own personal belief system.

Heathen (disambiguation) - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
I can safely say I'm a heathen, and damned proud of it.

Well, by the classical definition of Pagan (aka non-christian) I certainly am a Pagan. By the middle term of Pagan (aka non-christian, non-jew, non-muslim, non-hindu, non-sikh, non-buddhist/daoist) I am certainly a Pagan. By the neo-classical term of Pagan (aka person of Earth-worshipping and/or druidic practice) no I am not a Pagan.

When anything is seen as "inextricably linked" it is part of the same whole (Even when those words are not used, the same reality applies). The Cosmos is a perpetual movement and transformation of everything that we can see and everything that we cannot.

I'm sure the people who appreciate our "predicament" are not restricted to those who have beliefs in the supernatural

In fact, arguably those who hold such a belief have very much an incomplete grasp of the "predicament" because they postulate supernatural causes for natural processes.

It's certainly not justified to discount arguments based on some unstated perception of what our "predicament" actually is. That's an example of a fallacy called ad hominem - criticise the person, not the argument.

But this predicament that you talk about. Can you describe it rather than assume it?

There is now a growing body of scientific evidence from neuroscience to show that in fact consciousness is a property of a brain with certain levels of connectivity. So rather than being separated from the CNS, it's a property of it and so very much a part of it.

Self-consciousness gives rise to the first-person perception of self, which in turn is sometimes interpreted as a somehow separate part of a person, distinct from the body including the brain. That this is a neurological illusion has been researched by amongst others Daniel Dennett. It's worth looking into this before deciding that there's something "other", something mystical. In fact, it's a rather prosaic property of our nervous system.

That definition makes the word "cosmos" meaningless. You might just as well have referred to "everything" instead.

Certainly: As far as I'm aware, there is no assumption.

Our Home is "floating" in minus 270 degrees celsius: That's + 2.7 degrees kelvin - Instant death to anything we would recognize as life.

Our Home is also "floating" in an orbit around our nearest star: The sun. As far as we know, this is due to something called gravity, which we can neither touch or taste.

All and any dimensions in The Cosmos are not a escape from It, or a different place from It, they are It.

Just for some humor: The people in Australia are actually standing upside-down! So when you see anyone hugging a tree, have you not thought they might be doing it to hold on!?

The feeling of "exposure" or "awe" surrounding any such phenomena, is the land of what I call....."Our Beautiful Predicament."

Enjoy.

I personally don't think the word "everything" has the same awe-inspiring ring to it as The Cosmos. But please, If you feel more comfortable with everything..............